The boat is all we\u2019ve ever known. It\u2019s home, and it keeps us alive. It feeds us, keeps us warm, and gives us a place to sleep. We live and love and die on the boat. The boat is everything.<\/p>\n
One day, I woke up on the boat. I stretched and yawned and went out to look at the sky. The sky was big, and I scanned the horizon. There was nothing but a vast ocean, going on forever and ever. I remember my grandfather saying that there is only one boat. There are no others. That had always made me sad. I want there to be other boats to explore and experience. I still come out here to the deck every morning to look for signs of one.<\/p>\n
After coming down from the deck, I walked the corridors inside the boat, down to the galley to get something to eat. They grew all of our food on the boat and processed it to get the most out of all the nutrients because there are many people to feed now. But the food doesn\u2019t taste very good. It\u2019s bland and stops me up. I once knew a friend who worked in the hydroponics section, and he gave me an orange from a tree. When I ate it, it exploded in my mouth with heavenly flavor. But the boat decides what we eat, and eating is just an act of survival.<\/p>\n
Living on the boat is boring and repetitious. The boat understands this and keeps us busy working. There are some hours to relax and socialize, but mostly we are working to keep the boat running. Only the very young or the extremely elderly are exempt from work. They don\u2019t stay young or old, very long, so the boat understands it is not losing very much work from them. I walked to my job like I do every day, and I stand at the workbench and repair the machines that keep the boat running. The machines come in; I fix them, and the machines go out. Most times I feel I am really just another machine that fixes the machines for the boat.<\/p>\n
The boat really goes nowhere, because there is nowhere to go. They taught us in school that the world is one vast empty ocean, and there is not one space of land anywhere to live on. There is only the singularity of the boat, and so we must all work together to keep the boat and each other alive. There are so many of us now, and the boat seems smaller than when I was young. When I was a child, it was a place of wonder and excitement. A place full of discoveries to be made and with many empty rooms. Now it\u2019s crowded and old. I\u2019ve seen every square inch of it, walked every corridor, deck, and room. There is nothing left to see, no new thing, except for more and more people everywhere. I don\u2019t know what the boat will do about it. I think it should look for a bigger boat, another boat out there somewhere in that vast ocean.<\/p>\n
The people push and shove and yell. Their voices are angry and they believe different things, and they let those things divide them on the boat. I\u2019ve heard talk of \u201ctaking over the boat\u201d. I don\u2019t even know what that would mean. We need to work together to keep the boat alive, but they want to own the boat. What would they do differently, except maybe have power over everyone? I worry that the violent-ones will kill again to do this thing. It has happened. And what if they destroy the boat in their anger? We would all die, all drown in the world’s ocean.<\/p>\n
So I worry a lot about the boat, and the people in it. Especially when I see someone being careless. Like throwing refuse into the ocean, instead of using the recyclers. Our resources would dwindle to nothing if everyone did that. I sometimes think that it is already happening. It seems that there has been less and less to go around. Some of that could be accounted for by the increase in population, but not all of it. More and more people leave trash around, and great sections of the corridors are dirty. The boat is not well taken care of anymore, even though most of us are all kept working. I wonder if we are working on the right things. I wish I could tell the boat this, but I fear it doesn\u2019t listen or see any of us. It\u2019s just a machine.<\/p>\n
I finish my work for the day and head back out on the deck to watch again for other boats. Today, I\u2019m more anxious than ever about all of us on this island of steel. I\u2019m more worried than I\u2019ve ever been that we are all heading for destruction, and that we\u2019ll be the blame of it\u2014the cause of it. It would be one thing for a calamity to come upon us, and that would be sad, but there would be no shame in that. Nothing that we could have done about it. But to know that we had done it to ourselves, that we could have prevented it, that is the saddest thing of all. And it sticks like barbs in my heart that we are headed to that horrible destination.<\/p>\n
I ponder these things and look out over the waves, and try to console myself with thoughts of my loving friends and family, and the lives and loves that we\u2019ve shared. I think about the violent-ones and their agenda of hate, and their quest for purposeless power, wishing that we could all work together to make the boat a better place. I can feel what that would be like, can see what it would take to get there, and I want it so badly. I look out into the growing fog creeping over the horizon… and I think I see a tiny glinting light in the distance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The boat is all we\u2019ve ever known. It\u2019s home, and it keeps us alive. It feeds us, keeps us warm, and gives us a place to sleep. We live and love and die on the boat. The boat is everything. One day, I woke up on the boat. I stretched and yawned and went out to look at the sky. The sky was big, and I scanned the horizon. There was nothing but a vast ocean, going on forever and ever. I remember my grandfather saying that there is only one boat. There are no others. That had always made me sad. I want there to be other boats to explore and experience. I still come out here to the deck every morning to look for signs of one. After coming down from the deck, I walked the corridors inside the boat, down to the galley to get something to eat. They grew all of our food on the boat and processed it to get the most out of all the nutrients because there are many people to feed now. But the food doesn\u2019t taste very good. It\u2019s bland and stops me up. I once knew a friend who worked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1889,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/jan19-e1608144948903.jpg?fit=459%2C282&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p32u0F-ur","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1141,"url":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?p=1141","url_meta":{"origin":1887,"position":0},"title":"Owl and Kat","author":"KeithBPhillips","date":"October 28, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Owl looked over the water as the boat bobbed up and down rhythmically. His eyes pierced the darkness, scouring out every detail that the moonlight could reveal to him. Kat watched him closely as he swayed back and forth in time with the waves. \u201cDo you see it?\u201d She asked.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Stories"","block_context":{"text":"Stories","link":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?cat=6"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":185,"url":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?p=185","url_meta":{"origin":1887,"position":1},"title":"The Flying Saucer-1950: SciFi Movie Review","author":"KeithBPhillips","date":"April 9, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"[rating:.4\/5] The Flying Saucer. Sounds pretty exciting doesn't it? This movie is not. I couldn't even finish watching it; it was so boring. I got about halfway through and gave up. I know that sounds as if I just don't care, and that's probably about fifty percent correct, but it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Reviews"","block_context":{"text":"Reviews","link":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/220px-Poster_of_the_movie_The_Flying_Saucer.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3201,"url":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?p=3201","url_meta":{"origin":1887,"position":2},"title":"Let’s go on a Star Trek with ChatGPT","author":"KeithBPhillips","date":"February 28, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Keith PhillipsCreate a text simulation of the Star Trek Enterprise using all available knowledge. The ship should be fictionally functional as on the TV shows. Populate it with a crew and supplies that it would normally have. However, I would like to play the part of the science officer. As\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Stories"","block_context":{"text":"Stories","link":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?cat=6"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2159,"url":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?p=2159","url_meta":{"origin":1887,"position":3},"title":"The Dead Bones","author":"KeithBPhillips","date":"October 15, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\"You kill your trees and live in their dead bones.\" That\u2019s what she\u2019d said to me as I left the forest. I'd looked back at her with wet eyes and could not deny it. I couldn\u2019t tell her that she was mistaken, that I\u2019d not been part of it, because\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Stories"","block_context":{"text":"Stories","link":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?cat=6"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/Tree-Fern.jpg?fit=900%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/Tree-Fern.jpg?fit=900%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/Tree-Fern.jpg?fit=900%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/Tree-Fern.jpg?fit=900%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":555,"url":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?p=555","url_meta":{"origin":1887,"position":4},"title":"The Automatic Detective \u2014 A. Lee Martinez: Book Review","author":"KeithBPhillips","date":"July 25, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"The Automatic Detective is exactly the kind of book I\u2019ve been looking for.\u00a0 A real fun mix of Scifi and Sam Spade.\u00a0 Martinez has just the right amount of gritty detective banter and Scifi gadgetry to keep me hanging on every word.\u00a0 What a great ride through the future world\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Reviews"","block_context":{"text":"Reviews","link":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3106,"url":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?p=3106","url_meta":{"origin":1887,"position":5},"title":"Don’t Go There","author":"KeithBPhillips","date":"April 3, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"One day I was on TDY assignment to a base about 10 miles from my home base. Me and my buddy Bruce were out on the flight-line working on aircraft, and we heard a distant boom. We looked out to the horizon and saw a giant fireball go high up\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Stories"","block_context":{"text":"Stories","link":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/?cat=6"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/strange.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/strange.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.keithbphillips.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/strange.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1887"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1887\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3097,"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1887\/revisions\/3097"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.keithbphillips.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}