Record of a Spaceborn Few (Wayfarers, #3)

by Becky Chambers

The words I don’t need you made a part of her shrivel in on itself, but then, wasn’t that the point of being a parent? To help them need you less and less?

People got so hung up on what a thing had been, rather than what it was now.

Perhaps none of us can truly explain death. Perhaps none of us should.

What was better – a constant safeness that never grew and never changed, or a life of reaching, building, striving, even though you knew you’d never be completely satisfied?

Make sure people remember that a closed system is a closed system even when you can’t see the edges.’

‘Our species doesn’t operate by reality. It operates by stories. Cities are a story. Money is a story. Space was a story, once. A king tells us a story about who we are and why we’re great, and that story is enough to make us go kill people who tell a different story. Or maybe the people kill the king because they don’t like his story and have begun to tell themselves a different one. When our planet started dying, our species was so caught up in stories. We had thousands of stories about ourselves – that’s still true, don’t forget that for a minute – but not enough of us were looking at the reality of things. Once reality caught up with us and we started changing our stories to acknowledge it, it was too late.’

‘We are a longstanding species with a very short memory. If we don’t keep record, we’ll make the same mistakes over and over.

‘Do you know why people – why Humans started heading out into the open? Oh, there was lots of military posturing involved, no mistake, but the true believers, the ones who couldn’t bear the thought of not going out there – that’s where they thought they’d find answers. They said, hey, we haven’t got the context right. We need a sample size bigger than one lonely planet if we’re ever going to understand any of this. And in many ways, they were right. We found other people out here, so that question got answered. We found out that life isn’t rare. We’ve learned exponentially more about how planets work and how physics works, and the technology we have today would’ve blown their minds. We understand the galaxy in a way we never could have if we hadn’t left. But the big question – the end-all, be-all question – well, that’s still up for discussion. Why? What’s the point? Kip, there isn’t a sapient species living or dead that hasn’t grappled hard with that. It scares us. It makes us panic, just like you’re panicking now. So if the lack of a point is what’s bothering you, if it’s making you want to kick the walls and tear your hair out, well, welcome to the party.’

You need to reframe this frustration you’re feeling. If what you’re saying is that you don’t see a life for yourself here, that the kind of work you want to do or the experiences you want to have aren’t available in the Fleet, then by all means, go. But if the only reason you want to do it is because you’re looking for a point, you’re going to end up miserable. You’ll float around forever trying to make peace with that.’

Give me someone who wants it and had to work for it any day.’

Go wherever calls to you. And maybe you’ll find out that life out there is good, that it suits you. Maybe you’ll find that thing you’re missing. Maybe not. What you will find, no question, is perspective. What that perspective is, I have no idea. But you’ll find one. Otherwise, you’ll only ever think about other people in the abstract. That’s a poisonous thing, thinking your way is all there is. The only way to really appreciate your way is to compare it to somebody else’s way. Figure out what you love, specifically. In detail. Figure out what you want to keep. Figure out what you want to change. Otherwise, it’s not love. It’s clinging to the familiar – to the comfortable – and that’s a dangerous thing for us short-term thinkers to do.