Five minute free write (sort of) - Whiteboard

This started as a Five Minute Free Write but ended up as something a lot more...

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The classroom was clean and bright. Fresh sunlight streamed in from broad windows that lined one side. Kids sat in their chairs watching the teacher who stood in front of a large whiteboard. Across the top was written in big, dark, bold letters finished with an exclamation point.

'THE CRAZY YEARS!'

'Teacher...?' came a curious voice from somewhere near the front.

'Yes Tim?'

'Did people really used to throw garbage into the oceans and try and cut down all the trees?'

'Yes. It was a crazy time in our history. People were obsessed with something called, money. They didn't like science and didn't believe it when scientists said they were destroying the planet. Something about not enough proof. Lots of people wanted to do stuff, but they didn't, or rather, couldn't because they didn't have enough money to compete with those who did.' The teacher took a green marker and wrote down, 'dollar.'

'Wait, what was money?' came the same curious voice.'

'It was how people paid for things like food, doctors, and a place to live. It started as a way for people to exchange goods on a large scale. A value system for goods and services.'

'But...people had to pay for those? Aren't those the things that people need just to live?'

'Yes, back during the crazy years people had to work to live.'

'Work to live?'

'Yes. If they wanted to eat, they had to work. If they wanted a roof over their head they had to get a job. If they got sick and wanted to get healthy, well, they needed money.'

Another voice, from further back in the room, 'but didn't they have the technology and supply to give those to people for free? Robots, computers, and stuff like that?'

'Yes, Chie, but the world was based on money. And the prevailing philosophy was that if people didn't work they would be lazy and the world would fall apart. That the people who did work would have to pay for all the people who didn't.'

'But...that doesn't make any sense. If people didn't work, wouldn't they be happier, like we are now, and do things that they wanted to? When people do things they like to do, don't they do much better at it? Like, when they don't have to always be scared about not eating? I mean, there are plenty of people who don't work now...but that's ok...and there are lots of people who do a lot of work...and that's ok...'

'That's true. But many people during the Crazy Years were scared about not having money. It was a deep rooted fear of the unknown. What would happen if suddenly people were happy and not scared. Would people become lazy? Would the world fall apart? Would society be able to survive?'

The teacher took another color, blue this time, and while writing the word 'environment' began to speak again.

'It was finally the tipping point, like what Tim pointed out, about the oceans and the forests, that finally forced people to change. It was the desire for this money, the most popular of which was the dollar, that finally forced a portion of the population to stop those who wanted so much of it. The earth had almost come to the end of it's life. Life got very, very, very hard for a lot of people.'

'What happened?' called another voice.

The teacher looked away for a minute. The sun shining outside couldn't hide the dark look that crossed across their face.

'A lot of very bad things...but necessary things. There was a period of time where a lot of things were unknown. Money lost it's value, people fought to live....many died. But in the end a new system formed. One that allowed everyone to live how they wanted to live without the worry of those old fears. The hungry ate, the homeless were given a place to live, the sick were cured.'

A different color this time, 'community.'

'We began to see things like our ancestors saw things. We realized that the old ways weren't bad ways. What we thought was savage was actually more civilized than we had ever been. Sure, life had to change. The luxury that some used to have was no longer something we as a civilization could maintain, but we could raise the standard of the entire planet because of it. And, science could still move forward, without the constraints of wondering how to make money with it. It could be used to benefit all of society, not just some. We realized that if we acted as a responsible community, that if we loved our neighbor as we loved ourselves, we could be a better people for it.'

'But what about all the hate? I remember reading in books about it. Why did people hate each other so much?' came Tim's voice again.

The teacher pointed back at the green word, 'dollar.' 'When people didn't have to fight for this anymore things became a lot simpler. Money wasn't just used to buy things, it was used to control people and to create a divide which made people hate each other, but at the same time made more money for a small group. It was...' pausing for a minute while deciding the words, 'fucked up.'

A gasp in the room, and then giggles.

'I'm sorry, but there's no other way to describe it. The idea of money, specifically the dollar, brought so much pain to our entire species, well, all the species of our planet for so long. Wars were fought, people were killed, in the name of many things, but at the root was money. Once we reached a certain level of technology money was no longer necessary. But the old guard, I mean the ones who had a lot and wanted to keep it, refused to let it be implemented on the scale that would elevate society, not just a select few. It was also hard for a lot of people to accept that work wasn't necessary to live. Which is understandable after so many thousands of years of requiring it.'

'So, even though people didn't have to work, they still wanted to?' Chie asked.

'Well, wanted to might not be the best way to describe it. Felt like they had to. It wasn't going to be an easy step to bring the world in line and make sure everyone could live without working, but it was definitely a necessary step. We were at a tipping point...past many tipping points, in actuality. Work was life, the only way of life, that so many knew. The very idea that they didn't have to was pretty unbelievable. Like science fiction. But, what happened between when the great water wars started and when the war for arable land ended...people were ready to believe. Ready to believe a thousand times over. They were sick and tired of being slaves to a system that didn't benefit them and tired of being distracted from reality. There were only so many ways to keep people from thinking about the whole they were digging themselves into.'

The teacher took another marker, this time black, and wrote in big block letters finished with a smiley face, 'the future.'

'This is yours. The future. It's up to you to decide what is to become of our species. You here in this classroom. Each and every one of you has the ability to change the world for the better. Or worse, if you so decide. You have all the lessons of the past from which to learn. You can see the good we've done, the bad we've done, all the mistakes and all the successes. Luckily we've learned some of the most important lessons...at least for now. We don't know what the next challenge will be. Now that we're free of the shackles of money, destroying the environment, and focused on humanity as a single community, we're not sure what's next. It's all up to you.'

'Up to us? The future? That's a lot of responsibility...' came a nervous voice. 'What if we mess up?'

With a smile and a little laugh, the teacher set down the marker and looked back at the whiteboard, then at the class of young hopeful faces. 'Then hopefully you'll be able to learn from your mistakes so that your children will do better.'

---

So, like I said, this started as a five minute free write for another of @mariannewest's prompts that are so fun to play with but it grew into something more.

I was sitting in the arena in Reno, Nevada waiting for the next round of AKC Agility trials (dog competition stuff) and wanted to get some writing in. Since there was no internet I had to rely on a stopwatch to time my five minutes out. I had had this idea about a classroom since I read the prompt a couple of days previous. It was a vague, undefined idea that only really came into focus once I clicked the start button on my phone.

The words started to come out

...and the first question was starting to get asked when I saw I had only 1 minute left. Even when it hit zero I felt there were so many more words I wanted to line up so I decided to continue. I'm really glad I did. I know it seems like a vague idea of a philosophy, so utopian, no details on actual action, like an idealist. But it served many purposes for me.

Dialogue has been a problem for me. How do you incorporate it naturally? How do you pull out certain people in a scene? How can you use it to characterize people in the story? Do you add adjectives? What're good ways to add inflection? Ugh...the questions are endless. And this was I think my second real attempt...the first being earlier today on a different free write post.

The second...about the philosophy behind all this...everybody needs to start somewhere with their ideas and espousing them...I'm tired of a lot of things in this world and so I'm in the process of figuring out exactly what I believe. This kind of writing helps with that. It acts as an experiment to expand on thoughts, work through logic, figure out the narrative...all that jazz. As for solutions...damn...if I'm still figuring out what I'm trying to do, please don't expect me to know how to do it...yet. Stuff like that takes time.

It's late here in Reno and I gotta be up early for the drive back to LA with the family. I hope you enjoyed the story and would love to hear what you have to think about it :)

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