Profession

Back in the saddle

Thanks to Martha for the nickname!

The dogs and I went to Central Park where I threw balls for them, then we went to the groomers just because; they loved being fussed over and I enjoyed making them happy. Then we returned home, and lazed around a bit before it was time for me to get ready for dinner with Jon.

Dinner was nice; we talked about innocuous topics, keeping it light, and went dancing afterward. He saw me back to my gate but didn't press to come inside, the perfect gentleman. We made a date for the next weekend too.

The next day, Z came over and we started to plan my holiday party in earnest. She had news, too. The book she'd been working on about Ragnarok was finally done, and she'd just gotten an offer to publish it, and by a mainstream press, not an academic one, although it was her hulked-out dissertation. That called for a celebration, and I opened a bottle of Champagne, the good stuff, and treated her to lunch. We had a lot of planning to do, so she chose a delivery, and we worked as we ate.

"I like what I'm doing, though," she said. "I was going to quit party-planning when I got published, but I think now that I'm going to quit the university, do free-lance writing and party-planning. My income from that is a lot more than I expected, actually. Once people hear that I'm working on your events, they get a lot more interested in my work."

"So what do you think you're going to write about next?" I asked, topping off her flute.

"How the Return brought retro technologies back into vogue," she said. "Before the Return, we were essentially a paperless society, very advanced technology. But the sheer volume of Returnees who demanded tech that they could understand in some ways has been a step back. We're no longer harvesting trees for paper, but we're using a lot more of the alternatives. Communication has gone from small implants in the ear and near the vocal cords, all the way back to handheld devices. Physical newspapers, physical books. Tactile things. There was a real fight about bringing back old-fashioned automobiles, but the fossil fuels are gone, for one, and for another thing, they're clumsy, inefficient, and dangerous. The pods are much better. Even though life has become a compromise between the old and the new, we're still sending thousands each year to that spare Asgardian planet. Life is a lot harder there and the lifespan is shorter, but people are still clamoring for a simpler way of life. If the Asgardians ever let people have guns, even more people would go."

"Oh, I heard something about that," I said. Uncle Loki had mentioned it when I went to dinner with him and Torunn. "It was in a confidential conversation, but it might be that Thor is considering softening his position about that. There are a lot of areas where they won't put colonists down because it's simply too dangerous, and a change in policy would open up those areas. I think he might be sending representatives to the towns that have sprung up to ask them how they'd feel about allowing guns, because they all went there knowing what the policy was. Changing the policy would really relieve a lot of pressure here;  estimates are that half a billion people would go for the simpler life there if they could be assured that they could defend themselves against the predatory animals."

"That would be a really significant event," Z said, her eyes wide. "Do you think that anybody would be willing to talk to me on the record about it? That book is still a couple of years down the road, even with that bombshell to hurry things up."

"I'll ask, I can assure the person that you're trustworthy." Uncle Loki would know that any child of Alfred knew how to keep a confidence. "It's interesting, though. So many people want to return to a way of life that they feel is simpler--although a lot harder and dangerous--and there seems to be an equal number who want even more technological advances; they're lining up to go out to the stars with the Shi'ar and Scrulls when the UN comes up with an agreement to make sure that they're treated fairly, as much as can be guaranteed, anyway. The Kree, not so much; they're still regarded as hostile to human life given their past invasion attempts. It's so attractive because going out to the stars is no longer a one-way proposition."