“What is ‘scratch’ anyway?”
“Nothing. Or at least, only what you can get from fround so hard you can barely scratch the surface. I suppose it means starting fra farm on land that hasn’t the first seed planted, the first row hoed,”
“Hard row to hoe?”
“Exactly. so starting from scratch is starting literally from the ground up, though these days i suppose it’s from the ground down, since everything allowed up is already up as high as it can go.”
“Hardly that. just where it’s easy, where all the infrastructure, people, equipment are all in easy reach. The places not claimed for nature and ecosystem preservation but not city, no one bothers. Requires thought and planning.”
“Can’t have that can we?”
They both laughed.
#
What about us though? City life is okay. All the conveniences if also all the noise and chaos. Half the people aren’t outside long enough to notice if it’s smoggy sky overhead or sun replacement tunnel lighting. Still have to push the sun baths on some people, for the vitamins, but I like it out here, and so do the dogs.”
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This scene started as just speculation about the phrase used in the previous one, but as they tend to do, took on a life of its own, prodding character attitudes and potential settings and plot bits as well as reflecting my view of some related topics.
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