Please join me in welcoming Jay as Kaleidoscope World's new administrator
Jay has been writing with us for a year, and she's one of the most creative and thoughtful writers I know. She has a striking ability to peel back the layers of truly speculative perspectives and explore the feelings, philosophies, misunderstandings, and affections that might grow in these imaginary landscapes. It makes for great reading—and it makes for great science fiction.
I'm stepping away from Kaleidoscope World, and I'm happily handing the keys over to Jay.
Real talk: Kaleidoscope World celebrates old-world American science fiction and futurism—a real love of mine! However, lately I have personally found it difficult to engage with this setting. I still think it's worthwhile to believe in—and fight for!—Kaleidoscope World's “brighter American future,” but my imagination needs a break from this prompt. Jay has offered to step up and continue this project for everyone—and I'm so grateful to her for that.
We're about two weeks away from Earth Day and, with it, Kaleidoscope World's second anniversary as a site. This happy science fiction project has seen so much creativity from so many different writers—and it's brought me a lot of joy, too. I could not be more pleased with the writers I've met through Kaleidoscope World and how the last couple years of writing American optimism has gone for me. I'm really grateful for this chapter of my roleplay and writing life. Thank you all for being a part of it.
Little Düsseldorf, also referred to as Shrinktopia by English-speaking audiences, is an ongoing experiment in teeny-tiny living: a miniature multicultural, multinational, multiplanetary city, approximately the size of a room, populated by 5,000 shrunken volunteers who have been living and thriving at that size for two years. The Shrinktopia Exhibit tours throughout the Solar System and is focused on creating more sustainable living situations at a smaller size. After all, you know what they say about small feet … small footprints!
Issue #9, Winter 1957
Theme: Nuclear Winter Wonderland
Prompt: Science fiction has a long history of exploring a healthy fear of progress, as in Poul Anderson and F. N. Waldrop’s “Tomorrow’s Children” from the March 1947 issue of Astounding Science Fiction, which warns of a “Fimbulwinter” caused by nuclear dust that blocked sunlight and triggered a new ice age. For this issue of Kaleidoscope World, write a story that takes place in this shady atomic winter or a story that examines the cost of progress.
Happy August! This month, I'm looking forward to zooming in on our UFO member group, and to kick that off, here are some course descriptions for various UFO classes dreamed up by our writers.
With a little imagination, course descriptions were adapted from selections from the course catalog of the University at Buffalo.
This isn't all of them. Our writers are VERY creative, and when I sent out a call for suggestions, they were right on it. I have so many of these now. I figure I'll sprinkle them throughout the month.
To our esteemed readers:
As we look back on another year gone, another holiday passed, another tally etched into the complex story of human history—and the roles of our city, state, country, and planet in it—we would like to share with you a story about a time capsule named Miss Belvedere, which was placed deep in the earth 200 years ago, in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
[Content Warning: Nuclear Warfare]
Miss Belvedere was a brand-new golden Plymouth convertible with four wheels and a white interior. On June 15, 1957, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Oklahoma's statehood, she was lowered into a gunite-coated concrete bunker built to withstand the might of a nuclear bomb—an emerging, and then a festering fear across America at that time. Just 12 years earlier, our country had dropped the first A-bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki—and mankind would never be the same again. When the members of the Oklahoma Golden Jubilee organizing committee buried Miss Belvedere in that thick, concrete tomb beneath Tulsa all those years ago, they were imagining a future that could so easily, it seemed then, be razed by atomic fire—a type of abject, human destruction still very much in living memory in the hot, sticky summer of 1957.
It boggles the mind to think how long war, violence, and destruction held visions of humanity's future by the neck. Back then, it was unthinkable to the forward-minded citizens of Oklahoma not to consider the total ruination of mankind for America's sins. Today, it is unthinkable to imagine such a nightmarish future at all, for any reason.
One hundred years ago, when humanity's last war ended with two rockets, a quiet treaty, and great applause from Mercury to Mars, our grandparents must have wondered how long this new-old peace would last . . . Did the generation that ended conflict think that in maybe 20 years, maybe 30, it would all happen again? Would they have ever dared dream of 100 years of peace?
Mankind has so many dreams, but we're rarely prepared for the reality of the future—that's what makes the world so bright, so unpredictable, so hopeful.
Miss Belvedere's dark coffin was unearthed in 2007. Although her enclosure had been built to withstand the atomic warfare that seemed so close then, it had alas been breached anyway—by groundwater. No amount of fear could have prepared the committee members for the real threat of a little time, a little water . . . and poor Oklahoman construction (UFO forever)!
It is with this knowledge that we at News Planet consider it a great privilege to dream and hope with all of you here in 2157, soon to be 2158. There were times in this world when everything looked so dark. To be included in a chapter of humanity that begins so brightly is a rare gift. That we can dream of 2158 in color, in goodness and light is a joy we should endeavor to pass onto our children, and our children's children, and so forth.
Life is unpredictable. Humanity's capacities are boundless. We'll never really know what might next crack the hull of our world—but as long as you're with us we'll hope for the best and never again fear the worst.
Snowfall on Earthrise: Do Cold Temperatures Bring Us Closer to Our Fellow Americans in Space?
Earth, Ohio—The winter predictions for Northern Ohio this year have been dismal: icy lows, slushy highs—and snowy winds on all the in-betweens. Heat plows are groaning up and down my street every few minutes while schoolchildren across the county scream in snow-day delight. Well, I'm a lot older than those screechy little snow angels—and the prospect of a slippery, howling winter isn't so cheery for me. I find myself despairing often—but then I remember Earthrise.
We celebrate Earthrise every year here in Earth, Ohio. We put together our knick-knack trees, hang our moon lights, and sing lunar hymns about Borman, Lovell, Anders, and their magical ten orbits. We eat better today than the crew did back then with their packaged feast, but I imagine we feel just as together as they did—just as curious, just as hopeful … and probably, on this upcoming Earthrise, which is predicted to be exceptionally snowy, just as cold.
Nearly a century ago, when the Apollo 8 astronauts cobbled their Christmas tree together as they passed and shivered over the wintry dark side of the moon, could they have ever imagined how many Americans across the Solar System would celebrate them for years and planets to come? And as they emerged from the shadow and took in the bright and shining dawn of that brilliant blue marble in space, did they know what a marvel and a guiding light that photograph would forever be?
I'm cold this winter. I'm blasting the furnace and I'm begging the rocket pilots to fly over my house and melt all these ice dams. I'm bitter, and I'm old, and I'm definitely rolling my eyes at all the children playing in the street—but I'm also warmed this holiday season. I'm thinking of the astronauts, and I'm thinking of my loved ones who live far away in cold, cold outer space. I'm wondering if this chill in the air brings us closer together when we're so far apart. And I'm thinking, well, maybe I would like a white Earthrise after all.
Learn more about Earthrise at Kaleidoscope World...
