Goldilocks Music and Book Preview

Frankie had made up her mind before she had even walked out of the room, and she knew the word boredom would never again be a part of her vocabulary.

Had she been given one hour to sign the contract, it would be done.

But she was given six months.

When she returned to her work, her meet-ups with friends, her normality, she started to waver.  It was as if a lightning bolt had shot through her, setting afire and resetting all her senses.  Like a near-death experience, but this was a near-life experience.  It pressed all her buttons and excited her to the core.  An epiphany.  An awakening.  A spiritual zenith.

But this experience had a surprising and unexpected consequence… she started actually enjoying her old life, as if reborn.  As the weeks rolled into months, she had to step back from the excitement and extremes of the path offered to her, and start a process of unwinding how and why she felt so previously frustrated, and currently settled.  It perplexed her.

She started psycho-analysing who she was.  Self-reflection through the clearest of mirrors that she had never experienced before.  Who am I?

Six months was a clever time-frame, as it was just enough to get back to experiencing her past frustrations.  She began to see both paths of her future more clearly and weighed the two options in a balanced, unemotional debate inside her head.  Two doorways.   One the passive default, the other an outlier, full of unknown danger.

Strangely, to Frankie, both felt like an extreme option.

Taking the decision to join the program in the first hour would have been easy.  But not brave. It would have been impulsive, adrenaline-driven, and foolish.

Making the decision after six months in the cold light of day took the most courage she ever had to muster.

Her friends helped her.  But not in the way they had hoped.  Their shock and amazement were initially noisy and tiring -  the expected “you are mad to even consider such a thing” lines gradually descended into all the things she would never be able to have in her life -  throwing away the chance of a family, her own home, a secure and happy future.  And the list of reasons grew.

Frankie realised that her friends were actually listing all the things in life that she never wanted.

Unwittingly, they helped her decision move in the opposite of their intended direction.

But taking that fateful decision and crossing the line was still too hard.  And slowly the six-month clock counted down the months, weeks, and now days.

She decided to do something unusual for her.  Contact an old friend for her opinion. 

Sam lived on the other side of the country, and they had not communicated now for many years.  It was not a falling out or a deliberate choice on either part, but Frankie was absorbed in her studies and work over the years, and Sam was …well …Sam.  Radical, unconventional, rebellious, quite brilliant, and a strong and often controversial personality.  She didn’t play by anyone’s rules and lived an off-grid life with her hippy family.  Frankie’s circle of friends greatly disapproved of her.  Frankie thought the world of her.

She decided to take a few days off and travel down to visit and surprise her.  The journey in itself would cleanse her, but she really needed a second opinion -  from someone she respected.

The re-union was joyous, tearful, amazed.  They had become so different, but they both respected their differences and celebrated them.  Sam’s partner and kids had an aura of calm and peace she had rarely seen.  The lifestyle Sam had chosen was the right one.

A long evening around a campfire, eating, drinking, and finally smoking weed (Frankie thought, damn why not), and the whole story unfolded.

Sam listened, but never gave an opinion.  Only understanding, nodding, deep in thought.  But no help could be given.  She did not feel qualified to give an opinion of something so dramatic and extreme.

Frankie fell asleep later, glad she had travelled down, but disappointed (and understanding) of the response.

The next morning, before Frankie set off, Sam said, “You can’t go without saying hi to Mum.”

Frankie’s parents had both died when she was a teen, from a tragic vehicle accident, two victims from a disastrous software glitch known as The Cascade.

Autonomous air, ground, and sea transportation had for decades become safe and trusted.  So trusted, in fact, that the management of shared global positioning systems and automated routing infrastructure had become a background of impossibly large digital networks, managed by robots, and perceived as fail-safe.

That all changed when the smallest of imperfect code -  a mere 128 bytes -  lying dormant deep in the heart of the Primary Node -  was activated, causing catastrophic failures and cascading throughout the planet’s networks, resulting in thousands of deaths and injuries in moments.  Frankie’s parents’ car suddenly swerved off the road and plunged down a ravine into a river.

Sam’s parents were a comfort through those tough years, and although only her mother remained, Frankie was eager to see her and talk of the past.

But Sam’s motive for inviting  Frankie was not so they could catch up for a friendly chat, but something far more deeper.

The care home she lived in was for greater needs residents.  Sam’s mother was a thin, gaunt shadow of Frankie’s memory, and Frankie was shocked to realise that there was no recognition in her eyes.  Alzheimer’s was at an advanced state, and Sam’s mother just asked Frankie the same question over and over again, “Where am I?”

Frankie was saddened, and contemplated the cruelty of time.

After spending time with her mother, Sam took Frankie around to visit the other residents.  She seemed to know all of them and stopped to talk to each one, asking how they were, what they were doing today, and when the  family last visited.

Frankie saw a side of Sam she had never seen before.  Tenderness, caring, and real interest in each resident.

She also saw the true journey’s end.  Residents with no visitors, abandoned by uncaring families.  Mental and physical disabilities that shocked her, as she had never seen old age on this scale.  And society mostly hides this phase of human life.

Her parents died relatively young, and so she never experienced the often painful and heartbreaking journey most people witness caring for parents when they start failing physically and mentally, and the awful moment they are taken away from their family home into care.  That is when many people are first exposed to the prospect of how they will wind up later in life.

Looking at all the residents in their vulnerable state was a sad and powerful moment.  She had never seen or ever considered seeing anyone at this stage of their lives.  It had a deep impact on her and almost made her ashamed of her previous lack of thought or understanding.

When Frankie left to travel home, she thanked Sam for her wisdom.  “I’ve made up my mind.”