A New Year

"Have you heard, Thomas?" Moving the cup of tobacco leaf tea to his mouth, Thomas looked to the horizon before answering. When he spoke, the yellow rays of the new morning's sun were just beginning to peak over the horizon to the East.

"I would have to know what you were talking about to know if I have heard." Amie frowned at him. Of course, she frowned. Amie was always expecting more of him.

"Did you go to the celebration last night?" Thomas closed his eyes. Did she really expect he went? Being the head of New New York's agricultural department didn't afford him time for celebrations.

Farming and raising enough livestock to feed the remaining population of those who had refused to leave the greatest city in the world took every minute he had.

"The sun comes early. I don't have time for celebrations, Amie." He bit off sharply.

"But, this New Year marks the beginning of a new decade of rebuilding. Mayor Langley's speech inspired everyone." Turning he faced Amie.

"I don't have time for inspiration. I have time for milking. I have time for corn harvesting." He frowned when Amie couldn't hide the disappointment that flashed in her blue eyes. He knew he was being rude to her. And, he knew he shouldn't be. Reaching forward he squeezed her shoulder.

"I'm sorry, Amie. Why don't you tell me what you're excited about." Her expression changed instantly. Her shoulders lifted. The light in her eyes he'd dimmed a minute before came back to burn bright.

"Mayor Langley said she's received news from New Washington. President Markum believes the government will have the power grid up and running before the end of this year." Amie's lips spread in a beaming smile. "Isn't that amazing, Thomas?" Turning away from her smile that he always found too infectious he flicked his vision to the horizon once more and tried not to let Amie see his trepidation. The power grid coming back on wasn't amazing to him. He didn't want to lose the simple life the world had grown into since the electromagnetic pulses had taken electricity from the planet.

"Maybe we're better off without the power." He believed they were. Without electricity, a sense of community had returned to the world. The loss of smart devices, the inability of cars to operate, and the lack of Social Media had brought people, by their absence, together.

"How can you say that? Electricity would bring back progress." Thomas shuffled his feet in the layers of dust that covered the paved road underneath.

"We were a world of progress before the EMPs." Amie looked at him before taking her eyes away again, seemingly to consider his words. After a minute she returned her gaze to his.

"The EMPs happened because the world's governments got out of control. Because they became corrupt with greed."

"Was not that greed a result of progress?"

"Thomas, progress makes all of our lives better. Look at the progress we've already made. How much we've improved your ability to bring in more crops? Electricity will be a new dawn for us. Just think about it. Electricity will mean we can manufacture batteries and run tractors again to plow the fields. We can refrigerate the milk and the meat allowing us to keep them longer. Transcontinental travel will be possible, again. We can bring the old world back."

"But, at what cost?" He could see that Amie knew he was probing her. It was a dance they both enjoyed.

"At the cost of having a hot bath without having to boil water." Thomas couldn't help the small chuckle that escaped his lips. How many of these conversations had they had? Amie was constantly challenging him. She would have been an excellent student in the days before the collapse of technology when his work was carried out in lecture halls and not in fields and pasture lands.

"That would be a benefit. There is no denying that. But we can not only consider the good that comes from progress. Must we not also consider the bad? In the old world, for every advance that made life easier, there were those who used the advances that were made to create suffering and those who made new advances in the name of that same progress to create more and more powerful weapons. Where does the line get drawn? Would electricity not also bring back the ability to use again all the weapons of mass destruction?" Amie turned away, and he heard her let out a long, slow exhale. She was frustrated with him. He watched as her shoulders sagged briefly before they rose again when she found her response.

"We have to have faith. This is the new world. The enlightened world. I believe in the lessons the collapse taught us. We'll be more responsible this time." Thomas wished he could believe her words were true. But in his heart, he knew that while the collapse had taught society so many lessons, they would not be learned forever. As technology made its way back into the world, people would grow less vigilant in their efforts to not fall into the same traps that led to the collapse.

"Would it be that that were true. This new world would truly be a special place." Amie looked at him with questions written in the lines scrunched between her eyes. Going on he attempted to explain. "We are all only human. For all the good in our nature, there is also bad. With Yin, there is also Yang. As much as I would like to believe we would take greater care this time. I fear that eventually, we would become the way we were. And one day, and I admit, that day may not come for a long time, we would bring the world back to another collapse, and maybe there would be no coming back from that collapse." Thomas moved his eyes over the fields that stretched into the distance until they settled on the long lines of poles that would carry the power if the grid were to be turned back on again.

"But, people are always going to try to make the world a better place. That's our nature too. We can't live our lives in fear, Thomas. If we do, we won't have hope for a better future and what kind of life would we have then?" Thomas let his breath out. What world would they have? This one. Maybe the distance they had come was where the line of progress should be drawn.

"What if the EMPs were a gift? What if they hadn't come and the governments had used their nuclear arsenals instead? Would any of us have lived to see that aftermath?" A heavy weight seemed to hang in the air between them from the echo of his words. He waited giving her time to think before he continued. "Maybe this is where it should all stay. In this simple existence where we are able to provide for ourselves. Where we must all support each other." Amie crossed her arms over her middle before answering him.

"I can't believe the EMPs were gifts. And I can't believe being able to power hospitals and homes wouldn't be a good thing. I can't because I believe in progress. I believe in our future."

"What if our true progress was the loss of the progress that gave us the ability to destroy our way of life?" Amie stopped walking and dropped her hands to her waist before she said.

"There will always be the ability to destroy ourselves whether we make progress or not, Thomas. Entire wars that enveloped the entire known world at the time of their happening were waged on the blades of swords, and before that, they were waged on the blunt end of clubs. There will always be threats. Fear will always be there. No matter if we make progress or become purposefully stagnate. The real choice we face is whether to be optimistic or not. I've made my choice. I choose to be on the side of promise." Amie slipped her hands into her pockets, and they started walking again.

Maybe she was right, Thomas thought. Violence had not been taken from the world because of the loss of electricity or technology. Wars still happened only now they were between villages and states instead of countries. And had not the progress of reestablishing a central government brought those to an end? But how long would the newfound peace last? History would indicate not long. Humans have never been good at not killing each other. Looking back to Amie, he relented.

"Who knows what will happen? You may be right, or I may be. Somewhere years from now, when the world becomes what it will, we'll know. Lucky for you, in terms of this argument, the choice is not mine. Your path is the one that will be taken." Amie turned to him with the corners of her mouth turned up slightly.

"I guess we'll have to revisit this conversation a few decades from now, then."

"I guess we will," Thomas said, letting a smile spread across his lips before looking up to the skies that were free of pollution and hoping for the world's sake this time would be different.