Imagining the Information Age: Stories/Visions

Our people are scattered now--life is very difficult for all of us-- communication is often impossible.

There are no outward signs by which we can recognize one another. Each of us is vary small and one face as much like the next when seen in a sea of faces.

There are also no ways of determining one another by one's parentage or nativity. It is just as likely that one of us will be born to a politician as to whore, teacher, or farmer. So, perhaps it is just as well that we bear no distinguishing marks--for then our parents might.... As it is we can see a world that exists as surely as this page that no one--not even those who bore us suspects.

We live as others do. We eat very similar food, buy clothes with money earned somehow or other. We pay bills--even taxes-- and read the papers. We have possessions and lock our doors at night to keep each other out.

We walk on the same streets as everyone else, and enjoy going to cafes in the afternoon.

We watch people pass by and wonder if they are one of Our People.

Very often--it has happened to many of us--a stranger will look back at us, or ask a question or simply make some statement. Then we look back, make a reply, or even fall into conversation trying to ascertain all the while--are they one of us? Oh, how good it would be to talk of our ways again--to know Another.

But as it is, we are never entirely sure of another's true blood. It was a long time ago that we became afraid.

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