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A quote: “Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning.” ~~ Albert Einstein
I’ll start with a story …
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She thought if she stared at the horizon long enough she would see the cliffs of the land she left.
Foolish, she chided herself yet continued to stare.
“Are you going to continue to lurk behind me or finally speak?”
“Mistress, I merely wait in fullness. When you wish to continue your journey, I will guide you.”
She turned, brows furrowed, “All I wish is to return, even as I know I cannot. My journey has surely ended.”
He said nothing, not a raised eyebrow nor lip corner. He reached up and set the wheel in motion.
“You are wrong.”
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Now, it’s your turn.
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. featured image, cropped, Adobe Stock standard license
Dupin says: “Eureka,” cried Lord Calin. “The fishing wheel works. I have solved the problem of famine for our city.”
“Congratulations, Milord,” said I. “Then the King’s funds were not spent in vain. I beg you explain to me how it works.”
“With certaintude, young Master Masu. Using the physics and metaphysics of the imminent storm and its effects upon sea and air, the wheel turns, lifting fish into the air by the score as you see with your own eyes. They are ours now.
“With all due respect, Milord, how do we retrieve this wondrous bounty? The seas are much too rough to send boats near the crags where your wondrous wheel spins.”
Lord Calin stared at the wheel and the bounty it tossed into the air until the rains covered it from our view.
“Your point is valid, Master Masu. I must develop a suitable retrieval system. Have you time to assist me in this endeavor before I present my findings to His Royal Highness?”
Space is an ocean.
We see this unthinking translation of centuries of seafaring traditions and practices all over the early decades of science fiction. Asteroid belts that function as reefs and shoals, straight-line travel instead of orbits, and ships landing on unknown worlds without even an orbital survey.
Maybe it’s an effort to transfer the romance of the sea story and the Age of Exploration into the dawning Space Age. But it’s now as dated as the fumbling efforts of the early astronauts to use their experience with atmospheric flight when doing a rendezvous with another spacecraft.
Even today, after three generations of outward expansion into the Solar System, we still see motifs of sea travel in adventure stories, although many of the creators have never seen an actual ocean.
Cameron says: The Wheel on the Waves was a piece of art that had been the cause of numerous arguments amongst art students. The origin of the piece was still a controversy; At least five books were written on that alone.
And there was the discussion about the meaning. Was it a juxtaposition of the realms of water and sky? Was it a symbol of futility? Was this a piece of the Ship of Theseus come to rest?
Meanwhile, my family knows the truth. My uncle went on yet another tequila bender and had a moment of “Wouldn’t it be cool if-?”
(For the curious, the story I’m referring to in that last paragraph is here: https://victorygirlsblog.com/friday-fiction-100-word-challenge-122/ )
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