Week 4 Story: When Home Is No Longer Home
Edit: This story has been transferred to my Portfolio. Click here to view the most up to date version.
As an employee of a space exploration company, I was sent out on a quest into the relatively unknown. I reluctantly hugged and kissed my loved ones goodbye and began my journey. My company specialized in experimental pharmaceuticals using ingredients from space. Their task for me was to collect samples and explore nearby planets for possible ideas. Nearly a decade later, it was finally time to return home. I looked forward to seeing all of my loved ones. I'd missed them terribly, but I was able to carry on knowing that my findings would make a difference. It was sad to think about all of the life events for which I'd been gone.
I programmed my ship to transport me back to Earth and went to sleep in the ship's resting chamber. Sensing my restlessness, the chamber released a small amount of anti-anxiety gas to calm me and to help me to sleep. I awoke shortly after the ship landed. I spent extra time grooming my hair and beard before moving to exit the ship. As I stepped from the ship, I glanced out at the landscape and inhaled sharply. Everywhere I looked there was dirt. There was no water, plants, or animals. I rushed back into the ship to check that it had landed in the correct place. This was Earth.
My ship was only a couple miles from where my family lived. I felt dread growing in the pit of my stomach, but I had to know what was left. Loading up a bag with supplies, I decided to walk home. The screen secured to my wrist communicated with the ship to provide a sort of GPS. It said I had reached the place where my house once stood, but there was nothing there. I was starting to think the ship was malfunctioning and had placed me on an alien planet when I noticed a large sort of log sticking up from the dirt. Upon further examination, I found the initials HJ and PB carved into the encircled by a heart. It was the remnants of the great oak tree that once shaded my yard, and the carvings were the initials of my parents from when they were children. I fell to my knees and cried, for surely the entire world was destroyed and there was no one around to see or hear me.
I stumbled back to my ship and laid back in the resting chamber. It immediately sensed my great emotional distress, and released another puff of gas. I was relieved and quickly fell asleep. I'm still not sure exactly when I awoke, but it felt like a long time. When I stood, my knees buckled under me and my muscles groaned from disuse. I figured it was a result of the drug from the chamber, and dismissed it. I was trudging around the ship, looking for breakfast when I heard a loud clang from the door of the ship. I threw on some gear and grabbed a weapon before tentatively opening the door. A few children took off in the opposite direction. Staring after them in disbelief, I noticed the landscape. It was now green and lush. Birds flew in the sky and I could hear a stream nearby. The children were still screaming and laughing in the distance. I followed them to a small town.
A great amount of time had passed, but I had no idea how much. The world I had known was gone. I believe that my ship's resting chamber malfunctioned and something was wrong with the drug. I asked around about what had happened to the Earth before, but no one wanted to discuss it much. Apparently, climate change had reached a new terrifying extreme which brought several apocalyptic events. It was no surprise that there was little left when I landed. Enough time had passed now for the Earth to heal. If my family had been alive when I first arrived, they were gone now. I vowed to look for any descendants, but it was unlikely that any survived. Very few people had.
Author's note: In the original story, a Rabbi travels for a long time to reach Jerusalem, but when he arrives, it is destroyed. He was very upset and went to sleep on the ground before the city. He slept for 100 years. He awoke to Jerusalem beautiful and rebuilt. He speaks to his grandson, who is now himself an old man, in the city. He discovers how long he has been asleep and is very distraught over how everything is different in these times. He went back to where he once slept and went to sleep again. I wanted to project this story from the past into the future. I thought that a spaceship and future technology would give a good explanation for his long ageless sleep. I did not have my character find his descendants because in my story, the entire planet was destroyed instead of a single city. I thought it was less likely that they would survive that. I also had my character not return to his slumber. I was dissatisfied with the original story when it ended that way.
Bibliography: "The Sleep of One Hundred Years" form Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends by Gertrude Landa. Web Source.
As an employee of a space exploration company, I was sent out on a quest into the relatively unknown. I reluctantly hugged and kissed my loved ones goodbye and began my journey. My company specialized in experimental pharmaceuticals using ingredients from space. Their task for me was to collect samples and explore nearby planets for possible ideas. Nearly a decade later, it was finally time to return home. I looked forward to seeing all of my loved ones. I'd missed them terribly, but I was able to carry on knowing that my findings would make a difference. It was sad to think about all of the life events for which I'd been gone.
(Image Information: Space
Source: Pexels)
I programmed my ship to transport me back to Earth and went to sleep in the ship's resting chamber. Sensing my restlessness, the chamber released a small amount of anti-anxiety gas to calm me and to help me to sleep. I awoke shortly after the ship landed. I spent extra time grooming my hair and beard before moving to exit the ship. As I stepped from the ship, I glanced out at the landscape and inhaled sharply. Everywhere I looked there was dirt. There was no water, plants, or animals. I rushed back into the ship to check that it had landed in the correct place. This was Earth.
My ship was only a couple miles from where my family lived. I felt dread growing in the pit of my stomach, but I had to know what was left. Loading up a bag with supplies, I decided to walk home. The screen secured to my wrist communicated with the ship to provide a sort of GPS. It said I had reached the place where my house once stood, but there was nothing there. I was starting to think the ship was malfunctioning and had placed me on an alien planet when I noticed a large sort of log sticking up from the dirt. Upon further examination, I found the initials HJ and PB carved into the encircled by a heart. It was the remnants of the great oak tree that once shaded my yard, and the carvings were the initials of my parents from when they were children. I fell to my knees and cried, for surely the entire world was destroyed and there was no one around to see or hear me.
(Image Information: Desert Wasteland
Source: Flickr)
I stumbled back to my ship and laid back in the resting chamber. It immediately sensed my great emotional distress, and released another puff of gas. I was relieved and quickly fell asleep. I'm still not sure exactly when I awoke, but it felt like a long time. When I stood, my knees buckled under me and my muscles groaned from disuse. I figured it was a result of the drug from the chamber, and dismissed it. I was trudging around the ship, looking for breakfast when I heard a loud clang from the door of the ship. I threw on some gear and grabbed a weapon before tentatively opening the door. A few children took off in the opposite direction. Staring after them in disbelief, I noticed the landscape. It was now green and lush. Birds flew in the sky and I could hear a stream nearby. The children were still screaming and laughing in the distance. I followed them to a small town.
A great amount of time had passed, but I had no idea how much. The world I had known was gone. I believe that my ship's resting chamber malfunctioned and something was wrong with the drug. I asked around about what had happened to the Earth before, but no one wanted to discuss it much. Apparently, climate change had reached a new terrifying extreme which brought several apocalyptic events. It was no surprise that there was little left when I landed. Enough time had passed now for the Earth to heal. If my family had been alive when I first arrived, they were gone now. I vowed to look for any descendants, but it was unlikely that any survived. Very few people had.
Author's note: In the original story, a Rabbi travels for a long time to reach Jerusalem, but when he arrives, it is destroyed. He was very upset and went to sleep on the ground before the city. He slept for 100 years. He awoke to Jerusalem beautiful and rebuilt. He speaks to his grandson, who is now himself an old man, in the city. He discovers how long he has been asleep and is very distraught over how everything is different in these times. He went back to where he once slept and went to sleep again. I wanted to project this story from the past into the future. I thought that a spaceship and future technology would give a good explanation for his long ageless sleep. I did not have my character find his descendants because in my story, the entire planet was destroyed instead of a single city. I thought it was less likely that they would survive that. I also had my character not return to his slumber. I was dissatisfied with the original story when it ended that way.
Bibliography: "The Sleep of One Hundred Years" form Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends by Gertrude Landa. Web Source.
Casey, there were many memorable parts in your retelling of this story. For example, whenever the main character sees the initials on the tree is an emotional scene because that is when we find out that he is indeed on Earth. I like how you changed it to where he doesn’t find his descendants because it just adds another sad aspect to this story, but I’m curious as to how the remaining survivors managed to survive and rebuild society. Also, where exactly did the main character go in space to collect ingredients and was he the only one doing that? I think it would be interesting to see what would happen if the main character had a partner that went with him on the trip. Furthermore, what if the Earth he encountered after waking up again was a dystopia and he had to fend for himself? It would provide a stark contrast to the original where everything was restored perfectly.
ReplyDeleteHi Casey! I really enjoyed reading this story, even though it's so sad. The suspense that you built up in the first paragraph made the narrator's discovery of the destroyed earth all the more tragic. To give even more suspense, you could perhaps have the narrator describe something specific about his family during the first paragraph and say that he hopes to find the same aspect upon returning to Earth. I really liked the details about the initials carved in the tree, and the narrator sinking down to his knees when he finds the tree. I think that was a great way to convey the importance of both his family and this specific place to the narrator, because his parents' names carved in the tree shows that this land may have been in the family for some time. I also liked that you didn't have the narrator return to his sleep; that showed determination and strength in the face of great tragedy. Very well done!
ReplyDeleteHi Casey! I loved your re-telling of this story — it's very imaginative. Your version is very bittersweet, which I think makes it more interesting. I also liked that you explained some aspects of the story that are ambiguous in the original, like why the man falls asleep for such a long time. I did wonder how the earth has changed since the traveller originally left it — have things basically just returned to his version of normal, or is the earth any more advanced? I was also left wondering what people's reactions were to seeing this man return from space? Was there anyone left at all who knew his mission, or was his trip to space and all his work in vain? What if you added in some dialogue between the traveller and a survivor of this near-apocalypse? Overall though, I thought your retelling was very creative and well thought-out — looking forward to reading more from you!
ReplyDeleteCasey, reading this story was so interesting. I was engaged because it reminded me of the film Interstellar, in which Matthew McConaughey's character is separated from his family because of his duty and the affects of space time. Both the film and your story, and apparently the original story that you took this from, are very sad, but they all have important messages. Yours is about the devastating affects of global warming, a topic that is very prevalent today. The only things that I was a bit confused on was when the man claims that he believes that his ship malfunctioned. Can you explain this further? Good job!
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