Thursday, February 3, 2011

Scribbledehobbledehoyden: The Magpie's Eye: Page 21

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Sadness rules the world.  The first time ever I found myself in New York City as an adult, I found myself cold and walking down the city streets, staring up at the hundreds of lighted windows above me and thinking that if you could lift the buildings and shake them, all the pain in the world would sift out.  The older you are, the more pain shows on your face.  When an old man smiles, it's all the sweeter for the melancholy beneath.
Today is the new yesterday.  Tuesday is the new tomorrow.

That's obviously first draft.  But since I had no publishable use for it, I didn't bother to rewrite it.  Every word is true.  That was an important moment for me.

With genetic engineering, sharks can not only walk on land, but go door to door selling cosmetics or encyclopedias.

Light though it is, the above entry shows one of the inherent dangers of writing science fiction.  It's perilously easy to find yourself writing in the past.  I can't remember the last time a door-to-door salesman came by.

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