As I sit enjoying a cup of blackberry yogurt, and working hard, I ponder today just how close we are sometimes to a dystopian world. Or maybe a dystopian society.
Just so you know, I write this from the safety of my workplace, while taking a short break, without many cares. I am free to come and go at will, I can move about the city, the state and even the country without any cause for concern. St. Paul Minnesota is as far away from a dystopian setting as one can be.
But what about other places in our world? Even our hemisphere?
Russia and the Ukraine seem to be on the news a lot lately. How do you think the people of Ukraine feel about their world right now? With Russian troops on their border and firmly entrenched in the south, perhaps they don't feel the same freedom and safety I feel.
In my WWIV novels (World War 4, just so we are all clear) we will deal with our country in a much different setting. There'll be no power, no phones, no running vehicles (well, not many). Our protection and our government will be mysteriously missing. Absent will be fresh food deliveries, fuel deliveries, any sort of daily news. And the worst part? We'll have no idea what has happened.
Do any of you recall the blackout of the North-east back in 2003? I happened to be on vacation in eastern Michigan when that occurred. We lived through a number of tense hours at first, not really knowing or understanding what had happened.
Last summer (2013) I was sitting downstairs with my grandchildren, ages 2 and 5, when all power went out one night. And it was a very, very dark night according to one five-year-old young man. I was in the middle of writing Book One at the time. While the darkness only lasted a few minutes, it was a sobering reminder to me that something could happen. And if something major, something serious, did happen, how would we go forward being so unprepared for such an event?
In my second series (The Smith Chronicles), we will see what happens when our economy and society begin to crumble. Here, the catalyst will be something much more on the forefront of people's mind. Our national debt and the descent of the US Dollar will be our undoing. And just like in the WWIV series, we will examine the events in a microcosm. We will watch the effects on a group of ten people. See just how it changes their lives – perhaps forever.
I am not a prophet of gloom and doom. I do not predict this is where the world, or our country, is headed. Nor do I believe some great cataclysmic event will occur wiping out everything we cherish so dearly. What I write about is how our lives will change, if something like this were to ever occur. It's great food for fiction in my mind!
Until next time, read whenever you can.
lake
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