Experimenting with 2nd person present tense.
The ground of your ancestors is not diggable. It is hard as frozen rock, barren as ash after a wildfire, empty as your cheek pouches at the end of winter. Undiggable. The ground has been this way for many generations—too many to count. Tales from before describe a ground fertile with spidery white roots and lush tubers the size of torsos, of damp, loose loam and space for endless tunnels. Now, the ground is undiggable.
You were born high up on the hillside above this desecrated ground of your ancestors. The hill, with its many pebbles and boulders and steep incline, makes life a constant struggle for you and your compatriots. In search of new land, brave scouts once ventured high up to the mountain where unnavigable river beds cut through the slope, creating unthinkably high ravines. Your kind has been stuck here ever since, in between the treacherous slopes of the mountain and the undiggable ground patrolled by humans and their soulless machinery.
Too long has your kind lived in this confined sliver of space. Mazama pocket gophers such as yourself may be small, but they need room to dig, to build, to meander Earth’s dark places. As the saying goes, to confine a gopher is to stop the worms from crawling out of the dirt during a rain and dying in mud puddles. It is an impossibility.
Even as a young pup you heard the whispers of the Great Reclamation. Snippets of visions, patched together by a chosen few gophers over the ages, were stitched together to form this prophecy. But the final vision needed to complete the prophecy remained untold, and the tunnel forward remained blocked.
And so the years passed and the sprawling human compound, where the sacred grounds once lay, clawed its way ever closer to your hillside. Tree by tree was slayed, and gopher by gopher was butchered if they didn’t have the foresight to flee their tunnels in time. The compound grew and bizarre, boxish mountains millions of gopher-feet high and millions of gopher-feet long grew from the ground.
But this era of devastation may soon come to an end, for you had the final vision last week. The Great Reclamation prophecy will soon be complete! There is just one problem. The Mazama Code requires you, the Chosen Pocket Gopher, to carry out the quest. A quest from which you may not return.
Word of your quest spread quickly in the time leading up to today, and many fresh roots were deposited by your bedchamber last night. These roots gave you the energy to scramble down the hillside, where you stand now, and (with luck) to join the very hawks in the sky. Or so the prophecy goes.
You drag your limp, furry body between the base of a fern and a dry, scratchy bunch of grass, your whiskers finding the way. You sense a sudden shift in the temperature. Heavy waves of heat radiate toward you, causing you to flinch back. You cannot see more than a few feet in front of your tiny pink nose, but you know that you are on the precipice—just a few paces from where the undiggable ground begins. Go on, you tell yourself. Be like the weasel. Be like the fox. Be like the fearless marmot who lives high up on the mountainside.
You scuttle your baggy brown body along with your short, powerful legs until the canopy above parts and sunlight sears your dim, pitiful eyes, painting your vision a painful white. Again you hesitate, reluctant to leave the relative safety of the ferns and shrubbery and endlessly high fir trees. Ahead is doom: open space. Every instinct in your body tells you that you will not survive the infection of that thing they call bravery. Few gophers ever have. But the roots in your full belly—roots given up during hard times—sit like stones. Shame eventually moves you. To a pocket gopher—Earth’s most noble creature—shame is more powerful than the fear of disembowelment.
You scamper across the barren, black, undiggable ground—the ground that covers the memory of your ancestors like a molten river of genocide—with your heart practically up in your fur-lined cheek pockets, which are typically used to store food. You swallow instinctively and instead of forcing your heart back to where it belongs, down goes a tasteless chunk of tuber that you’d forgotten about. Shoot, I was saving that for later, you think.
Your pink feet and hardy claws patter and scratch on the hot, rough, unearthly surface. A looming sense of catastrophe hovers over you but there is nothing you can do about it, so you distract yourself with what’s below. You wonder if there are still tunnels beneath the black human-made rock. You imagine a network of deep, dark, and (above all) safe tunnels. Another network would be cut low in the earth, practically touching the surface, which could be used to graze the white succulents dangling within a whisker’s reach. But, of course, these ancestral tunnels have long since been compacted, flattened under the unthinkable weight of the dead rock ground you scamper across, which is heavier than the world itself.
Finally, you stop in the shade of a tall tree, out of breath and shaking with fatigue. No, not a tree. You sense that it is much longer and wider than any tree. Your whiskers explore, sending miniscule shock waves to your mind, which paints a picture clearer than any your eyes could see. The object is hard and smooth, somehow even more void of life than bleached bone. It is some type of mountain made by the humans. It’s one of those boxish mountains, you realize. You have never seen one of these mountains before; they have only been described to you, drawn in the dirt by those who had the misfortune of blindly stumbling upon one in the night (for that is when gophers roam). You explore more, squinting your miniscule eyes up at the structure, mouth agape, for some type of sign. There! On the side of the structure a contraption is drawn. It is some type of massive, tubeish bird-like creature with a bald head and tiny black slits for eyes. You understand that it is human-made, because nothing that heavy and odd looking could fly in the natural world.
If the prophecy is correct, this is the entry point to your final destination: the sky. You have always been unsure how a gopher could end up in the sky, but you have no more seconds to waste out in the open because a shadow passes over you. The fur on the back of your neck instinctually recognizes this fatal, feathery shadow. It is cast by a red-tailed hawk.
In terror, you search for an opening at the foot of the boxish mountain. The shadow above you vanishes as the hawk tucks, careening toward you at catastrophic speed. You need to take cover! There! A small crack in the side of the boxish mountain! You dive for it, squeeze through, skin and fur ripping at your sides against the sharp edges of the entrance. You pull your rear legs in behind you with a sudden jerk and there is a rush of air, a bang, and a frustrated screech of talons against the mountain side. The hawk screams in anger and a gleaming black beak twice the size of your head crams through the opening. The beak opens and a putrid tongue, pinker than an earthworm, protrudes. You scamper backward, urinating on yourself in fear. The beak thrashes against the walls of the entrance, forcing the hole ever wider, pushing through. It is just gopher inches from you and yet, you remain motionless, paralyzed with fear. Suddenly, the beak vanishes through the hole, there is a whoosh of wings, and the yell of a human from the other side of the mountain, who must have scared it off. Your heart is back up in your cheek pockets. There is nothing to swallow this time.
As you turn away from the entrance, your fear is replaced by wonder and disgust at the brightness inside this human-made box mountain. Aren’t the insides of mountains dark? There must be another sun in this odd world. The interior of this bad place is open, echoey. And, worst of all, it is undiggable, you note, scratching at the smooth rock surface, which is polished like river stone. Your nose also tells you there are humans about. You need to be on the move.
Loud human instruments of magic clank, hum, and explode with terrifying bellows as you sprint through the mountain’s endless insides. You run in a panic. Not quite a blind panic (your kind does not appreciate metaphors of blindness), but close to it. Your whiskers stop you before you run into a vague shape many gopher feet high and wide. You navigate its features with your whiskers and take a deep whiff of its acrid stench, a stench that reminds you of the smoke and melting sap from when you were a small pup and fire rushed across the earth’s surface as you sheltered in the tunnel dug by your mother.
Remember the prophecy, you tell yourself. When you come to machinery—a term and object you vaguely understand only because of your own prophecy—you must climb. You take hold of the vague machinery—its dimensions are beyond your vision, but then again almost everything is—and pull yourself up onto its lower slopes. Your balance is poor because you are not a climbing creature, but your energy reserves are full thanks to the roots provided by your compatriots. You make slow and careful progress, rising to a height that, should you fall, your soft body would explode on impact. The shout of a nearby human causes you to slip, and for a moment all seems lost. Your digging hands are strong, as is your grip, and you do not fall. You continue climbing, and the higher you go, the more confidence you build. You start to truly believe—to believe in the accuracy of the Great Reclamation prophecy and the success of your quest at taking back the stolen ground. How your kind will dig through that impenetrable black rock, you do not know, or have time to think of as you climb. Focus, you tell yourself. The fate of nearly 15 pocket gophers depends on your success.
You pull yourself into an entrance. With shaky muscles, you crawl—thankfully now in the dark—until you reach a dead-end. The box-shaped tunnel is slightly taller, and therefore less secure, than your tunnels on the hillside, but it will do. Feeling safe in the dark, you listen to your exhausted body and decide a short nap is in order. The early stages of your quest required bravery and death-defying speed. This middle part—you understand from your vision—requires the patience of a hibernating creature, of which you are not. But tunnels are your forte, and sleep comes easily.
Many days later, long after your hunger and thirst passed from need to obsession, movement wakes you. The earth trembles as if one of those magic human-movers is rumbling over the top of your tunnel, shaking the dirt ceilings loose and threatening a collapse. The trembling continues and now the entire world flips upside down and the floor becomes the ceiling, then the ceiling the wall. You grunt in pain and astonishment as your newly bony body bangs against the unnaturally hard surface. The world stills. Minutes pass before a shrill, hammering cacophony erupts. The hammering is so strong you feel the vibration through your feet, and the hair all over your body stands on end. Smoke fills the tunnel. You clap your hands over your ears against the noise and find that warm liquid is beading out. It is blood, and with every drop drains a mote of your hearing. You screech in pain and desperation. Your screeches weaken, not by lack of vocal cords, but by something else. By. . . deafness. All sound ceases, aside from a whining, harsh pitch that complains in the center of your brain. Consciousness fades.
You lose track of the days and your life becomes an endless series of dreams that are more memory than dream. These dream memories consist of your home tunnels, of your sisters and brothers when you were small, of your mother’s milk, of delicate forbs, grasses, and roots. Of accidentally mating with one of your sisters because of your bad eyesight. These dreams are rudely interrupted by deaf consciousness, pain in your ears and hollow stomach, the cold alien landscape of the too-large boxish tunnel, and the dead air that smells of sulfuric human magic and your own dried excrement. You relish sleep and the dreams it brings. Really, all that you relish is that death finds you quickly.
Death does arrive at your tunnel’s doorstep. Let it be over soon, you think. You are being lifted up. And up. And up. Peculiarly, your stomach, which now feels sick, seems to be back down on the floor. Wait. This isn’t right. If I’m dead, you wonder, why am I going. . . up? All Mazama pocket gophers know that in the end, one sinks down. Down into the earth. Mazama pocket gophers do not rise to the realm of hawks and the sun. Then you realize. This is it! You aren’t dead. This is the final act of your quest.
Stretching your back and hindquarters, you feel blood and life flow into your legs and feet. Your head clears and you make your way to the end of the tunnel as quickly as you can, which isn’t that quick given your weakened state and your short, stubby gopher legs. The floor of the tunnel shakes and vibrates, and the sensation of lifting up into the sky continues. You somehow know that this machinery in which you ride is somehow well above the fir trees, above the human-made box mountain in which it was previously contained, above the hillside where you were born, above the real mountain where the marmots frolic in the mist. Altitude was not a word in your vocabulary before today. But now, somehow, the word comes to you. You are gaining altitude.
The original entrypoint to the machinery is gone. The humans added another tunnel where that entrance was, back that day when you lost your hearing. Your whiskers find the way. They always do. Your legs follow, as they always do. You make turn after turn—far too many turns to count. At least five. The tunnel narrows and the walls shrink until the ceiling is at your back. You flatten yourself and push on, the confined space giving way to a vast room that, in the pitch black, your whiskers sense is larger than your bedchambers back on the hillside.
You search, running your whiskers along the wall, until you find what you’re looking for: a root. A thick, hard, bright red root nearly the width of your body. This is where your vision of the prophecy ended, but you do not need to be told what to do from here. You are a gopher, and this is a root.
You set your long, buck teeth into it. They sink in easily enough, but the root resists when you try to pull out the bite-sized chunk. The root casing stretches unnaturally and tastes like bitter poison. You are only slightly surprised. It is human-made, after all. Humans are a species made of poison. You take another bite, spit out the root casing, then take another. Soon a sizable portion of the root’s hardened bronze innards are exposed. This inner cord of the root is stone-like. But your teeth are strong. Your teeth are pocket-gopher-strong.
From Reuters
5/14/25
SEATTLE, Washington — Investigators finished their investigation of American Airlines flight 820, which crashed Monday, killing all 323 passengers and crew aboard. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, the crash was caused by faulty wiring at the tail of the plane. The elevator, which is the flap that controls a plane’s elevation, became unresponsive soon after takeoff. Boeing, the manufacturer of the 737 Max 8, has denied wrongdoing, calling for an immediate investigation into American Airlines’ maintenance prior to the flight.
American Airlines flight 820 departed Seattle at 9:23 a.m. for Los Angeles. Authorities say four minutes after takeoff, the pilot reported losing control. The Boeing 737 plummeted 8,000 feet into a raptor sanctuary one mile south of Interstate 5. Because the aircraft was transported, via the Puget Sound, from Boeing’s Everett factory to Seattle International Airport just three days prior to Monday’s tragedy, it was the jet’s first time in the air.
Federal investigators arrived in Everett Wednesday to tour the nearly 1,000 acre complex and were initially denied entry. Local police were called to the scene, arresting two security guards who were allegedly ordered to keep the gates closed for the next 24 hours because of an alleged rabies outbreak.
“We’ve had a number of strange rodents approach the facility in recent days,” said Boeing spokesperson Allen Plaintiff. “Two employees were bitten and are receiving care at Everett Community Hospital. We were happy to open our doors the moment things were cleared up.” One of the security guards, who wished to remain unnamed, claimed that the rabid rodent situation was merely a cover up story, and that Boeing was disposing of evidence at the time of the FAA search. The FAA has not commented on the matter.
On Thursday, Boeing stock took another major blow, dropping an additional 18 points when nearly a dozen of its safety inspectors resigned after Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun made a public announcement that it was not his idea to cut funds for quality control measures in 2014. Boeing, one of only two major airline manufacturers in the world, has been struggling ever since Lion Air flight 610 crashed in 2019, killing all 189 people on board. Outside analysts have called this latest crash, which was the deadliest day of American aviation since 9/11, the final straw for Boeing. “Another plane down, another out and out lie issued by Dave Callhoun,” said Karen Simile, one of the 11 safety inspectors who walked off the job Thursday. “It seems almost like groundhog day around here.”
An internal company memo reports that Boeing’s Everett factory may be temporarily closing due to financial constraints. . .
KENNETT PETERSON 