Saturday's Storyteller: "Things were much simpler where I'm from. Not like here."
by Belinda Roddie
Things were much simpler where I'm from. Not like here. Not like this twenty-second century nonsense I was always hearing about as a kid. See, where I'm from, we liked staying in the twentieth century. We ignored all the technological advancements of the twenty-first century, and, well, I guess we sort of shot ourselves in the foot. Because I don't know what to do in a city like this.
I've never heard of half the things I'm supposed to work with on a daily basis. Retinal scanners? "Automatic typing?" Sensor-equipped walkways? This all sounds like something out of an old, cheesy sci-fi movie. And yet, here I am. A "second century" baby, raised on "traditional values," now thrown into a world I never learned to understand.
I'm in the turbo-vator when I run into her. She's wearing a headband that lights up when she blinks. It's like it's detecting her movement - or her pulse, I dunno. She smiles at me as we both get off on the twenty-third floor. We work in the same office. She helps me with my computer.
"It's speech to text now," she told me last week. "It's really accurate. The microphone picks up everything."
"Even my mistakes?"
"Especially your mistakes."
We laughed at that. She then asked me where she got my jacket. It's a hand-me-down, one my father wore when he worked in the fields of his humble East Elsmwood farm in the Midwestern town where we grew up. No supermicrofiber stitching or inlaid technojunk. Just a good old fashioned Pendleton coat, worn out and loved all the same.
This week's prompt was provided by Arden Roddie.
Things were much simpler where I'm from. Not like here. Not like this twenty-second century nonsense I was always hearing about as a kid. See, where I'm from, we liked staying in the twentieth century. We ignored all the technological advancements of the twenty-first century, and, well, I guess we sort of shot ourselves in the foot. Because I don't know what to do in a city like this.
I've never heard of half the things I'm supposed to work with on a daily basis. Retinal scanners? "Automatic typing?" Sensor-equipped walkways? This all sounds like something out of an old, cheesy sci-fi movie. And yet, here I am. A "second century" baby, raised on "traditional values," now thrown into a world I never learned to understand.
I'm in the turbo-vator when I run into her. She's wearing a headband that lights up when she blinks. It's like it's detecting her movement - or her pulse, I dunno. She smiles at me as we both get off on the twenty-third floor. We work in the same office. She helps me with my computer.
"It's speech to text now," she told me last week. "It's really accurate. The microphone picks up everything."
"Even my mistakes?"
"Especially your mistakes."
We laughed at that. She then asked me where she got my jacket. It's a hand-me-down, one my father wore when he worked in the fields of his humble East Elsmwood farm in the Midwestern town where we grew up. No supermicrofiber stitching or inlaid technojunk. Just a good old fashioned Pendleton coat, worn out and loved all the same.
This week's prompt was provided by Arden Roddie.
Comments
Post a Comment