Acting Collectively

personby Nancy Jane Moore
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I find myself thinking a lot these days about the difference between individual and collective solutions to problems.

As a lifetime martial artist, I believe personal responsibility is important, especially in a crisis situation. But personal responsibility does not necessarily mean individual solutions; rather it means that you take action in a situation instead of wringing your hands.

It can, for example, mean you follow the evacuation plan out of a disaster area. Or that you organize your neighbors to deal with a disaster. Or that you follow public health recommendations about things like wearing masks and getting vaccines. You take personal responsibility to behave in a useful and collective way.

But in the United States, we all too often take the attitude that all problems are individual, not collective, with the “you do you” approach to the pandemic being only the latest example.

A couple of weeks ago I did a lot of driving on California freeways, which made me extremely aware of how building a society around cars takes individualism to an extreme. We have this whole network of high-speed roads, driven on by people with varying degrees of skill in vehicles of all sizes and in all conditions of repair.

Individualism only goes so far in that situation. Even if I’m doing my best to drive safely and responsibly, there are only so many options to protect myself on a six-lane highway clogged with cars if someone else is driving like an idiot or even just has a tire blow out.

43,000 people died due to traffic “accidents” in the U.S. in 2021. (I put “accidents” in quote marks because I read Jessie Singer’s There Are No Accidents, a book that points out that many of the deaths and injuries we put under that title are caused by policy decisions. I wrote about it here.)

I wonder what our life would be like today if we had put the same amount of money that went into motor vehicle infrastructure into rail systems.

Rail is collective; cars are individual. Continue reading “Acting Collectively”…

Love Letters from Space Telescopes

personby Deborah J. Ross
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 What an age we live in!

A spectacular trio of merging galaxies in the constellation Boötes takes center stage in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. These three galaxies are set on a collision course and will eventually merge into a single larger galaxy, distorting one another’s spiral structure through mutual gravitational interaction in the process. An unrelated foreground galaxy appears to float serenely near this scene, and the smudged shapes of much more distant galaxies are visible in the background. Image Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, M. Sun. Article here.

On March 1, 2023, NASA’s Juno spacecraft flew by Jupiter’s moon Io, coming within 51,500 km (32,030 miles) of the innermost and third-largest of the four Galilean moons. The stunning new images provide the best and closest view of the most volcanic moon in our Solar System since the New Horizons mission flew past Io and the Jupiter system in 2006 on its way to Pluto.

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Jupiter’s moon Io, as seen by the JunoCam instrument on Juno, on March 1, 2023. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/ processed by Kevin M. Gill.
Cleary, Io still looks like a pizza. The mottled and colorful surface comes from the volcanic activity, with hundreds of vents and calderas on the surface that create a variety of features. Volcanic plumes and lava flows across the surface show up in all sorts of colors, from red and yellow to orange and black. Some of the lava “rivers” stretch for hundreds of kilometers
 
 


Glimpsed only occasionally at the hearts of massive clusters of galaxies, ultramassive black holes are some of the largest and most elusive objects in the universe. These black hole behemoths have masses exceeding that of 10 billion suns, making them far more monstrous than even the supermassive black holes found at the centers of galaxies like the Milky Way, and their tremendous size has long perplexed astronomers.

Now, researchers studying a rare galaxy merger with three supermassive black holes at its center may have finally discovered the origins of these cosmic monsters.

Using a high-resolution cosmological simulation called ASTRID, the team modeled the evolution of the universe as it appeared about 11 billion years ago. In the simulation, the team witnessed the birth of an ultramassive black hole following the merger of the three galaxies. Each of these galaxies contained its own quasar, a supermassive black hole that feeds on gas and powers massive outbursts of radiation that can outshine all the stars in their host galaxies combined.

If Sleeping Beauty Were Jewish

personby Gillian Polack
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I’m working on fairy tale retellings right now, and preparing for Pesach (Passover) and getting ready for Eastercon (the UK’s national science fiction convention which is hybrid, is called Conversation this year and has a spectacular programme) and so time to do things is rare and fleeting. Fortunately, I have insomnia tonight, so spent two hours in bed, thinking. I got out of bed because I remembered I needed to write something for all of you, here. Insomnia doesn’t lead to great amounts of intellectual capacity, so it was very lucky I remembered a little story I wrote many years ago. It explains why I have insomnia… and is a fairy tale retelling about Passover. I’ve given you a link to the original, just because.

If I can fit everything together neatly through something I wrote so very long ago … maybe I will be able to sleep? Also, my cleaning this year is less impossible this year because when my refrigerator died, it took a lot of the food I needed to finish with it. Such unexpected synchronicity.

Before I give you the story, let me share a link to that fabulous Eastercon programme. Only a few of the panels won’t be available virtually. https://guide.conversation2023.org.uk/ The timezone is (because I’m the kind of person who loves stating the obvious)_ UTC/GMT+1. Normally it would be UTC/GMT 0 (zero, nothing at all) but the UK is in daylight savings time, unlike me. I’m heading towards winter and we’ve lost summer time. I’m on panels and giving a reading, so, if you join us at Conversation, join me in conversation! (And that’s my bad joke of the day. Now everyone around me safe from my attempts at wit for hours.)

In the meantime, I might copy my character and sleep.

 

If Sleeping Beauty were Jewish


Sleeping Beauty was Jewish in a non-Jewish world. It was just over a week before Pesach (1). She had a thousand and one deadlines from the world outside, partly because April is a busy time of the year in the non-Jewish world and partly because if she didn’t clear the decks (2) then crucial things would fall into the mire while she commemorated Exodus (3).

She was tired of being exotic. Tired of being Jewish. Tired of being busy. Let me admit it, she was just plain tired.

Sleeping Beauty took another long look at the cupboard (4) and said “I’m going to take a nap.”

She was woken up a week before Pesach by a pretty standard handsome prince. Things were looking good. For one thing, there was the prince. For another, after a hundred years the food in her pantry was unbelievably past its use-by date. She simply threw everything away to start again. The easiest Pesach cleaning (5) she had ever done in her life. For a third thing, there was the prince.

There were no deadlines. They had all gone, long ago. So had her opportunities. So had her friends. But her prince was a nice chap. She could deal.

That next week she discovered what her new life would be like. She had hastily married her prince, which was fine. What was less good was that he didn’t even know what ‘Jewish’ meant and how her background shaped her life. She was beginning to discover the effect of cultural change on everyday life in other ways, too. For instance, she had her own castle still, but none of the servants quite understood her instructions. What was oddest of all was that the people around her kept telling her, ‘No-one hates Jews any more. Stop complaining.’ Yet she still couldn’t go to synagogue without security guards three thick.

The princess thought “At least my guard is because royalty needs security in this odd future of mine. It’s not because anyone threatens Jews with violence anymore. I know this because there was nothing about violence against Jews in the newspapers. That’s another good thing: I’ve slept through racism and it’s gone.”

She arrived at shul (6) and discovered they wouldn’t let her in unless they knew her. There were security guards 5 thick and barbed wire to boot.

“The schoolground was fire-bombed yesterday,” explained one of them, apologetically.

“No-one told me. It wasn’t in the news.”

“It happened to the Jewish community. Why should it reach the news? It wasn’t terrorism, after all. It wasn’t even important,” said that non-Jewish guard.

The princess had a very private morning service, just herself and her prayer-book, in the tower she had hidden in a hundred years ago. Then she went right back to sleep again.

(1) Passover. Not to be confused with Easter with which it sometimes coincides. It’s the time of great family feasts, much alcohol (for 1 or 2 nights) and becoming very bored with eating unleavened bread. There are no Easter eggs, no Easter bunny and there is absolutely no Good Friday.

(2) Enough cleaning to generate great angst in even the tidiest neatest human being on the planet. One part of it is to get rid of any chametz (food not suitable for Passover).

(3) Moses and his Merry Men (and Women). Or the second book of the Bible, which contains the story of Moses. Or both. Take your pick.

(4) Or the pantry. Anywhere where food is kept. They all have to be emptied and cleaned for Passover and it’s one of things that sounds simple, but necessitates many long looks and much tearing of hair. This process is the single biggest argument for never becoming Jewish.

(5) Pesach cleaning – ritual cleaning for Passover. See (4).

(6) Shul is another word for synagogue, the place of prayer for Judaism. After all that cleaning, one needs a prayer or two, though maybe not the three hours that’s traditional in Orthodox Judaism on first day Passover.

The News of the Day

personby Nancy Jane Moore
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iScreenshot of the NY Times reporting that the grand jury voted to indict Trump

I read news online these days, so I decided to capture a screenshot of The New York Times headline announcing the  first Trump indictment.

I hope there will be many others, so that I can collect them all.

Some say that it is terrible for the country for a former president to be indicted. Given this particular former president, I think letting this man continue to get away with the harm he has done and continues to do would be much more terrible. If we don’t hold to account those who abuse power for their personal gain, our country will not survive as a democracy.

Elie Mystal is not sure that this case will succeed, and provides details about the legal issues at stake. But even if it doesn’t, we can hope that one of the other cases will. As Elie says:

One constant feature about Trump is that he’s always committing new crimes to take the place of the ones he’s already gotten away with. Maybe next time the feds won’t let him off the hook.

Real Life is Real

personby Madeleine Robins
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Sometimes life just gets real, you know? As I’m writing this, it’s Monday, my day off. I went downtown to have my hair cut and the blue-streak blued up again, then went over to Target to get some things, then crossed 4th Street and Mission to go through the Westfield Mall to get to BART and thence home. I had my back to the street, preparatory to going into the Westfield building when behind me there was the most Godawful noise–something between a *bang* and a *pop*, and then the sound of a motor gunning. Not sure if it was a motorcycle or a car, because what I saw was a guy lying in the street, obviously having been struck by the vehicle that had hauled ass away.

I waited until the light changed to cross the street; the man–with some presence of mind–grabbed his backpack and the sneaker he’d been knocked out of, and dragged himself across to the opposite sidewalk. By this time I, and a couple of other people, were on the phone to 911. The victim curled up around his pain, groaning. I suspect, from his dress and his backpack that he is unhoused–he had that ‘carrying everything I own’ kind of manner. But right then all that mattered was that he was hurt. Conscious and apparently oriented, not bleeding–although his pants were down around his knees, and he had a hell of a contusion on his hip. A fire truck came around the corner as I was on the phone–I don’t think they’d come in response to my call, but they saw us and came over. The lead EMT, a woman with impeccable bedside manner.

And this is the moment where I had to take myself away. Not because it was all too Real Life, but because I could feel myself wanting to participate, to provide information, to be helpful. Without any real info to give, of course (my back was to the street, I knew nothing ab0ut what had happened except for what happened afterward). And the EMT didn’t need me being helpful: she needed to focus on her patient. So I crossed the street back to the Westfield and took myself to BART.

And when I got to my stop on BART and came upstairs, I was treated to the sight of six mid-twenties people in various states of clown dress–makeup, spangly clothes, big shoes, etc. “Is there a convention?” I asked. The guy nearest me rolled his eyes, so, for the second time in an hour, I took myself away. The writer in me would love to know the end of both stories, and probably never will.

Everyday: the update

personby Gillian Polack
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My life is very busy right now. Just for once, Im going to skip over the health stuff entirely. I know I’m juggling newly hatched chicks and cannot drop them: you don’t need to know about the enar-misses and the squawks and the way my hands are scratched and pecked at. To avoid talking about being sick, then, I’m going to make a list.

Ten things I’m doing this week.

1. Researching – this is my regular research and is all about how the built worlds are described in novels. Not just any novels. Fairy tale retellings.

2. More researching. I’m giving an academic paper that involves close knowledge of Marvel movies and of Old French chansons de geste and Medieval Arthurian tales. I’m not reading and watching all these stories from scratch. This is stuff I’ve known for years, especially the chansons de geste. My first academic analysis of Old French epic legends was in 1982. (I grow old.) It’s the most fun revision ever, and it’s going to last me through until May. It’s my spare-time reading and viewing, and a really good reason to get other work done.

3. Eating. I’m finishing food up for Passover. Tonight I became so tired of it that I ordered takeaway dinner. Three hours later I got my act together again and mung beans are madly sprouting for eating in two days. That’s the last of the mung beans.

4. Preparing for Passover, the rest of it. So much work… and I have to start extra early because of not being that well. I watch my progress every day. Today’s big event was making sure I had the right birthday present for my mother and that she could have it on the right day. If I fail at everything else, as long as Mum has her birthday present and I have the right food and a clean kitchen I can manage.

5. Preparing for the UK’s National Science Fiction Convention. It’s called Conversation and everything I know about the programme so far says that even the online programme is going to be wonderful. British fan interests aren’t the same as North American fan interests (although there is overlap) which is why I love going to virtual conventions in both regions. If Australia ran a virtual convention, I would attend here, too.

6. Everything else. I have a list, and right now it’s a lost list, so ‘Everything else’ is the best I can do!

Never-ending Relationships

personby Nancy Jane Moore
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No, I don’t want to register to read your online publication. It’s not just that I don’t want to pay you — I am willing to pay for publications I read regularly, though I want to be sure something’s worth it before I commit any money — it’s that I don’t want to set up another account.

I want to read news from a variety of sources, but I don’t want to sign up for every individual one, give every one of them access to some data from me — and no matter how conscientiously I try to eliminate all the data a site collects, I know they’re getting a lot.

Likewise, I don’t want to download your app. I don’t need a different app for every publication I read, every company I do business with. Apps are useful for things like the laundry machines in my building or using iNaturalist to figure out what kind of a plant I’m looking at, but they aren’t useful for everything.

Browsers work fine for reading publications.

I guarantee you that I don’t want to download an app for your hotel that automagically becomes my room key. I mean, I may stay at your hotel again if it’s necessary, but in truth I don’t want to have a relationship with you other than for the nights I’m actually spending there.  Continue reading “Never-ending Relationships”…

Auntie Deborah’s Agony Column (The Best of…)

personby Deborah J. Ross
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Back in 2015, I had fun playing around with an advice column for my favorite characters. I hope you’ll enjoy these “Best of…” entries from that column.

Dear Auntie,

After way too many experiences dating angsty, unemployed vampires, I finally met a nice, soft-spoken, polite man. He even has a fairly normal name, Norman. He even has a job, working at a motel. Things were going very well when I realized something was a little “off.” I wonder if that’s my own projection from my past romantic relationships. How do I know what’s normal? Anyway, he’s invited me to meet his mother. What should I bring?

— Buffy

Dear Buffy,

You are wise to trust your instincts, for they have served you well through many perils. All too often, women are trained to ignore otheirgut feelings about a person or situation. We allow ourselves to be persuaded into dangerous circumstances instead of standing up for ourselves. Norman may be what he seems, but he may harbor a darker side that your intuition is warning you about.

My advice is to come prepared for anything. Never mind flowers or a bottle of wine! Bring your slayer arsenal — stakes, spears, swords, the works — and keep your wits about you. Make sure you have an exit strategy if things go sour. And whatever you do, do not get into the shower.

— Auntie Deborah

Dear Auntie Deborah,

I’ve suddenly found myself in a land of many colors, where troubles melt like lemon drops. My problem, though, is that this green-faced woman keeps sky-writing love letters to me…for everybody to see! I don’t return her affections, so what should I do?

—Dorothy

Dear Dorothy,
You’ve clearly ended up in a slash version of your own book. My advice is to click your heels like crazy before the flying monkeys get any ideas.

—Auntie Deborah

This last entry contains references to the works of J. K. Rowling. It’s behind a page break. Like the others, it is from 2015. Please take it in the playful spirit in which it was originally written.

Continue reading “Auntie Deborah’s Agony Column (The Best of…)”…

Who Counts as a Person?

personby Nancy Jane Moore
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Back in 2002 I wrote a story about an upper-middle-class young man who got arrested in Louisiana because his physical appearance contradicted his sex genotype: he looked male, but his genotype was XX. He ended up in a jail cell with several transwomen, some drag queens, a lesbian, and a woman who was his opposite: she appeared female but had an XY sex genotype.

This story was set in 2023.

I believed in this story, so I sent it out to every magazine and anthology I could think of. Nobody wanted it. I don’t know why they didn’t like it, but perhaps it was because it seemed too unlikely at the time. Or maybe I was just ahead of the curve in gender stories.

Fast forward to the actual 2023, where Tennessee just adopted a law restricting drag shows and many other states are in the process of following suit. My made-up Louisiana law prohibiting people from dressing or appearing in a way that contradicts their sex genotype no longer looks like science fiction.

It’s almost enough to make me send the story out again, except that these days I bet magazines would turn it down because it’s too much like the real world of today.

Thinking about it reminded me of another story of mine, one I wrote back in the 1990s. It turned on whether clones were people or property under the U.S. Constitution.

That one, called “Passing,” did get published. In fact, it won a contest sponsored by the National Law Journal. Continue reading “Who Counts as a Person?”…

Say It Again

personby Madeleine Robins
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Almost three decades ago, when my older daughter was in preschool I got a call one day: she had slipped on a slide at the playground and cut her chin. How badly? “I think you’re going to want to take her to the doctor.”

Okay. Bad enough to flap her generally unflappable teacher. I made my apologies to my boss and got myself uptown, and inspected the chin–when you can see identifiable layers of adipose tissue, yes, it’s time to call the pediatrician. So I called the doctor, asked our after-school babysitter to meet us there, and gathered up my bloodied but unphazed girl. With the immediate scare of blood and tumult over (Julie had been holding an ice pack and gauze at her chin for some time) she regarded the whole exercise with curiosity–until the doctor told us he had to stitch up her chin. This would involve several small injections of lidocaine to dull the pain, then the process itself. At which point Julie went from vaguely curious to Totally Against The Whole Idea. Continue reading “Say It Again”…