As Travelers in Sky Boats

by Kristin Janz

My sister blames the Travelers. Before they came, she says, we were content within the small world we knew. No one wondered what lay beyond the flat blue horizon where ocean met sky, or who journeyed between the stars. Children never complained that there was an easier way to mend fishing nets, that they did not like the taste of seaweed. Men did not abandon responsibilities to pursue the impossible fantasy of becoming Travelers themselves.

One rainy night, when both she and the water leaking through our roof were keeping me awake, I told her that she sounded like a Traveler when she spoke that way. Who was she--or they--to tell me how I should live, what I could know or not know?

She did not speak to me the rest of that night or most of the day that followed. I did not enjoy her silence as much as I had expected to.