In Dr. Gregory Benford’s novel The Stars in Shroud, the Quarm have infected humanity with a psychological disease. Although Ling emerges from this state of perpetual fear, his wife and children still suffer from it. This disease induced the colonists on Regeln to leave their comfortable homes and dig holes to hide in. The majority of the Earth’s population must battle their fear to even walk the interior corridors of their apartment buildings. Ling’s wife Angela begs him to allow their children Chark and Romana to be programmed by the government: better life as a functioning drone, she argues, than a life spent cringing inside their rooms, with nothing more than the TV for company.
In order to find a solution to humanity’s dilemma, and thus to secure a better life for his children, Ling leaves his family and travels to the faraway planet of Veden. The Hindic peoples there seem strangely unaffected by the Quarm plague. Yet civic unrest has risen lately. During an outbreak of violence, Ling rescues a young woman named Rhandra. She seems so weak and fragile that she reminds him of a bird that crashed into his window at home (and consequently died). As Rhandra has no safe place to return to, his heart goes out to her, and he lets her live in his house. Time and familiarity weave their spell:
“It did not happen that evening, or the one thereafter, but there was a glacial momentum to the event which gradually made the expectation of it fill the air between us, like a thin fog through which we spoke.”
Thankfully, I have never been forced, by the necessities of work or military service, to spend long periods apart from my spouse. While I’ve wrestled with depression, I’ve never faced one so dark as Ling endured, nor did I have to face it alone. Ling’s aims are noble, but his quest to discover a cure for humanity isolates him from family and friends, and the religion that fulfills him.
As we enter into the holiday season, perhaps we should use Ling’s experiences to reflect upon those relationships most precious to us. Life has a way of confounding us with unanticipated developments: opportunities that seem like heaven-sent solutions to a problem can later cause us no end of tribulation. While love and concern will always prompt us to reach out to others in need, those relationships most precious to us must be protected against threats of any kind. Everyday, we must do what we can to nourish and strengthen them.
If not, we risk losing those most precious to us.
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| "A Beloved Family" |
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