Windmill Story

This was one of my many attempts to depict machines enslaving humanity through social/psychological means rather than military ones. By having one of the machines be a windmill, I ended up exploring the much broader theme of people getting so lost in their work that they lose sight of what they're working for. I started the story with intentions of entering it in the Kalamazoo Gazette's annual literary contest, but abandoned it because I found it difficult to stay within the contest's word limit. The red text part way in is a bit of dialogue I considered deleting and replacing with the narration in the following paragraph (trying to reduce my length).

     Raff Volker took a last look up the narrow staircase to the apartment where he'd lived for thirty years. After a moment he snorted contemptuously. To even consider missing the place was ridiculous. Good riddance.
     Raff emerged from the tower and shivered at the cool wind in its shadow. He didn't notice the familiar winds of the windmill's blades slicing the air as he looked over his farm. His weathered face resembled the muddy ruts of his wheat field. He sighed.
     "Mynheer Volker."
     Raff looked towards the voice. A young man was crossing the gully that fed the windmill's pumps. He waved.
     "Do I know you?"
     "No, mynheer," the young stranger replied. "My name is Lucas Van Eider. I heard a rumor that you're selling your land. Is it true?"
     Raff considered the question. Money might be a good idea. He may last longer than he expected...
     "No," the old man finally answered, shaking his head. "I can't take money for this." He gestured to the windmill. "I am leaving, though. Take it if you want." Raff turned away and headed up the grassy embankment he'd made a home for so long.
     "But--" Lucas stammered, chasing the farmer, "I've never even run a windmill! Couldn't you at least--"
     "The neighbors can tell you everything you need to know," Raff answered. He climbed into a tiny fishing boat moored on the canal behind his windmill. "The Schummels. Good people."
     With that Raff untied the boat and drifted lazily towards the sea. He settled in and admired the vessel. He had bought it long ago and barely used it. He missed fishing.
     Raff felt bad about being so abrupt with Lucas. How confused the poor boy must be! But Raff had given enough time to that farm. His best years. It was time to be free.

*     *     *     *

     Jerry hated public places. They were full of people, and people stared. People saw your ragged clothes and shaggy beard, and guessed you were poor. People judged.
     Books don't judge. Books were good to Jerry. Jerry loved books, and wanted nothing more than to grab one from the library shelf and read it. But he didn't have time. (Actually, a casual observer could argue that Jerry had nothing but time--an abundance of it--if casual observers made a habit of arguing.)
     Instead, Jerry passed the bookshelves and found a place to sit with his laptop. He carefully removed the computer from its carrying case, making sure not to bump it against anything. After all, it represented a great deal of money he would've spent on food were it not for a social worker's insistence that he use the Internet to find a job. There was a resource center with computers for people like Jerry to use, but the hours were limited. Jerry had recently missed an interview because he got an e-mail too late. And the library computers were for people with library cards; you needed an address to get a library card.
     The best Jerry could do was an e-mail address. He had a few, plus accounts on almost every social/professional networking website. Checking and updating them all took so long that he didn't finish until the library was closing. Jerry gathered his things, gazed longingly at the bookshelves, and left. When he had a job, an apartment, a refrigerator full of food...then there would be time for books.

*     *     *     *

     The Schummels were indeed good people. When Lucas went to their house and told them what had happened, they immediately invited him in for supper.
     "I still can't believe it," Lucas exclaimed, pausing to nod thanks to Sophia Schummel as she set a plate in front of him. "To just give your land to a complete stranger!"
     "Raff didn't have any family to leave it to," said Jasper, the man of the house.
     "Why not sell the place, then?"
     "Probably didn't think he'd be able to spend it," said Sophia. "Poor man had one foot in the grave."
     From there they discussed the workings of the Volker farm--the Van Eider farm, now--with Jasper promising to show Lucas around in the morning.
     At the table they explained that Raff Volker's health was failing, and that he had no family to leave his land to. His kindness, it seemed, was nothing more than a late retirement. Jasper Schummel, a wheat farmer himself, promised to show Lucas around in the morning, leaving the rest of the evening for friendly conversation. Lucas told the Schummels about himself, and they reciprocated. They discovered mutual aquaintances and common interests, laughed, and simply enjoyed each other's company.
     Lucas was happy Raff had sent him here. The young man's mother had died the previous winter, and he had lived alone ever since. The hard work of ekeing out a living gave him little chance to socialize. It was the first night in a long while that Lucas felt like part of the human race. He grew particularly fond of the Schummel's daughter Katrina, a lovely girl a few years younger than him.  Lucas went home (or rather to the windmill apartment, which he would have to call home eventually)with a full stomach and a better idea of what he wanted from life.

*     *     *     *

     Jerry's diligence didn't seem to be paying off. It had been a year and a half and he had only found temporary jobs. His current one, planting flowers in a greenhouse, had forced him to move his computer work to a fast food chain nearby. He had to admit being able to eat and surf the web simultaneously saved time, but didn't like that he had to keep buying food throughout the day to avoid being ejected.

     With the planting season almost over, Jerry was getting frantic about finding another job. Adding to his frustrations was the decreasing speed of his computer. He did everything to speed it up: frequent virus scans, defragmenting, deleting the extraneous files that build up over time. He even tried to avoid bogging the system down with software updates, but the insistent notifications always coerced him eventually. Maintaining his computer consumed all his free time, and the only alternative was spending the little money he had on a new one.

*     *     *     *

     It was Lucas van Eider’s first harvest, and the land was good to him. Passersby on leisurely bicycle rides enjoyed the sight of the gentle breeze blowing through the wheat field; Lucas did not. In his first day of harvesting he cut only a tenth of his field. Looking out over the rest was depressing. He brooded over this briefly on the second morning, then got down to business. There was no time to waste.
     In an hour he filled his little hand-drawn cart and set off to the nearest grist mill. By the time he returned with a second load the first would be ground into meal he could take to market. When he got back the second load would be finished and he would take that to market before finally returning home for a third. It was this process that made the work go so slowly; he would need a horse or a canal boat when he could afford it.
     Shortly after leaving his farm, Lucas noticed the gully running high. He peered back to his windmill and saw the blades turning slowly and sporadically. With a groan, he abandoned his cart and jogged home. His mill was an older design without a fantail. To catch the wind properly, Lucas had to rotate the tower’s cap manually. Otherwise, the pump would slow and the gully overflow.
     It was an hour to dusk when Lucas brought his third load to the grist mill. Thinking it better to wait than go home, he perched on his cart and watched the millers work. Many millers, he knew, were themselves farmers who needed someplace to grind their grain. Doing it for others was merely a side business; they took part of their customers’ product for payment. It would be nice, Lucas thought in passing, to have a grist mill closer to home.
     As he began his last trip to market, Lucas realized he hadn’t eaten all day. He had a standing dinner invitation at the Schummels’ house during the harvest (Sophia kindly realized the bachelor wouldn’t want to cook after his day’s work), but it was getting late. He wouldn’t make it tonight---or any night, probably.

*     *     *     *

     “You tap here when you arrive at the job, and here when you’re leaving. They can tell if you’re lying because of the GPS.”
     The man training Jerry for his new job as a cable installer was showing him a smart phone application used to log employee hours. It was Jerry’s first day shadowing an experienced coworker. As excited as he was to have a coworker, this new development worried him.
     “There’s no other way to clock in? I mean, you need a smart phone?”
     “They’ve got loaners you can use, if you don’t make personal calls. Any other questions so far?”
     “Hmm,” Jerry pondered. “Oh! Where do I get all the paperwork I need, for taxes and health insurance and such?”
     “That’s all done online now. Cheaper to process that way.”
     After work, Jerry returned to the transitional housing he’d finally qualified for and quickly got on the Internet. He typed in the address he was given and waited as the page slowly loaded. First the background colors, then the headings, body copy… Just when it looked like he’d “arrived”, a notification appeared. A program needed to be updated before he could proceed. He impatiently accepted the update, and another message popped up. The computer didn’t have enough RAM.
     Jerry smacked his forehead. He could really use a book right about now.

*     *     *     *

     The harvest came late in Lucas van Eider’s third year on the farm, due primarily to some minor ailments. It had, at least, given him time to spend with Katrina Schummel, who helped nurse him back to health. Nevertheless, the chill of winter hung in the air as he hauled his crop to the grist mill, and he inevitably was caught in a downpour of sleet and hail on the way back from the market. Water filled the brim of his hat like a bowl and sloshed out; he periodically tipped his cart to empty it. Lucas kept his head bowed to avoid the stinging hail, and because of this noticed once again that he gully was running high.
     Very, very high.
     Lucas dropped the handles of his cart and ran as fast he could towards home. The image flashed through his mind over and over again: earlier in the year he had seen the trails of burrowing animals in his dike.
     His dike, which his windmill sat upon.
     His dike, which held back the waters of the canal.

*     *     *     *

     The following year was a long one for Lucas Van Eider. He had a dike to repair and land to reclaim from the sea. He had also resolved to build his own grist mill. The projects filled his days and put him in the debt of an Amsterdam banker. giving urgency to his work. His fields were planted too late for a complete harvest, and he had no energy to spare for his (largely imagined) courtship of Katrina. She was, in fact, engaged to marry Tom, the contractor who helped Lucas build his grist mill. Though it was months away, Lucas had already decided not to attend the wedding. He would be busy lubricating his gears.

For whatever reason I dropped the story there and made a brief attempt to rewrite it from the beginning. I find the fact that it ends mid-sentence both hilarious and depressing.

     Lucas Van Eider was poor.
     It was, he sometimes felt, his defining characteristic. When one puts all of their efforts into trying to scrape together a living, there's little time left for developing a personality. One can't waste energy on hobbies and curiosity and socializing. Dreaming is mostly confined to matters of food and shelter. It was only in those rare moments spent savoring the thin broth of his supper that Lucas could let his mind drift to greener pastures.
     Even then, his goals were vague at best. Perhaps he'd like a wife; his tiny cottage on the outskirts of Amsterdam had seemed improbably big since his mother died the previous winter. He would need money to woo and then provide for a woman; needing money meant needing steady work.
     It was with all these things in mind that Lucas decided to investigate a rumor he'd heard in the market. An old wheat farmer with no family was leaving his work. He was, according to the rumor, looking to sell his land--and the windmill which kept it dry--for a low price. It sounded like a promising beginning for Lucas's future.
     Knowing such an opportunity wouldn't last, Lucas quickly set out to find the place. The cobblestone road he'd been directed to led out of the city before becoming a dirt trail, following the bank of