Sowing Seeds

Yesterday after my walk, I went to the library, where I picked up two apocalyptic books:  Parable of the Sower by Octavia Buter and Five Years After by William R. Forstchen, the fourth novel in the series that started with One Second After, about an explosion in the earth's atmosphere that creates an electromagnetic pulse that wipes out electronics, electricity, and most of the conveniences of modern life.

Part of me just wants books I know I will enjoy, which is why I return to books I've already read and enjoyed, like Parable of the Sower.  But yesterday, I started Five Years After, which is not a book I've read before.  I did read the other books in the series and enjoyed them immensely.

I went back to the 105 pages of my own apocalyptic novel.  I started it in summer of 2019 and picked it up again in winter of 2021.  I stopped writing it for a variety of reasons, but mainly because I wasn't sure where it wanted to go.  I still don't--but I do think it has a lot of potential.  Maybe I'll play with it this summer.

As I'm thinking about the novel today, I see that there are 3 characters from the protagonist's past, and each one will offer the protagonist a choice about the future--and because it's an apocalyptic novel, the future is rather bleak already.  Will she choose creativity or love or working to overthrow the government?

I came across this line in the manuscript:  "Older feminist activists kept records about which doctors would help, back when abortions weren’t legal."  I wrote that line in 2021, back when I thought the abortion question was mostly settled.  It makes me wonder what else I think of as mostly settled that might be suddenly restricted.  Sigh.

We're supposed to have more rain in the coming week than we've had in the past month, so I decided that yesterday was a good day to sow the quarter pound of wildflower seeds that I bought last year.  For the most part, I simply scattered them across the yard.  When I say yard, I really mean our patch of dead leaves and pine straw and forest floor.  Some parts get more sun than others.  We'll see what happens.

As I sowed the seeds, I thought about the parable of the sower, both the one in the Bible and the one by Octavia Butler.  I thought about seeds and soil and the fact that most wildflower seeds swept away by the wind aren't going to land in perfect potting soil mixes.  

I'll be intrigued to see what develops this summer:  with seeds, with reading, with writing an apocalyptic novel.