Time's Ark

Greetings, if you've landed here by some chance, this story has now been published.  As such, I'd like to offer respect to my publisher by doing that thing that Amazon does where you can read the first little bit, but to read the whole story, you've got to go buy it.  So, without further ado, here's the first little bit.  To read the whole thing, please buy issue 2 of Into the Ruins.  Thanks!  ~ Jay

 Azra moved slowly and deliberately to the stately display table where three seemingly unrelated objects rested next to one another with ceremonial intentionality. The room, it's slowfan turning listlessly above smooth, time-polished wooden desks, began to fill with a wide variety of people representing great diversity. This gathering was unique. Invited were top scholars from most circles, but also students and apprentices, some quite young. Mixed in were members of the trades—mostly builders and inventors. A few continuity elders edged their way into the back rows. Azra's own most senior apprentice, Kori, sat quietly to the side of an imposing lectern, in front of a covered easel.

The chatter and greetings of fellows too long separated, now well met, died down after a time. People took seats and found comfortable spots to stand around the back wall. Attention turned to the front of the room. Azra never used the lectern, it's sides polished and worn from generations of nervous hands grasping for safety. Instead, he forced himself out in front of it, to stand in full view of his audience. Even after all these years, this was an effort. He much preferred the cordiality and cooperation of a small group. Yet, he knew this type of presentation was an important tool that he must use, however uncomfortable he might be.

Without thinking, he picked up the potted plant. “Welcome,” he began, and waited respectfully for the echoed welcoming response from his audience. There, in the back, he caught a glimpse of Shakre. Good. She's come. The real meeting will be later with her and . . . He didn't know how to finish that thought.

“Thank you for coming,” he continued. “You will no doubt be wondering why I have invited such a . . . hmm . . . diverse mix of people to come listen to an old man teach.” Azra accepted a small wave of lighthearted laughter. His audience knew without questioning that if he called a meeting for a lesson, anyone invited would stop what they were doing and make the journey.

“I haven't taught a lesson in quite some time. My apprentices and contemporaries are quite capable of carrying on the Subjects.” He paused and glanced at Kori, who smiled back at him. “They are really quite remarkable, these fellows I have had the privilege to work with these long years. Our future seems to be in good hands.

“But I am not here to speak of the future, fascinating and beguiling though the future may be.” He set the potted plant down, and picked up the folded piece of parchment that lay next to it. “I am here to speak on the subject of the past.” He opened the letter and scanned it for a moment. “This, you may know, is a seed letter. You have all written them, and you know them to be an important part of our continuity.” In the back of the crowd, one or two of the continuity elders nodded in assent.

“This happens to be my letter.” Azra smiled wide and the crowd laughed with him. “My letter, like yours, I suspect, shows me . . . no, demonstrates to me the need for continuity elders and their wisdom. Among other dangers and pitfalls, without this wisdom, we are likely to mistake the hasty truths of youth for the guiding and eternal truths of Natural Law.” He paused. “Embarrassing though they may be.” Again, the crowd broke into a respectful laughter.

“But I'm not here to lecture on continuity either. Rather, I'd like for you to look at this seed letter as a metaphor. We write them when we are young. The continuity elders keep them safe until we have reached an age where we have power and capability, but need the wisdom of perspective in order to use that capability to bring the Web a vigorous and healthy today, and an excellent foundation for tomorrow, within the bounds of Natural Law.

“They are, in a sense, an ark that travels along the river of time. What is necessary for them to successfully navigate that river is a safe haven from the ravages of this river: time. Surely, some letters are lost to accident or some such, but as a small but important part of their work, the elders do a generally good job of providing these arks with the means to get from one moment in time, to a much later moment in time.”

Azra could sense the continuity elders hovering somewhere between pleased and cautious. From their perspective, Azra's profession was a necessary evil. He didn't think a little flattery would hurt, but he was under no illusions that it would help them accept his work with any kind of charity or support.

“Now imagine—could we write a seed letter to our children? Actually, I know some that do. It's not the prerogative of the elders to facilitate this sort of communication, but I'm sure they'd approve. I myself, as a young man, wrote a seed letter to my grandchildren. I think that was before I was handfasted, even. Now that's confidence.” He smiled and again the audience greeted him with a respectful, quiet laughter.

“What if you wanted to write a seed letter to your great-great grandchildren? Now you start running into practical difficulties. Who will keep this letter? For surely, you will perish before it's intended recipients are even born. And what will you write it on? Our best parchment, kept dry and safe from accident or even sunlight, might last this long. Now what if you wished to send a seed letter to your great-great-great-great-great grandchildren?” Azra paused and spread his hands wide, inviting comment.

A young man in the front raised his hand, palm open. Azra nodded to him. He rose and spoke with surprising confidence to the group. “I am Jaqar, a seventh student in this, the Central circle.” Azra nodded again for him to continue. “Perhaps, teacher, a person might carve a stone into a statue, with a message—written or pictorial.”

“Yes,” said Azra, simply—without the exaggerated praise in his voice another teacher might reserve for so young a student. “This is so. We have many such objects, and we make many such objects. As you all know, the Central Stone is fifteen generations old, and while we have made many conventions and refinements to our way of living, the basic tenants that protect and guide us are written there. And we hope that this stone will still be right where it is now for fifteen more generations, and fifteen after that.

“But we know from the work of our continuity elders, that time does not allow for stillness. It is Natural Law—all things are born, they live, then they die. That this is true for me, means it is true for you. It is true for all things. Even stones.” There was more nodding from the elders in the back, but one elder in particular was scowling. Azra smiled in his direction.

“But because we have these two examples, the paper and the stone, we can see that different things succumb to the ravages of time at different rates. Indeed, the artifacts we still sometimes discover from the world before are a testament to the longevity of some materials resting in particular environments.

“I will simplify, and propose the following: If you wish to maximize the longevity of an object, then make it from materials of extremely high durability, like a very durable stone, or the metals of antiquity, and place it in a highly stable, secure environment—somewhere dry where thieves would not plunder.” Again Azra opened his hands palm out, but he didn't really expect anyone to disagree. These were, he thought, facts even young school children could grasp.

“Now,” he said. At this, the audience leaned in just a little. “We know the Ancients were powerful—very powerful, but also careless. We have few messages from them, and really our only evidence that they walked the earth at all is the very fact of the longevity of some of the materials they created. Our brightest minds and most skilled metallurgists cannot replicate many of the materials they have left us. Our very best estimates are that the Ancients passed from this world more than fifty generations ago.” Azra stopped to let this sink in. These figures were not a secret, but neither were they settled. Many scholars would not accept that a culture could have existed so long ago that was as powerful as the few objects they left behind suggested. Nevertheless, Azra pushed on.

“I said a moment ago, the Ancients were careless. We assume they must have been. How could a civilization with so much power and so much knowledge allow itself to burn brightly and then fade, as we see the barbarians beyond our most distant walls do so very often?” Azra looked around the room, but did not signal for commentary, instead leaving his question to hang in the air. He carefully set the letter down and picked up the hammer that lay on the table next to it.

“This hammer was my father's hammer. He was a builder, a great one. Many of our best structures in Central circle have his sweat and love in them. He gave this hammer to me when I came to fifth year. It could be that, deep down, he wished I would have become a builder as well—this despite what we know to be true of Natural Law, that each person is charged with forging their own path.” Azra stopped to remember the man for just a moment, bringing the truth of feeling to his speech. “I believe he loved me unconditionally. Still, good men make mistakes. Like my father, we are human, and make human errors—each according to their peculiar flaws. Therefore, if we can say anything about humans as a group, it is that while we share similarities, we are all very different from one another, capable of great kindness, great sorrow, and all things between. Can it be that every Ancient was uniformly careless? By this logic, that must be impossible. What if there were some who saw the error that ended their power?” Azra set down the hammer, but did not invite comment.

“Imagine a boat which springs a leak. You start to bail the water out, but you see that this is futile. Around you is only open ocean, and it is clear that if you bail water, you might slow the descent of your craft, but you see that it will eventually fail no matter what you do. There is no land near enough to swim to, and no other boats on the water. Your fate is to drown. How will you spend your last moments? Will you bail water hopelessly? Will you meditate in prayer to prepare yourself for what comes after we die?

“Surely there were Ancients who saw the end coming and tried each of these. But there is one small possibility that I would like to discuss. If you had a pen, some paper, and a bottle, you might write a note, say something true about your life. You might write a story or a poem, an explanation, or an apology, something to communicate with the future, your predicament, your hopes, your fears. Something meaningful to pass along. You might write that note, pop it into the bottle, and throw it over the side as your ship slipped below the waves and you breathed your last few breaths in this life.” Azra mimed putting a cork into a bottle and tossing it to those students in the first rows before him.

“If you were an Ancient, and you could see the end of your civilization coming, would you reach for that pen? Maybe just one or two might. But you might also grasp the length of night coming upon the world. What material would you use? Where would you put that message? What could possibly expect to survive fifty or more generations?” Azra opened his palms wide, suggesting a broad call for input.

A tall, middle-aged woman stood. “I am Rakell, from Third circle east over the mountains. I am a scholar of three degrees. I would put my message, whatever the material, in strong desert rock. Perhaps the red rocks of the Nikal deserts.” Azra nodded, but said nothing. Another young man stood. “I am Tokal from the Second circle west of the Singing lakes. I am a master in the building trades. I would build a great ark for my message to sit within, to protect it from time and thievery.” Again Azra nodded but didn't say anything. At last a continuity elder raised his hand. Azra was surprised; they usually spoke very little. He stood. “I am Jindall. I am a Third level continuity elder in this Central circle. I would make it from as large a block of the metal that does not rust as I possibly could.”

“All good arguments,” said Azra. “Each with a weakness. Deserts shift and change. What was once desert might, in the course of two hundred and fifty generations, become a lake bed or river way. Great arks are no less subject to the vagaries of time than the objects which reside within, and would so perish over time. A great mass of the metal which does not rust would be a very tempting target for looters and thieves.”

The audience fell silent. Azra again picked up the potted plant. “This,” he said slowly, “is an Althea plant. It's a shrub, actually. It thrives in dry, desert environments. Its life cycle is very interesting. Can anyone tell us how it reproduces?” He paused. “No? Hmm, I'll have to have a talk with our botany scholars . . .” This time, no one laughed at his joke.

“In the desert from which this plant comes, rain sometimes doesn't come at all. For years at a time. In order to survive and reproduce, when it does rain, this shrub very quickly creates tiny spores. They look like seeds, and there are seeds inside. But what we see when we look at the spores are actually very resilient shells. The seeds inside may lay dormant for years, even generations. When just the right conditions reappear, the spore opens, and the plant seed takes root.

Azra looked around the room at the many silent faces. “Before I go on, I would ask that you ponder the following question: If the Ancients were able to leave us a seed letter or an ark of sorts, what would be in it?” He stood silently, watching students and masters alike shift nervously for a moment. “What would they say to us?”

Finally, into the silence that followed, Azra spoke. “I have brought these three items here to demonstrate the vastly different possibilities. The letter, a symbol of wisdom and advice. The hammer, a symbol of hopes and dreams for the future. The plant, a symbol of passing on heritage—a way of perpetuating a culture. There are doubtless other possibilities, and I grant”—he paused, looking several of his audience members directly in the eye—“I grant that this conversation might be better presented as a thought experiment on a cold day over a warm cup of tea. Except.” He motioned to his most senior apprentice. She stood and went to an easel covered in cloth behind the lectern, bringing it out and uncovering it. “Except, that we have found just such an ark.”

* * *

To read the rest, please purchase issue 2 of Into the Ruins.  Thanks!!

March of the Squirrels challenge

Exerpted from:
Cummings, Jay. "The Power of the Future is in Our Hands" Discover Stuff Magazine n.d.: n. pag. Web. 21 Jan. 2015

The future of sustainable energy may well be in the palm of our hands. As senior project manager at the Springfield Institute of Technology's Laboratory for Advanced Matter and Energy, Joeseph McShmitty is in a unique position to know. “This technology will revolutionize how we think of energy,” says McShmitty as he holds out his hand. On it, he's wearing a finger-less glove that resembles one a cyclist might wear. A thin wire travels up his arm to a small black box strapped to his bicep. Waving his hand and wriggling his fingers, he continues, “Just our ambient motion through the day creates enough energy to charge a cell phone completely, or light an LED lamp for an evening.” McShmitty and his team are calling their breakthrough a “Micro-Energy Capture Harness” or MECH device. “These MECH devices,” McShmitty says, “Will stand the whole energy industry on its head.”

The key is in the specially designed fabric that makes up the glove. Using technology developed by McShmitty and his team, tiny capacitors are carefully woven together to make a kind of fibrous mesh.  This mesh is then further woven into synthetic leather.  After the fabric is cut and fit using traditional tailoring techniques, a miniature deep-cycle battery is attached. As the hand moves, motion energy is converted to electrical impulse. Electric charge multiplies throughout the MECH device, gathering strength before finally being transmitted to the battery where it is stored and made available for use in other appliances.

“It's very nearly a perfect technology.” Says McShmitty. He notes that as the user increases the use of their hands, more power is generated. “When we give these gloves to teenagers who send, on average, more than a thousand text messages every day, the energy capture potential is nearly limitless.” With no more inconvenience than a runner might experience while wearing a heart-rate monitor, it's very easy to see the appeal of the MECH devices. “It does so many things,” McShmitty says, “It lets the energy user be directly responsible for generating their own power.” This means far less reliance on fossil fuels, a critical step toward energy sustainability.

McShmitty and his team are unrelenting in their pursuit of energy sustainability. “I see villagers in developing countries where utility infrastructure is intermittent or non-existent, plugging their MECHs into phones or lamps or radios at night, enjoying a clean, renewable by-product of their day's hard work, completely independent of any kind of government utility or control.” This kind of independence, McShmitty and his team believe, will increase global standards of living, lift people in developing countries out of poverty, even introduce democracy to parts of the world that have known only war and chaos.

And gloves are just a first step. In a people-powered world, this technology has no limit. McShmitty and his team are hard at work, furiously developing prototype MECH shoes and MECH pants, MECH underclothes even. “Why not?” He muses coyly. “Why can't everything you move in and wear generate electricity?” In the future that McShmitty envisions, all of these are possible. “We can be free of all the encumbrances of our current energy infrastructure.” He says. “What you wear will set you free.”

Space Bats Submission
 - Jay Cummings

Broadcast

Grampa Joseph plugs the TV in once a year on the Fourth of July. No one's sure why. We burn an awful lot of mass powering that behemoth up. There are plenty of teenagers around who don't have a clue what the thing does. I remember, though – all those talking heads and crazy cartoons. I remember we couldn't get enough TV when I was a kid, though we didn't get to watch very often.

It was gradual, but eventually, it just kind of went away. I grew up. The farm makes demands. Nights became about other things. The cute girl at the next place over, for instance.

But not for Joseph. He was constantly on the search for a working broadcast. It's been a dozen years or more since anything regular came across, and a fair few years since we picked up anything at all. So now, he just powers the thing up once a year, like a part of some kind of ritual ceremony.

We don't expect to see anything, just electric fuzz. That's fine by me. At night, I prefer the moon, the stars, and the warmth of that girl from the next place over, who is my wife now. But we all come out to see Grampa plug it in, and hit the search function. We all know that when he's gone, we'll get rid of it for good.

Except this year, we found a broadcast. It was a crazy mess of stuttering images in black and white. Some guy with a camera moving around a ranch talking about this and that and a bunch of crazy stuff. Half the time the sound came in all garbled.

We were all stunned. Even Joseph was surprised, who, if you'd asked him before he found it, would have told you he was expecting something like this. At some point during the broadcast, the guy held up a sheet of paper with directions to his place written on it. Then it went back to fuzz.

We were quiet, as though none of us could believe that what we'd just seen was real. My brother was the first to speak.

“That guy's a lunatic.” He said.

My sister chimed in, “But we saw it, so doesn't that make us just as crazy?” After this, there was more silence.

Joseph finally turned to me. “What do you think?”

“I think,” I hesitated. I'm always in the middle. Mister pragmatic. “I think, that if he's broadcasting from so far away, he's got resources. If he's broadcasting his location by television (I said the word as though the thought is impossible.) then he's trying to connect with other people with resources. The fact that we have picked up his signal and watched his message means we are just the sort of people he wants to meet and connect with.”

Everyone digests this.

“I think,” I continued. “That he probably has something to offer, and we'd be no worse off than we are now by investigating.”

***

“The danger is minimal.” I told my wife. She was pacing the floor as we were preparing for bed. I hate it when she does that. “It's summer now, the wildlife is up the mountains.”

“It's not bears I'm worried about. You know that.” She stopped pacing and sat down beside me on the bed.

“I get it.” I said, “but it's also the time of plenty for . . . undesirables.” We avoid words like 'bandits' or 'marauders.' They seem overly melodramatic, and don't really describe those sorts of people very well. Yes, there are folks out there who would rob a fellow blind at gunpoint, but the years have been hard on those kind too. Any of those left don't work their evil when they don't have to, and midsummer is a time when anyone can live off the land or find some work if they want it.

“But why does it have to be you?” She complained. “Why can't they send someone else?”

“You know as well as I do, that I'm the only choice that makes sense. And besides, I'll have Jess and plenty of firepower, you know that.”

My wife harrumphed at the mention of Jesse. Jesse is my nephew. He's kind of a hothead, and has a reputation for acting before thinking, but I have faith he'll grow out of it. He is very handy with horses and a gun, though that's not why I insisted he come.

I knew mentioning my nephew wouldn't ease her anxieties a bit, but I did have to try. I love this woman more than trees love sunshine, but she knows that when I say I'll do a thing, I do it.

The next morning Jesse and I got up early and hit the road.

* * *

The road was blessedly uneventful. The place was out of the way, but with the directions from the broadcast we didn't have too much trouble finding it. We were greeted with great enthusiasm.

“I'm Alex.” Said the man from the broadcast quickly, but easily. He seemed younger than me, but this fellow clearly had so much energy he might've just seemed young. A much younger woman – a grand daughter maybe - walked up and carefully took the reigns of our horses. “This's Genevieve.” He turned to us. “Gen'll take your rides if that's OK. She'll take good care of them.” Jesse looked at me and I nodded as she led the horses away.

Alex's hospitality was exceptional. We were fed, and got a mini tour of his place. We saw the usual: gardens, orchards, livestock, workers and managers. Everyone we came upon greeted Alex with genuine respect and enthusiasm, and he seemed to give that out freely as well. You couldn't miss the towering wind turbines, which were obviously the source of power for his broadcasts among other amenities I noticed. They had a well pump that was doing quite a few gallons per minute from what I could tell, electric lights here and there. I wondered what else they had hooked up to power that I couldn't see.

When we got back to the main compound and were sitting around a large, old table drinking cold beer, I asked the obvious question, “Why do you spend power broadcasting . . . whatever that was?”

He didn't wait for me to elaborate on the question. “I know, right?” He looked from me to Jess and back. “Who has a TV these days? Who wastes time and electric on that?” Jesse nods, but I prefer to remain impassive. He continued, “And I don't exactly have what you'd call a 'Showbiz Personality.'” I smiled at the archaic language. “Except that you're here, right? And you're clearly from a well-resourced outfit yourself. You must have power too. Tell me, what's your source.”

That was a question of a very proprietary nature, and I wasn't sure if I should go into so much detail about our setup so early on, but I found myself a little beguiled by his openness and enthusiasm. “Well,” I said, “We're mostly biodiesel.”

He sat back into his chair. “No kidding.”

“No kidding. We've got an incredible small engines guy.” Jesse smirked a little and shot me a knowing glance as I continued, “He can hack just about any engine.”

“Hack?”

“Sure,” I said, “You know get inside the things, fix them. Make them work on what our still produces.”

“Ahh, uh huh.” Alex contemplated this and then there was silence for a minute. “A still.” He said, and then let a long slow smile spread cross his face. “Jackpot!” He said suddenly.

* * *

“Jackpot?” I found myself becoming a little weary of his excessively enthusiastic manner.

“Yes,” Alex continued, talking fast, words tumbling out one after the other. “Jackpot. See, anyone who watched my broadcast, must have the resources to do so. Anyone that came must have the resources to send someone. And chances are - and I was betting on those chances, Gen'll have to eat so much crow - that those somebodies would have resources that are different, but no less capable than our own.”

“I had the first part there figured.” I said, “but I don't quite follow that last part.”

Alex smiled. “We're turbines, you're biodiesel, we've both thrived because among other things, we know how to harness, produce, and protect our electric.” I nodded agreement. He continued, “It's like elephants.”

“Elephants . . .” He'd lost me.

“Elephants.” Alex makes his arm and hand into an elephant trunk. “See, the trunk of an elephant, or different elephant species, evolved separately like five different times over the course of history. Convergent evolution, it's called. The development of similar systems in separate organisms. In today's world, to have the resources to watch TV you must have sophisticated energy systems and quite a bit of know-how. But how you got there would be different than how we got there. Same end, different means.”

I let this sink in. I got it now, what he'd been talking about, but I still wanted to know why we were here. So I just asked. “All right, you've found us. We're here. What do you want?”

Alex spreads his hands. “But just think. You have a small engines guy. What if you didn't?”

“I don't know, I haven't thought about that too much.” I said honestly.

“Well, you should. I have.” He waved his hands dismissively. “I mean, not about your guy, but about our own situation. We have a similar someone who keeps our turbines running. More than that really. He . . .” Alex paused, as though considering whether or not to continue his thought. “He, builds them.”

I was a little taken aback. “Builds them? Like from scratch?”

Alex smiled. “Well, we don't smelt ore from rocks or any of that, but yes, he builds them from easily obtainable salvage.”

“Bull shit.” I looked him straight in the eye. “You mean to tell me that big turbine out there was built here at your place?”

He smiled and simply nodded. Well. I'll be damned. I was right to come here. If they know how to put something like that together, they'd make very good friends indeed.

Alex continues. “Well our guy got sick last year. Real sick. He almost died. And almost dying makes a guy think about the future, and how it can possibly be better. We ran into the broadcasting equipment on a salvage run, mucked about with it, made our little production, put that sucker on repeat and, well, now you're here.”

It's my turn to lean back in my chair. I see the truth of it. “On our place, we run well pumps and lights. We have a front-end loader and two ATVs. We run a small electric fence intermittently.”

“Holy shit.” He's genuinely surprised.

“Yes sir, we don't advertise all that, by the way.”

“No kidding.”

“No kidding. Our engines guy is good.”

“He must be.” Alex has stopped grinning. He looks as though he's doing some mental arithmetic. “So then . . . where do you . . .”

“We don't.” I finish his sentence. “We also make our own from what you call 'readily available salvage.'”

There's silence in the room. Jesse looks a little nervous. Not even our trusted hired men know the extent of our operation.

Alex looks at me. I look at him. And by what, I don't know, but we both know in that moment.

“You're . . .” He says first.

“Yes.” I reply. “And you're . . .”

Alex nods.

* * *

“Are you familiar with the seven generations concept?” I'm asking Jesse as we're loading up for the return trip early the next morning. He hasn't talked to me much since our meeting with Alex. Jesse has good reason not to trust complete strangers. I've been open with these folks in a way that might be dangerous. He needs to know why.

“No.” He says, simply.

“It's the idea that when you make a decision, like a major decision, you think about how that will affect your descendants seven generations hence.”

Jesse grunts a little to acknowledge that he heard me. I'm quite certain he has never thought about descendants, except for the fun part where you make them. I smile, thinking about that cute girl from the next place over. “Think about it.” I say. “What would happen if I get snicked by a ne'er-do-well, or catch something nasty?”

“I don't know, Uncle, our family seems strong.” He replies.

“Well sure it is, but project seven generations down the line, is our situation stronger, or weaker?” Jesse gives me the respect to at least appear to be considering that. I answer for him. “Weaker.” He nods tentatively. “What's the key to our family's success?” I ask.

Jesse again thinks for a minute, “Hard work.” He replies.

“Horse pucky. Any fool can work hard. Try again.”

This time he screws his face up a little and takes a minute before replying. “Smarts?”

“Closer.” I stop my horse, he does the same, and I look him right in the eye. “The right answer is: vision. Your father, your aunt, me and Grampa and his dad could see things clearer than most, and we could envision where we wanted our family to be and how to get there. Sure, hard work and intelligence are important, but seeing where you want to be decades down the road is the real trick. Most folks can't see past this harvest season.”

There's silence between us as we spur our horses back to a walk. After a while, I break it. “Now. Imagine what the family will look like seven generations from now.”

More silence.

“I. . . I can't, really.” He says.

“You will.” It's more of a command than a word of encouragement. “I can. Maybe we'll have electric, maybe not, but our compound will grow and our sphere of influence will double, triple. We'll be the law for our region, and a good one.” Jesse starts to nod. I can tell that vision appeals. “Now. How do we get there?”

“I . . .” This is an important moment for this young man. “I'm not sure, Uncle.”

This is the small step away from the hothead stage Jesse's at the end of, that I've been looking for. I'm glad he came. I'm glad he's here. I recognize that it takes him a great deal of courage and humility to admit he doesn't know.

“We must be solid, Jesse. When the wind blows, we must be a sheltering wall. When the droughts come, we must be a spring of water. When the snow falls, we must be a welcoming fire. We must have more than we need, so we can give some away . . . on our terms.”

Jesse nods. “Like the Knox family.”

Good. He's really listening. “Right. We took them in when they had nothing. We have enough surplus to take a chance on people like that. It turned out they're honest folks. That's generations of strong backs and wary eyes loyal to us. You can't buy that kind of trust.

“Alex knows this,” I continue. “He wants the same for his place. Look at the way he treats his folks. He respects them and their work completely, and so they respect him and his leadership in return. I'll bet a great number of the people working that outfit came to him the way the Knox family came to us.” I pause to let this sink in. “Someday our outfits will meet in the middle. I hope we can be friendly when that happens.”

We ride in silence for a minute. Then Jesse asks, “But how do we, you know, make more than we need?” The idea of a surplus seems foreign to him. “It never seems like even we have enough.”

“Yes, I know. But really we do. Think, what happens when we lose a few ewes from the flock, when there's less lamb meat to go around?”

Jesse shrugs. “We eat less.”

“No.” I reply, “We eat different things. Barley and potato soup, things that stretch. We succeed because we diversify. When our chickens get wiped out by racoons, we eat lentils until we can build the flock back up. If our wheat gets knocked down by hail, we ration out beef bones for broths and soups.”

It's a beautiful morning and the horses are making fine progress on the overgrown road. “Jesse,” I say, “It's the same with electric. We trade what we know about engines with Alex for what they know about turbines, and now we have two sources of power. Shit, we've always felt pretty good about biodiesel, but what happens when our first turbine goes up?”

“We make more than we need.” He says.

“Right.” I agree.

“So we can give it away . . . on our terms.”

“On our terms.” I echo. “On our terms.”

Jesse's horse whinnies just a little as he spurs her slightly to canter up ahead of me. He's got it now, he's starting to see that distant time in his minds eye. And like a good young buck, he's anxious to get there.