Time and Dirt
(First Day -- Previous Day -- Day 14 -- Next Day)
Day 14
Heliopause Colony on Planet Vertumna, Medbay
“Solane, guess what. They *did* almost set the greenhouse on fire. Today they all learned an important lesson in how dangerous smoking in an enclosed space with a lot of fertilizer is. That stuff will keep fires burning even when it has no access to air! We can’t exactly afford to lose our hydroponics a second time, no matter how much I dislike working there, a second famine would be *much* worse...
And then I still had to argue with some of them that I’m being too strict. Mostly with older people who feel they can look down on me because I’m 17. Ignoring that I have worked in geoponics for six year now whereas many of them have only been there a year, or even just drop by occasionally, reluctantly, when we need the extra hands for harvesting.
Ugh, I just don’t know what I’m supposed to do! All of this took so much out of me. Would it be okay with you if I just sit in silence for a bit today? And just hold your hand for as long as I can...
...
... Just good to have you with me, Solane. I’m sorry I have burdened you with all my other problems the past days. You need to rest.
Here, I brought some new flowers for you to smell when you wake up. Annual asters, they are in bloom right now, bright purple and red flowers, reminding me of your eyes. The roof of a tiny gazebo protects them from the heavy rain, to make sure their soil doesn’t get waterlogged. And from below that roof, from the baskets I picked some calibrachoa, their beautiful large bell-shaped flowers in pink and violet are some of my favorites.
And, and these bold blue cornflowers fit really well with both! Their petals look like tiny flowers, surrounding a slightly darker disk. Your mother always called them rye flowers, never even explaining what rye is. But she did tell me they were once important to many of the people that organized our spaceship that brought us here. Symbolized their old home they were willing to give up for their children or something. A reminder of Earth and what we escaped, then?
...
And now I’ll have to go back and check to see that the greenhouses haven’t been flooded or something. If I could, I’d at least try to sleep here, so I can spend a bit more time with you, but I was strictly forbidden from doing that...”