The Technology Century by Deborah Hartman (free ebook reader for ipad txt) 📕

FOREWORD

“Sweet is the lore which Nature brings;
Our meddling intellect
Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things”
– The Tables Turned

(1798) by William Wordsworth


1936

Thick foam boiled to the surface. The rich unpasteurized cream swirled with the fresh potatoes picked hours earlier from the dark red soil of Bucks County.

Dusk settled across the wild meadow that had been her fortress. Her emerald eyes danced with fire and light as she raced homeward, hearing the dinner bell.

From afar, she spotted a window. The glow of a candle lit a memory: Her mother’s slender hand had snapped a match, leaving the scent of vanilla and wax to permeate her home.

A heart-shaped serene face greeted her with a mischievous grin, “Leave your critters outside.”



1986

"I will come back soon,” her mother adamantly promised.

Floating in a sky-borne classroom, teaching children about space from the endless starry blackness, her heroic parent seemed supernatural. Crazy new devices called satellites promised to carry her mother’s image home, to give a lonely child a last bedtime glance while tucking herself beneath a fluffy pink coverlet.

Pride filled her as she watched the fire and power of the cylinders revving. The earth shook as the massive Challenger rose. Fear rattled her soul.

This would be her last glimpse. Her mother would never fulfill her dream. Today, she became motherless.



2036

Anno Domini is over. The skies swirl mauve and grey in the noon sun. Smog chokes the morning and evening lights. The Milky Way is a myth: marred-faced children with lobotomized expressions equate constellations to mere stories of Pegasus beasts.

The town crier leans heavily on his broken copper-pipe cane. He screeches the pitches of darkness, "Reap what you sow. Dead we are. Don't speak the word."

A baby wails an innocent plea, craving his mother's breast. Primal urges flow and her chest aches with emptiness. A lone tear streaks down her blackened face: Only a pale line remains.

Text: Copyright 2005 Carolyn Hartman (Cover Photo) Copyright 2010 Deborah Hartman
Publication Date: 08-15-2010

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