Pigeons Are Aliens? Then I Am Out Of Ideas.

I give up trying to write my sci-fi book. The reality is I’m not really much of a sci-fi person. I suppose you could say I don’t possess that sort of boundless, ultra-imaginative mind.

But let me back up a few years and tell you what happened. It began with an intriguing pandemic saga. As the world teetered on the edge of uncertainty, I found myself in the company of three generous clients, filling my accounts with respectable sums. Ah, how swiftly the tides turned! Staff were axed, and two of them eventually succumbed to the tempest, leaving the third clinging to a bare-bones crew.

With no clients or grand plans on the horizon, I embarked on an artistic undertaking. Once, I had basked in the glory of being a gallery-represented artist in Palo Alto, California. But art was always a labor of love. It was never about chasing the dollar. A colossal 6 ft by 6 ft wall hanging emerged, birthed from an eclectic collection of fabric scraps I’d lovingly collected over the years. Many were relics of days gone by — fragments of my travels, my son’s artifacts, treasured pieces of concert t-shirts from raucous nights, or remnants of jeans I donned when I could slip into a size 4. I even immortalized paper mementos, like my cherished Prince concert tickets, through photographs and their transfer onto fabric.

Progress was steady until a fateful tumble from a ladder sent me sprawling and shattered my elbow into something like pottery shards. Each piece was meticulously reassembled by a well-meaning surgeon. However, a year later the doctor, in an absurd twist of fate, broke my distal humerus accidently while trying to fix something to improve my range of motion— oh, the irony!

While nursing my broken body and barely containing a healthy dose of anger and resentment, I turned to a less motion intensive form of creation — writing (although, continuing with art that didn’t require using a ladder). I ventured into the realm of sci-fi, immersing myself in extensive research. The result was rather commendable until I stumbled in the final lap. The whirlwind of new discoveries in quantum physics, intricate theories on consciousness, simulations, temporal contortions, dimension shifting, and the tantalizing notion of clandestine extraterrestrial presences left me bewildered. At my core, I’m really a simple person.

In a whimsical sci-fi alien sidebar, I must share an intriguing thought— the peculiar notion that pigeons may be cosmic interlopers in avian guise. An encounter with a park-dwelling sage led to this revelation. “Have you ever laid eyes upon pigeon hatchlings?” they inquired with a sly grin. Truthfully, I hadn’t. “Precisely!” they exclaimed. The cryptic puzzle of pigeon origins lingered in my thoughts. I can’t help but cast a wary eye on these feathered bystanders now. I even engaged in a spirited conversation with one of them in Athens, regaling it with the beauty and talents of Louis Tomlinson, the musician I had just seen in concert. Perhaps it had not heard of Louis Tomlinson because it turned and walked away.

But I digress. Returning to the realm of science fiction, many chapters have taken on a life of their own, demanding to be shared as standalone narratives. So, I will share them here, fully aware that the prospect of completing the overarching story is as elusive as glimpsing a pigeon nursery.

Enjoy these stories, and should inspiration strike regarding how to conclude this opus, please share.