JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 12: A SHOCKING Change of Direction

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways...

"the rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale"

…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.
When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”
I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”
We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!”

Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings continues below.

Felix Jax, youngest member of the Jax Family Youth Coalition and it’s undisputed leadership. “A solution to the troubling problem of the test pilots – both AI and Human – to experience profound…not to put it delicately or dance around it, bouts of suicidal depression and a tendency to kill themselves before being debriefed upon their return from brief forays into interstellar space.”

Someone behind me muttered, “I’d be happy to debrief Felix.” I turned to scowl at several of his birth cohort, male, female, and trans-either-way. They uniformly cringed, fingers twitching enough for me to be pretty sure they were have trouble reconciling their desire to curry favor with me…or be violently dealt with by Felix. “Watch it, kids.” I whispered, then grunted and turned back to the meeting. I raised my hand.

Felix nodded to me, smirking. He’d heard the commentary and raised both brows. I said, “As a former member of the test pilot cohort, I’d like to ask everyone here to give me your absolutely serious attention.” I shot a glance over my shoulder and the “peanut gallery” settled down. I searched for Tiananmen – aka “Gate of Heavenly Peace”, or HP for short – found her and nodded.

She stood, walking forward. She removed a blonde wig and with a flick of her hand, resolved the hologram mask over her face.

Her old face reappeared and most of the people in the meeting gasped. She stopped not far from me and said, “I’m not back from the dead, just back from some serious counseling.” No one spoke, though most of them could have. Everyone in the room had spoken for or against her inclusion in our FTL program at one time or another.

“I know you all believed that I killed myself because of what I came face-to-face with after making a record number of jumps to interstellar space.” Lots of nods, more wide-eyed-amazement. There were even faces that displayed sheer horror. I nodded to Tiananmen. “I didn’t kill myself. I faked my death in order to talk with Felix and Grandpa about the future of Jax Lunar Lumber and the exploration of Strange New Worlds.” She shot me a look. We both had come to enjoy a century-old flattie “television program”, re-engineered in full-immersive ThreeDee.”

I raised a finger. Her dark skin turned maroon in embarrassment and she nodded. Clearing her throat, she said, “In case you are unfamiliar with…”

Felix said, “We all know your infatuation with that moldy-old show of Grandpa’s. Just get on with it!”

She lifted her chin. “You and I can have a very important conversation later, Cousin.” Felix blanched. He’d inherited nearly translucently pale skin that blushed a spectacular pink. Which he hated and Tiananmen loved to set off at every opportunity. She continued as if nothing had happened, “Oddly, the strange new world we have a chance to explore not only for the family and Jax Lunar Lumber, but also for all of Humanity; happens to need us.” She paused as everyone leaned forward to hear the wonderful news, she continued, “But, unprepared in every way, the trip to the world will kill you. Just as it killed me. I’d have died if the Aliens hadn’t been waiting for me the moment I popped out of transspace.” There was silence. She smiled, looked at me, adding, “And we’ll need the total cooperation of Master Cheat and All-around Pain-in-our-collective-posterior, Sturdlan Vilbix.”

The Board Room exploded in the jeers, catcalls, boos, and an amazing calling-down-of-curses.

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/ ; https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html

Image: https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/YkAeUwwE2aksDqd5tgwyec-970-80.jpg.webp

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 11: Lumber…but THAT’S not all!

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways

The rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.

When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”

I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”
We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!” Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings continues below.

When we met a couple weeks later, I strode into the Jax Lunar Lumber Hall, laid my compad gently on the table and said, “We have a bigger problem than I thought – and we have a huge opportunity.” That got the Board’s attention, young, old and in-between. “Turns out, the Moon has a shortage.” Their regard intensified. “While we seem to have a growing market for Lunar-grown lumber, wood, and other products, we’ve profoundly overlooked a secondary – but eventual primary source of not only income, but usefulness to Lunar civilization.”

One of the Middle-Aged Jax Board Members, Pahnnik, lifted a hand and said, “Lithium.”

I smiled, adding, “Take it away, Pahn.”

He nodded, stood, and went to the holotank. “We already know that our control of the Moon Trees – for posterity, of course.” His smile would have have been only slightly more frightening if he’d had his teeth capped with points. As it was, a few of the more timid members of the family fell backward into their seats. I raised my brows to encourage him. He said, “The Moon Trees, while the obvious foundation of our corporation here, and one I have no trouble encouraging as I have come to rather enjoy breathing since I was born,” he flashed the smile. I was glad to see that over half of us weren’t being fooled by his folksy pitch, leaning forward, folding our hands, gaze narrowing a bit, and resting our chins on hands folded into fists. He blew from his nose faintly, irritated, and continued, “It turns out they might have a more…concentrated use.”

He looked to me and bowed slightly. With my obvious approval assured to the family Board, I said, “I’ll let Pahnnik continue. It’s a good idea – maybe even helpful for Lunar civilization.”

He tapped the table in front of him and sat as an image appeared in front of us, “Simply put, agromining describes a process that uses plants to extract metals from soil. The process ideally harvests metals from high biomass crops which grow in metal rich soils, particularly those associated with sub-economic mineralization. The crop is harvested, and incinerated, leaving behind a high-grade bio-ore. In some cases, we can use the heat from incineration to feed into other processing, like distillation, purification, and even heating. Agromining offers the possibility of exploiting metal rich soil substrates that are otherwise uneconomic to mine. In our case, we’d be recovering lithium.”

“For batteries?” said Felix, the youngest member of the Board at seventeen. Gengineered and trained in esoteric mathematics; a sort of biocomputer, so to speak, he freaked out his peers while also being devastatingly handsome and funnier than most HV comedians.

“Certainly, but lithium has some fairly toxic effects on Humans,” said Shantell-Alberta, one of the Senior Members. “I’d hardly call that a ‘market boon’.”

“In and of itself, it’s not. However, since research on Faster-Than-Light drive has cast a fairly large net, lithium’s use to deal with various mental health challenges – mostly in the past, but some that continue even today – has brought it to the attention of the FTL Drive Center.”

Shantell-Alberta’s only-slightly-younger twin sister, Bernice-Coretta, shook her head, rolling her eyes. “By which you mean, you grabbed the Director’s hand and led him to a fancy dinner?”

ShanA, as she was known to her sister during less-formal arguments, said, “Bernie, your political acumen astounds me. Of course I did. It aligns us with the future of Humanity among the stars!” She flicked her fingers at her much-younger cousin.

But Felix interrupted, “And it’s a solution.“ He paused. Lots of frowns, irritation, and obvious to me, avid looks from the Youth Coalition Felix led. “A solution to the troubling problem of the test pilots – both AI and Human – to experience profound…shall we say, bouts of suicidal depression and a tendency to suicide before being debriefed upon their return from brief forays into interstellar space.”

Someone behind me muttered, “I’d be happy to debrief Felix.” I turned, scowling, to scowl at several of his birth cohort.

They uniformly cringed, fingers twitching enough for me to be pretty sure they were have trouble reconciling their desire to curry favor with me…or be violently dealt with by the commentator. “Watch it, kids.” I grunted, and turned back to the meeting.

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/ ; https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html; https://www.ancestry.com/first-name-meaning/jax#:~:text=The%20name%20Jax%20traces%20its,name%20in%20its%20own%20right.; https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3263/8/2/56 ; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_(medication)

Image: https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/YkAeUwwE2aksDqd5tgwyec-970-80.jpg.webp

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 10: Pushing Out the Borders

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways The rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.

When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”

I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”

We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!”

Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings continues below.

LAST TIME

I leaned in, “You might want to read through Lunar Law, Mr. Turdland.” I turned and walked away. I turned back, “Just to show you there’s no hard feelings, the venue you’ve been offered is owned by Jax Lunar Lumber, Limited Liability Lunar Company.” I turned and headed down the hallway as the door slid closed behind me. I was under no illusions that I had won anything but a brief reprieve from conflict between myself, family, and this man…

I ‘pinged’ the Lead Grandkid and whispered, “He’s going to be a big problem, Sweetie. Prepare the Forces.”

Nat said, “Hearing you loud and clear Grandpa!”

“Also,” I said, “Sturdlan Vilbix is armed, possibly even to the teethe – literally. But the scan of his skull wasn’t clear. If you could get a closeup, maybe dental X-rays, I’d appreciate it.”

“Ten-four, grampa!”

I pulled up the security feed and settled back to see what our uninvited guest was up to. He stormed down the hall, pushing past anyone who got in his way. I grimaced. He was not going to make this difficult. He reached a short section of corridor, and I sealed him/them in. First he rammed into the door, expecting it to open for him. Then he turned up, faced the image feed and flipped me off. The feed shut off.

I smiled and turned it back on, touching an audio feed and said, “You think we’re some sort of amateurs up here, Mr. Turdland? You may have dealt with Earth security…” He shut me down again. I turned on a different speaker, “But this is the Moon. We’re a bit more…” He shut me down, I opted for a feed next to his ankle. I cranked the volume and said, “…sophisticated than you seem to be prepared for.” I was glad he jumped when I opened the door at the same time. “If you’d follow the directions you’ve been given to your accommodation…”

“This is kidnapping!” he shouted, turning to the visual feed and flashing both of his middle fingers at me.

“If you’ll read your Lunar Rights Manual, you’ll see it’s not.” I hung up on them as they raised both of their hands again. I added a spray of ultrasound to mess with his enhanced hearing as well as check his teeth – and the rest of his body – for weapon implants.

I went to my messages and skimmed them, then stopped in startlement…I read, “We’ve found it!”

I shook my head, pulled up the list and laid it alongside the list one of my spies had sent me. Scowling, I read, “Nearly all the seeds germinated successfully, and after a few years, the Forest Service had about 420 seedlings.” I nodded. We knew that much. What was interesting though, was that the list of known Moon Trees was only one-hundred and twelve. A bit over three hundred of them were unaccounted for. Redwood, sycamore, Douglas fir, Loblolly pine, and sweet gum. Where were they? What about the trees in Brazil? Planted in the Amazon Rain Forest? There are even a few whose status remained unknown. Why is that? You’d THINK four hundred seedlings, some of which were ceremonially distributed, then “lost”, and when located, left a fourth of them unaccounted for.

NASA and the world forgot about the trees for a while – did they have something to hide? And now it seemed like at least a few of the missing trees had been discovered. And suddenly an exploitative talent agent show up on the Moon, ready to take “his talent” all over the planet… Scratching my chin, I scowled. Brad Barphmin, alias Sturdlan Vilbix shows up with a key to anywhere on the Moon he wanted to search for the lost Lunar Trees.

Why? What exactly did he want? WHO did he need?

I bit my lower lip, then called Solar Commonality Intelligence. This would likely call for cooperation of everyone in the volume of the Oort Cloud. And we would best get our act together, soon. While I was happy to Jax Lunar Lumber to do its duty, it was way bigger than I’d thought.

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/ ; https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html

Image: https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/YkAeUwwE2aksDqd5tgwyec-970-80.jpg.webp

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 9: Hmmm, Not QUITE So Fast!

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. In 1986, Payless Cashways purchased Knox Lumber Company, eventually filing for bankruptcy. Before it vanished, the rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…

Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.
When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”
I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”
We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!” Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings continues below.

Once my grandkids – Noah, Natalie, Ronan, and Rayna – arrived and set about separating Roza Rymbayeva Golovkin, Six-Times-Great-Granddaughter Of The Last Lunar Walker’, Gene Cernan from her “handler”, I grinned at Sturdlan Vilbix, self-proclaimed "handler" of the obviously exhausted speaker and artist.

The grandkids went to her, gently taking her hands and leading her as they pushed Sturdlan Vilbix aside, ignoring them.

As they did, every piece of spy equipment Turdman’s people had brought had its electronics and quantum circuits scrambled. “Sturdland” shouted, “Hey!” and then found themselves alone and in Truflesh without an Image Enhancement Field surrounding them.

I was startled to see “they” were a rather round, runty “he” with blaze orange hair, coiffed into something they’d have called a beehive in the 1960s mostly worn by women in the US – the grandkids’ great great grandmother had worn one just like it, but brunette instead of orange. He reminded me of a TwenCen cartoon character called Complex or something like that. It wasn’t really flattering on either Sturdlan’s real face or their/his virtual face.

I waited. The grands were waiting too. Finally, sensing the show was over, the main part of the pack escorted Roza out, chattering like a passel of grandchildren typically do, keeping their voices down and trying to amaze her with their intelligence and sense of humor. Natalie – who had just finished her training as a sergeant in the Solar Marines – was a specialist. She stepped closer to him, expertly blocking a move by Sturdlan to follow her and “rescue” his meal-ticket…or whatever she was to him. Nat blocked him/them and the man found himself un able to move and in danger of experiencing a broken arm.

It wasn’t clear exactly what she’d specialized in, but I don’t dig that deeply into my kids or grandkids’ lives. OTOH, by the precision with which they had rescued their target and the “enemy” (not sure how long Sturdlan was interested in maintaining that position), I was pretty sure it was some form of logistics. She was also in the Solar Commonwealth’s United Marine Marching Band and reportedly challenging the current Drum Major for their position.

I waited a bit longer then opened my mouth…

Sturdlan said, “Fine…” he started to walk free. Nat increased the pressure of her grip. Sturdlan winced, nearly going down on his knees.

I said, “That’s not the phrase I was looking for, Mr. Turdland. Perhaps you’ve forgotten. I only wanted to hear two words: ‘I accept.’” I shot Nat a glance. She eased off a bit and he started breathing again. He remained silent. Nat increased the pressure. He started to pant.

A few moments later, after sagging, he growled, then managed, “I. Accept.” He paused, adding, “Grud…”

Nat squeezed hard enough for me to hear a pop. He screamed and started to collapsed. Nat held him up, then twisted his elbow. I heard another pop and he gasped. When she released him, he went to his knees and his hands, head hanging between his shoulders. He muttered something I didn’t appreciate. “What was that?” I said.

Nat took a step back to him. He hastily said, “Nothing! Nothing!” She leaned in and he winced. She said, “Probably shouldn’t continue trying to mutter sweet-little-nothings again, eh? Boy?” He managed to nod without passing out. Nat grinned, kissed me on the cheek, and followed the rest of the herd of family.

I said, “So, how about we arrange an itinerary that will feature Roza instead of your somewhat…how can I say this and offend you most…childish, simplistic, and meaningless trash?”

“It’s what people want!” they said, struggling to their feet. The air around them flickered and the image of a purple baboon formed around Sturdlan Vilbix. The eyes grew wide the baboon exclaimed, “That’s not what’s supposed to happen!”

I nodded. “Rosa probably wasn’t supposed to share her own music, either. Nevertheless, it will.” Sturdlan glared. I said, “It’s a good thing you’ve got a smaller, but reasonable venue to share your music in, generously sponsored by Jax Lunar Lumber.” I grinned.

“Over my dead body!” Sturdlan shouted, surging to his feet. The effect without his image enhancement was less than threatening; thought worrisome even so, mostly because his face had changed color as his blood pressure soared, and I was pretty sure he carried concealed weapons. I passed him the Lunar ordinance regarding unregistered firearms as enforced on the Moon by all signatories – which currently included all of the nation states from Earth with either single-nation colonies or cooperative colonies.

“That’s the penalty for anyone who chooses to take out any one of the weapons recorded on your person or concealed in various pieces of luggage…”

“You can’t…”

I leaned in, “You might want to read through Lunar Law, Mr. Turdland.” I turned and walked away. I turned back, “Just to show you there’s no hard feelings, the venue you’ve been offered is owned by Jax Lunar Lumber, Limited Liability Lunar Company.” I turned and headed own. I was under no illusions that I had won anything but a brief reprieve from conflict between myself, family, and this man.

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/ ; https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html

Image: fabricated by me using two public domain images.

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/YkAeUwwE2aksDqd5tgwyec-970-80.jpg.webp

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 8: The Deposing of a Cheat and Swindler and A Man Named Brad...

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways, the rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.

When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”

I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”

We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!” Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings continues below.

The grandkids pushed them aside and went to Roza, gently taking her hands and leading her past Sturdlan Vilbix, ignoring them.

As they did, every piece of spy equipment Turdland’s people had brought had its electronics and quantum circuits scrambled. Turdland shouted, “Hey!” and they found themselves alone – and in the flesh without the Image Enhancement Field surrounding them.

I was startled to see “they” were a “he” with blaze orange hair, coiffed into something they’d called a beehive in the 1960s – the grandkids’ great great grandmother had worn one just like it, but brunette instead of orange. It wasn’t really flattering on either Studland’s real or virtual face.

They stood looking like a pretty ordinary early-forties-with-no-life-extension-procedures person with a slightly crooked nose, the skin damage caused by acne just under his eyes, and a remarkable five-feet-eleven-inches (1.8 meters for a small slice of Earth) of non-height, and I said, “Nice to finally meet the unenhanced you, Brad.”

His eyes bugged, he looked wildly around him, seeing his monster-multiple-sense-recording drones and sputtered. “You’ve destroyed a billion credits of…”

“We didn’t destroy anything, Brad. It’s all been deactivated and gently dropped to the lunar surface. The grandkids – two of whom are twenty-nine-year-old-Earth-standard and so are legal chaperones to your superstar.”

“She’s not ‘my’ superstar! She belongs to all of…”

I tapped my Fourfold cellphone and it unfolded into a laptop screen and lit. “According to this, while you do indeed release her artistic output to the rest of the System you both do so solely to,” I glanced down to read it precisely, “ ‘consumers who can appreciate the brilliance of ‘Roza Rymbayeva Golovkin, Six-Times-Great-Granddaughter Of The Last Walker’ and have been rigorously cleared by the RRGSTGGOTSLW Corporation’ – which, my grandkids’ diggerprograms inform me consists entirely of yourself.”

A dark, raging anger burbled to the surface, darkening the person’s face. Their arms twitched and they looked surprised. They twitched harder, then stomped a foot. Their visage darkened even more and they leaned closer to me and breathed, “I can still kill you with my unenhanced muscles. I was once…”

“A fake MMA champion. Yeah, Natalie was quick to find that because her father was a REAL MMA competitor when he legitimately served in Combined Forces back in the day.”

“I served…”

I cut them off, “Beers. At a really…how can I put this diplomatically?” I paused, “Let’s just say that your bartending license was as fake as all of your other licenses. So, lets skip the rest of your empty threats…”

“I’ll show YOU EMPTY!” They twitched and then froze in place.” I could still see their muscles pulling against the restraint-field the grands had thrown up around him.

“You know, Brad, I’m gonna give you exactly one time to make this all right. You’re going to give Rosa back her life – and that includes ownership of all her music that is currently funding your not only greedy lifestyle but a lifestyle astoundingly debauched depraved, and corrupt, reminding me of a politician from the early 21st century who ran for a high office a couple times. Now, I’m going to release the field around your head. You can respond, but before you start cussing me out, I’d like you to remind you that we have all of the records you’ve tampered with, as well as how you’ve set up the dispersal of fees and investments so that most go to you and a fraction goes to Rosa. You can still manage her fame – which appears to have been the case before you got greedy.” Brad’s face grew red. “Hmmm…maybe you do have a conscience that might be shocked back to life. We’ll see. I expect to hear two words from you. Those words are, ‘I accept’. If those are not the words I hear, the AI is recording this entire encounter and will broadcast this event to our lawyers – as well as several lawyers you have retained in various places both normal and amazingly corrupt. Also, in the event you totally lose it, this encounter will instantly be broadcast live to several live feeds – and instantaneously translated into forty-three languages. Am I clear?” Brad’s eyes had nearly bugged out of their sockets. “I expect two words from your mouth. If it’s more than that, all of this as well as your records and passwords will be broadcast to anywhere Humans are listening.”

I grinned at him. I waited. The grands were waiting too. Probably Natalie – who had just finished her training as a sergeant in the Solar Marines – was a specialist. It wasn’t clear exactly what she’d specialized in, but I don’t dig that deeply into my kids or grandkids’ lives.

I waited a bit longer then opened my mouth…

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/ ; https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html Image: https://external-preview.redd.it/xL2Y2UHb2B0JN5P162FShQfxqCTYNuOp3WEYxdF86j4.jpg?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=6955074e421a5e98c69b2da35179a3a91faa5662

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 7: (s)Turdland Vilbix Meets Their Match

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways the rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.

When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”

I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”

We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!”

Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musing continues below.

Sturdlan Vilbix appeared just as they’d predicted and started spreading their drones. Little Rayna ran in, cute as a bug, and hugged my leg.

“Grandpa, Grandpa, do the turkey neck! Please! Please! Please!” Natalie, Ronan, and Rayna cried, jumping up and down.

Noah, oldest and sometime wisest, watched me carefully and said under his breath, “Granddumpsterfire? Neck or no-neck?”

That was the code phrase my grandchildren, aka The Council of Four decided on for me to let them know if it was a Go-No-Go situation. Rolling my eyes, I shook my head several times, shaking my wattles of fat and making cheek noises. Rayna hugged me again and ran out of the room.”

Sturdlan, who had instantly become Turdland to the Four said, “I’m sorry Mr. Whatever-You-Are, are the little adults removed now until her majesty, Queen of 4D rLife and the most influential singer the entire Planet of Earth has ever or EVER will know – and me myself and I, her Essential Handler…”

“I’m the Owner and Proprietor of JAX LUNAR LUMBER, Mr. Turdland.” I grinned a toothy grin at them. They couldn’t see what I saw over their shoulder.

Roza Rymbayeva Golovkin, Six-Times-Great-Granddaughter Of The Last Walker on the Moon, Eugene Cernan on December14, 1972; who had been contracted to perform a concert on the Moon, ticking off a number of Firsts: First Spacesuit Concert; First Megahit Song Composed on the Moon, First Concert Arranged By the Multiple-Award-Winning Artist, Sturdlan Vilbix…They said, "Which is, of course, me, and I speak for..."

I cut them off, “I’m certain all that is very interesting, but…”

They were not going to give up their constant live-streamed limelight easily, and cut me off, “Now, I’d like you to scurry on and make sure your ‘grandchildren’,” I’d been feeling sorry for him until that moment. He talked about them like they were an infection that needed a dose of anti-Life to get ride of. He spoke without regard for my grandkids, who were Citizens of the Moon. I sighed. I’d hoped we’d be able to be civil, but it appeared they weren’t interested.

I hadn’t wanted to give the grandkids full reign, but they’d planned, plotted, constructed, and prepared to separate Turdland from their meal ticket…I mean their employer, the last living relative of the last Man to Walk On The Moon, the magnificent Whatever-Their-Name-Was...

The Grands, or the Council of Four had hacked Roza Rymbayeva Golovkin, Six-Times-Great-Granddaughter Of The Last Walker – who, Natalie discovered preferred the lest-grand ‘Roza’, just wanted to pay her respects at the Cernan Lunar Memorial and spend some time at the foot of the Lunar Tree planted in his name. “Without,” Natalie told me firmly, “The bozo who keeps her on a leash so he has an easy way to make money for his stupid habits...”

“I don’t need to know. We’ll get Roza out to her ancestor’s tree and we’ll make sure Turdland has an…interesting time. Grandma’s got something really special cooked up for him.”

Ronan jogged in, Lunar-long legs making him almost as tall as his Earth-grown cousin, Noah, even though he was only nine and said, “Gee-Pa, everything’s ready for the windbag.”

At that moment, the windbag in question stepped out of a lift, saying, “We have very important work here to do! Billions of Humans are clamoring to see me…” they snapped their mouth shut, staring at the assemblage looking through them at the singer and several-times removed granddaughter of the Last Man to Walk On the Moon stopped, cleared their throat and said, “I mean ONLY to speak for Madame Golovkin when I say…”

The grandkids pushed them aside and went to Roza, gently taking her hands and leading her past Turdland, ignoring them. Just then, every piece of spy equipment Turdland’s people had brought had its electronics and quantum circuits scrambled. They shouted, “Hey!” and then found themselves alone.

With me. I said, “Nice to finally meet the unenhanced you, Brad.”

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/;  https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html

Image: https://external-preview.redd.it/xL2Y2UHb2B0JN5P162FShQfxqCTYNuOp3WEYxdF86j4.jpg?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=6955074e421a5e98c69b2da35179a3a91faa5662

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 6: Visitation Of The Most High Celebrity

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways

the rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.

When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”

I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”

We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!”

Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings continues below.


We ended up having roughly a year to prepare for the arrival of Roza Rymbayeva Golovkin, named after a famous Kazakh singer and song-writer. She was a Sixth Generation descendant of the last Human to walk on the Moon in the 20th Century – Eugene Andrew Cernan was an American astronaut, naval aviator, electrical engineer, aeronautical engineer, and fighter pilot. During the Apollo 17 mission, Cernan became the 11th human being to walk on the Moon. As he re-entered the Apollo Lunar Module after Harrison Schmitt on their third and final lunar excursion, he became the Last Man to Walk On the Moon – the Last Walker in other words.

Now his six-times-removed granddaughter was standing in front of me, her face suffused with wonder. She said, “I don’t hurt anymore!”

“Excuse me?” I managed. That was two seconds before her Personal Handler, Sturdlan Vilbix,” they introduced themselves as, stepped in and started to talk as she grabbed me by the bicep and squeezed. It HURT! She had muscles trained under the full gravity of the world that had nurtured Humanity into intelligence. Now, here she was steering me further into Jax Lunar Lumber, using gestures to station dozens of drones in the ceiling, on the floor, on desks, in trees, and anywhere their cameras – I was pretty sure the glittering light twirling around the back and belly of each one was a camera designed to record, broadcast, and recreate every scene, every motion, and every nuance of the Six-Times-Great-Granddaughter Of The Last Walker – or “Six-T-Grandsdaughter-OT Last Walker”. That quickly morphed to antichrist, or 6T for short.

My own grandkids had warned me. They begged me to let them prepare a defense against this entity of The Media. After I finally gave in, the Council of Four convened – Noah, Natalie, Ronan, and Rayna – and gently ushered me out of the room and got to work.

When Sturdlan Vilbix appeared just as they’d predicted and started spreading their drones, little Rayna ran in, cute as a bug, and hugged my leg.

“Grandpa, do the Turkey Neck! Please! Please! Please!”

That was the code phrase they’d decided on for me to let them know if it was a Go-No-Go situation. Rolling my eyes, I shook my head several times, shaking my wattles of fat and making cheek noises. Rayna hugged me again and ran out of the room.

The Handler and 6T looked at me. The Handler said, “I’m sorry Mr..? What did you call yourself?”

“Owner and Proprietor of JAX LUNAR LUMBER.”

She flicked me away, saying, “Whatever. You’ll have to keep your children…”

“Grandchildren,” I corrected her.

They sighed as if the weight of the world was on their shoulders and said, “You’ll have to keep you GRANDchildren both out of our way and preferably off the premises. We have very important work here to do! Billions of Humans are clamoring to see me –” She stopped abruptly, glanced at Roza Rymbayeva Golovkin, Six-Times-Great-Granddaughter Of The Last Walker, cleared her throat and said, “I mean ONLY to speak for Madame Golovkin when I say…”

I flicked my fingers in her direction and a swarm of tiny drones, no larger than Ronan’s fingernails but shinier, flew as a swarm through the room. Moments later, every drone but those under the control of the Council of the Four fell to the floor, energy-drained into just so much ballast.”

“And you may be interested in something I say.” I grinned – and just happened to catch a glow of real delight in on the face of the former 6T…now reverting to Roza Golovkin…

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/ ; https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html
Image: https://external-preview.redd.it/xL2Y2UHb2B0JN5P162FShQfxqCTYNuOp3WEYxdF86j4.jpg?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=6955074e421a5e98c69b2da35179a3a91faa5662

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 5: Celebrity Visitation...

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashwaysthe rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.
When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”

I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”

We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!”

Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings continues below.

The thing is, the Last Moon Walker picked a coconut tree to be buried under. Just so happens to be one of the larger species of coconuts – the Cocos nucifera. You’ve seen it, I’m sure. It’s pretty much the “coconut” tree everyone imagines when they think of a coconut palm.

The problem is that Moon soil is totally wrong and the only way we can grow trees on the Moon is if they are actually planted in the soil…

After the Second Wave reached the Moon and started expanding the places you could find footprints in the fine Lunar dust, what followed was fifty years of Colonization. Not all of them stayed, and some colonies were dreadful failures, but gradually, the population of the Moon began to climb.

The Americans were NOT alone this time. Chinese, Indians, Australians, European Union, Saudi Arabians, Brazilians, Japanese…in all, forty-two nation states sent astronauts. Multiple genders fed their spirit of adventure, inspiring people of multiple viewpoints to come to the Moon. Multiple faiths claimed their point of view from the Moon as well. (Despite the vocal fears and horror of those whose only allegiance was to Humanity, predicted an outbreak of sectarian warfare to rival anything in Earth’s bloody religious history. After another fifty years, the fears abated, and while cautious, mutual respect and conversation – and of course arguments! – seemed to hold sway.

The Second Wave is marked by the last person to come to the Moon to “visit”. Her name was Roza Rymbayeva Golovkin, named after a famous Kazakh singer and song-writer. She’d done several touristy things, then returned to Earth.

She was coming to Jax Lunar Lumber to see her tree. The Lunar and Earth press started to bother us the day after. Of course, no one had ever paid attention to Jax Lunar Lumber until the Last Lunar Walker contacted us to see her tree.

In other words, she was making another “Visit-To-The-Moon”.

I was irritated, to tell you the truth. I’d made the Moon my home. I was a resident. What was she…a celebrity. I’d honestly never had much use for celebrities. I’d half a mind to tell her what she could do with her visit.

Then I got a personal message from her.

Hand-delivered by an old man who worked in the bowels of the Communication Needle at the South Pole Station, also known as Chandrayaan, the Indian lander that touched down in August of 2023, he physically knocked on the door to my quarters. I’d just finished planting both a species of corn designed for Lunar gravity, and flooding a shallow one-hectare pond after seeding it with dried Prochlorococcus, the algae species that produces more oxygen than any other species.

He waited for me to open the paper note and read it. The lower sheet of paper was blank. He held out a pen when I looked up.

I said, “Have you read this?”

“No, Mx. It’s not allowed.”

“So you don’t know what it says?”

“We’re very discrete. That’s in our company slogan.”

I nodded. I wrote, “Please feel welcome here. We look forward to seeing you.” I handed it back to him, he bowed, and made his way slowly out of Jax. I went back to the cavern, then headed to the deepest cave. We’d blasted a hole through the surface, then used nanomachines to build a transparent dome of Lunar glass. Light flooded down, falling on the palm tree which now stood four meters tall. The signature torso – slender and straight, swelling, and the leaves fountaining from the swelling made the image perfect. It didn’t have any fruit – coconuts – yet. Coconuts take a year from appearance to falling off the tree. These still had several months to go. I’d noted when a good time would be.

Several days later, I got a not delivered by the same man. When I opened it, I read, “Dear Mx. Jax: I am coming to the Moon to die. I would like to die hear my coconut tree. I would also like my remains to fertilize the tree. I will be arriving in eight weeks. My doctors tell me I have that, plus an uncertain number of days.” On the bottom, she wrote, “Whatever amount of credit is required to do with, I can afford it. Spare no expense. Whatever remains will be given to Jax Lunar Lumber. Perhaps you can arrange for the trees wood to be harvested and made into a box in which to place my rendered body and a few mementos. Thank you for doing this.”

I brought the letter into my bedroom and sat at my desk and stared at it for several hours. Finally I stood up. There were some things I had to get done before I had a celebrity die in my lumberyard…

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/ ; https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html ; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandrayaan-3

Image: https://external-preview.redd.it/xL2Y2UHb2B0JN5P162FShQfxqCTYNuOp3WEYxdF86j4.jpg?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=6955074e421a5e98c69b2da35179a3a91faa5662

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 4: The Judge’s Descendant and the Coconut Tree

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways The rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.

When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”
I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”
We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!”

Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings continues below.

We got the email from Earth a few days ago, from the last living Lunar Walker. He wants to come and see the Tree. We got the email from Earth a few days ago, from the last living Lunar Walker. He wants to come and see the Tree. You know the Lunar Trees? “…the Command Module Pilot on the Apollo 14 mission, [brought] a small canister containing about 500 seeds aboard the module in 1971. [When they returned, they were germinated at NASA, then sent to people around the US and a couple other places on earth.] “In 1996, a third-grade teacher, Joan Goble, and her students found a tree in their local area with a plaque identifying it as a Moon tree. Goble sent an email to NASA and reached employee Dave Williams. Williams was unaware of the trees' existence, as were most of his colleagues at NASA. Upon doing some research, Williams found some old newspaper clippings that described the initial actions taken by Roosa to bring these seeds to space and home to be planted.[6] Williams posted a page on NASA's official website asking for public help to find the trees. The page also contained a table listing the locations and species of known Moon trees."

So, yeah, we have our Tree. It’s a redwood and it’s been growing for the past seven years not far from Jax Lunar Lumber. Oh! Don’t worry, we’re not planning to cut it down or anything. It’s sort of our mascot, actually…if you can have a tree for a mascot. It’s on our website. I should know, cause I’m the one who put it there. I’ve been planting trees on the Moon for the past two years. I leased a lava tube and using some plans I found on the internet, I started to create a habitat that they can survive in.

I know saying that I’ve been planting trees for the past two years makes it sound like I’m some sort of Johnny Appleseed – though that would be Cedric Allen Easternpine, which kind of sounds cool, but my real last name’s just Allen.

Anyway, travel from Earth to the Moon and back has become sort of routine – as routine as taking a vacation in the Antarctic is back on Earth…weird if not impossible. But like I was saying before I got sidetracked, the Last Lunar Walker wants to come up here, look around, and I guess he wants to die here.

Creepy, but I had an aunt in my hometown of Crosby, Minnesota who wanted her body entombed in a casket carved from iron ore, and sunk to the bottom of one of the old iron mine lakes. She was rich, and threw enough of her money at it while she was still smart enough to manage her own affairs, that they eventually gave up resisting her and named the lake after her and called it the Ceilia Anne-Johnson Usorituen Water Cemetery.

I will say a few of my relatives nearly had heart attacks of their own before she ended up getting what she wanted.

So, she’s there, and the Last Moon Walker is using HER case (and law team) to make it so that he can be buried on the Moon.

Of course, Lunar Law being so new and all, there’s a statute that says you can’t technically bury anyone in a hole in the surface. It’s got to be part of some sort of structure. While the Last Moon Walker hasn’t named himself, we have a fair idea who it is and so I wrote to the whole group and offered the possibility of being made into humus and being used to grow another tree of their choice – though they have to bring several seeds with them when they leave Earth.

The thing is, the Last Moon Walker picked a coconut tree to be buried under. Just so happens to be one of the larger species of coconuts – the Cocos nucifera. You’ve seen it, I’m sure. It’s pretty much the “coconut” tree everyone imagines when they think of a coconut palm.

The problem is that Moon soil is totally wrong and the only way we can grow trees on the Moon is if they are actually planted in the soil…

Resources: The Moon Trees, https://www.urbanforestdweller.com/we-almost-forgot-about-the-moon-trees/; https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html ; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coconut 

Image: https://i.insider.com/6285a7720fdb180018cc15a3?width=1000&format=jpeg&auto=webp

JAX LUNAR LUMBER CHAPTER 3: “What’s So Funny About Little Green…Trees?”

A couple years ago, I related to my wife that, when I was working for the now-defunct Knox Lumber Company, I was told that if someone were patient, they could buy ALL of the supplies necessary to build a house ON SALE from the store. Knowing the company strictly from the perspective of a “yard ape” (aka Outside Lumberyard Attendant), and having moved zillions of tons (or watched it moved by the truly massive forklift that only a few people were allowed to drive) of building materials – from bags of sand to prefabricated trusses…I believed it. After a moment, I said, “Do you think you could buy the supplies necessary to build a Lunar colony from Knox?” We laughed and I said, “That’s ridiculous!” However, as I thought about it, it occurred to me that it might JUST be possible.

That speculation led to the first “Jax Lunar Lumber” little blurb. It wasn’t even a piece of flash fiction. But lately, after discovering that there are actually things called Moon Trees, and that scientists have just grown rock cress seeds in Lunar soil, I suddenly realize that there might be stories I can harvest from this subject…um…so to speak…

So, we’ve got Lunar Trees scattered around the US and a couple other places on earth: “…the Command Module Pilot on the Apollo 14 mission, to bring a small canister containing about 500 seeds aboard the module in 1971. Seeds for the experiment were chosen from five species of tree: loblolly pine, sycamore, sweetgum, redwood, and Douglas fir. In 2022, NASA announced it would be reviving the moon tree program by carrying 1,000 seeds aboard an Artemis Mission.

“After the flight, the seeds were sent to the southern Forest Service station in Gulfport, Mississippi, and to the western station in Placerville, California, with the intent to germinate them. Nearly all the seeds germinated successfully, and after a few years, the Forest Service had about 420 seedlings. Some of these were planted alongside their Earth-bound counterparts, which were specifically set aside as controls. After more than 40 years, there was no discernible difference between the two classes of trees.”

That’s the story. But whatever happened to the other 580? “Nearly all the seeds germinated successfully, and after a few years, the Forest Service had about 420 seedlings.” Did they “unsuccessfully” germinate? What might THAT mean? How about the kids from the class? Did seeing the Moon Tree affect any of them? I mean…for me? I could imagine a slightly different future (though I live in a state that did NOT get a Moon Tree (we’re too far north…). The nearest one for me to see is in Des Moines, IA. My son and grandkids saw one of the three trees in North Carolina.

“Most of the ‘Moon trees’ were given away in 1975 and 1976 to state forestry organizations, in order to be planted as part of the nation's bicentennial celebration. Since the trees were all of southern or western species, not all states received trees. A Loblolly Pine was planted at the White House, and trees were planted in Brazil, Switzerland, and presented to Emperor Hirohito, among others."

So, my senior year in high school, the trees were sent out to their new homes (the complete list of where they went are in the Wikipedia article linked below.

But I’m a writer. Some of the possibilities for story here: the tree that was given to the Emperor of Japan, Hirohito – the man who initiated and led the War in the Pacific – including the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. What??? Why would the US Government give HIM a tree that had gone into space? There’s a story there, I’m sure.

One of the trees was sent to Santa Rosa, Brazil to the “Soybean Fairgrounds, Parque Municipal de Exposições”. Ironically, this Brazilian State was settled by… “European immigrants in 1915, mainly Italians, Germans and Russians. The German dialect traditionally spoken in the region is Riograndenser Hunsrückisch.” Two of the groups were members of the Axis Powers along with Japan; the third a people who would become the second-greatest Communist empire on Earth…

Is this significant? *laugh* Probably not at all; but MAN it would lend all sorts of stuff to a STORY! Maybe throw these “gift Moon Trees” in with fact that “Nearly all the seeds germinated successfully, and after a few years, the Forest Service had about 420 seedlings.” The fact that the trees were handed out accounts for of them; as well, some 47 of the trees later died…though not one of the Redwoods… Based on a count from Wiki and under the assumption that only ONE tree was granted to each recipient (unless otherwise noted), that only accounts for 112 of the 420…so…what if 308 of them were planted on a remote mountain preserve or a place all of the species might flourish: Redwood, sycamore, Douglas fir, Loblolly pine, and sweet gum. They grew, and…(cue eerie music) what happened? What about the trees in Brazil? Planted in the Amazon Rain Forest??? There are even a few whose status is unknown. Why is that? You’d THINK something like that would make a splash; then again, NASA and the world forgot about the trees for a while – did they have something to HIDE?

While none of these trees is precisely "little", all of them share the legacy of having been to the Moon and back. And the fact is that: "Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin were the first of 12 human beings to walk on the Moon. Four of America's moonwalkers are still alive: Aldrin (Apollo 11), David Scott (Apollo 15), Charles Duke (Apollo 16), and Harrison Schmitt (Apollo 17)" -- four men left who walked. How many people flew to the Moon and back? In addition to the 24 Apollo astronauts, four others are slated to follow them for the first time in 50 years in November of 2024...

This is going to be FUN!

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_tree, https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/moon_tree.html, https://www.astronomy.com/space-exploration/when-will-artemis-2-launch-and-what-will-the-mission-do/

Image: https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/moon_trees/moon_tree_campkoch.gif

JAX LUNAR LUMBER Chapter 2: From A Joke To A Thought Experiment…

A couple years ago, I related to my wife that, when I was working for the now-defunct Knox Lumber Company, I was told that if someone were patient, they could buy ALL of the supplies necessary to build a house ON SALE from the store.

Knowing the company strictly from the perspective of a “yard ape” (aka Outside Lumberyard Attendant), and having moved zillions of tons (or watched it moved by the truly massive forklift that only a few people were allowed to drive) of building materials – from bags of sand to prefabricated trusses…I believed it.

After a moment, I said, “Do you think you could buy the supplies necessary to build a Lunar colony from Knox?” We laughed and I said, “That’s ridiculous!” However, as I thought about it, it occurred to me that it might JUST be possible.

That speculation led to the first “Jax Lunar Lumber” little blurb. It wasn’t even a piece of flash fiction! But lately, after discovering that there are actually things called Moon Trees, and that scientists have just grown rock cress seeds in Lunar soil, I suddenly realized that there might be stories I can harvest from this subject…so to speak…

While Jax Lunar Lumber isn’t going to open up any time soon, it seems the foundation for the concept of farming the Moon is NOT pretty much out there: it’s firmly out there, and numerous interests are exploring what it might take for us Humans to move into space; not just for the thrill of landing, grabbing some rocks, hopping around, or standing in front of the world and shouting, “Taa! Daa! WE landed on the far side of the Moon and you didn’t! Nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah!”; but there are serious thoughts about how we could create a long-term presence in places OFF Earth.

The International Space Station has been orbiting Earth for the past 20 years, but everyone knows that, while it’s value as a research station is limitless, it’s not a particularly strong foothold off Earth. Just watch the movie “Gravity” to see how firm our hold in outer space is! (FWIW: https://www.scienceabc.com/humans/movies/movie-science-how-scientifically-accurate-is-the-movie-gravity.html)

If we’re going to have a permanent presence in space, then we need (literally) REAL estate. We need to have places where we can (literally) put down roots.

We need colonies on the asteroids, the Moon, and Mars.

Those social programmers among you may decry such a huge investment, arguing that “the money should be spent on the poor and sick here on Earth!!!!” – know as well as I do that while the real dollars being spent on NASA fluctuates but has slowly risen; the PERCENTAGE of the national budget has dropped dramatically since the 1960s (https://www.lpi.usra.edu/exploration/multimedia/NASABudgetHistory.pdf) and continues to fall. So those favorite social programs are STILL getting far more money than NASA ever did – except in the heyday of the program when we were so paranoid that we had to “beat the Russians to the Moon!”.

My question is that, even with less NASA and more government programs, POVERTY has not dramatically decreased – in fact poverty and food instability, and real income have remained fairly stable between 1969 and today – 56 years…(between a 10% and 15% variation) even though in that same period, NASA funding fell precipitously. Why haven’t we seen a dramatic decrease in poverty as program funding has increased? No idea (or I have ideas, but NO ONE would be interested in them!) (https://www.census.gov/newsroom/stories/poverty-awareness-month.html)

A bit of background first (so that harsh judgements might be tempered): I grew up in a family that used food stamps; my own family has used food stamps; and I worked for 30 years (retired three years ago) in a school where 65%-80% of the students were on free-or-reduced lunch; and as a counselor for my last ten years, discovered that not only had I kept food in my closet in my classroom, most other teachers, counselors, social workers, and nurses also keep food and gift cards handy to help students whose families are in need. I’m NOT a millionaire – and I’m now on a fixed income.

All right, that being said, I maintain my position that Humans have to get off of Earth permanently – at least some of us need to. I’d never make it into NASA, so I’m eliminated (and “Yes, I DO know that for a fact – I applied for the Teacher In Space program and was turned down.”). So, how can SOME people get there and STAY there?

The more I’ve been reading, the more spreading Humanity out among the asteroids seems a better and better idea. HOWEVER, that doesn’t seem to be the dream that has grabbed our attention. Currently, it’s Mars, using the Moon as a jumping off point. So, I just finished a novel that takes place on Mars sometime in the 25th Century (when PICARD, Season 3 takes place!) so I understand our obsession with The Red Planet, but in my story, space colonization isn’t quite that ambitious, but I’m going to stop right here, or I’ll ramble.

I’m going to focus on the Moon and step back from my idea of a small business called Jax Lunar Lumber…

But it was that step that ran me smack into the fact that NASA actually sent seeds on the Apollo 16 landing and exposed 1000 seeds of several different trees to Lunar conditions, returned them to Earth, germinated, planted them, then passed them out to several American states, Brazil and Switzerland.

Knowledge of the plants disappeared, until a class of elementary school kids and their teacher found one in “their own back yard”, asked NASA – who ALSO had no idea what the class was talking about, then dig around and found not only the information, but where and whether the trees were still alive. Many of them are. While nearly all of them germinated, there remained only 420 when the National Forestry Service handed them out to be planted as their recipients desired.

Today (if you’re interested), you can use the Wiki reference to find them and visit them if you’d like.

FINALLY: all this was to say that not only are there Moon Trees on Earth, as well as underground farms that grow more than mushrooms, several groups are giving serious thought to establishing underground farms on the Moon…

And THAT finally leads to Jax Lunar Lumber Company…

There are lots of threads I’ve gathered in my research, and due to the fact that my current push in my writing is to WRITE TIGHT – that is, tell a story in as few words as possible. Hard for me, because (as you can see), if you get me started, it’s almost impossible for me to STOP. In the original bit of short story and its tag on, which you can find here: https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2019/05/possibly-irritating-essays-jax-lunar-1.html; and here: https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2022/11/jax-lunar-lumber-chapter-1.html,

I didn’t really do much with the story but play around with a bit of vignette (“a brief evocative description, account, or episode; a small illustration or portrait photograph which fades into its background without a definite border”), and snigger at my cleverness.

That is, until today. It appears that there’s serious thought out there about how to grow Earth plants on the Moon, on Mars, and (for my stories) on asteroids; because if we don’t MINE the asteroids, then Earth is going to eventually run out of natural resources…not tomorrow or even in a hundred years, but the lithium used for today’s dramatically inefficient electric batteries is very limited. The question of this article is “Will We Run Out of Lithium?” – the answer after one second of reading, is “Duh!” (https://energyx.com/blog/will-we-run-out-of-lithium/#:~:text=Global%20lithium%20reserves%20are%20estimated,record%20of%20100%2C000%20metric%20tons.)

We NEED to leave the planet, and those colonies need to be able to take care of themselves – the same principal that ANY CULTURE who set about colonizing had to face. (BTW, before you assume that Europeans were the sole colonizers of Earth, please actually do some reading. It’s broad, varied, sometimes wildly contradictory, and depending on who’s writing it, they excuse or accuse any number of other countries…it’s…complicated…

My main takeaway from that two hours of reading several articles was that: If the Earth itself fractured in so many directions, spawning so many businesses, interests, investments, economic entities, and even countries…what’s it going to be like when we get to space?

That will NOT be a subject I’ll be interested in tackling if/when I start to write Jax Lunar Lumber stories…but it will definitely be something I keep in mind.

Image: https://assets.weforum.org/article/image/FbmtC2oWTDZqbfXoyVZIBgaODM3oCjmpBhQGPZUPnUo.PNG or https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/44937/would-it-be-possible-to-grow-bamboo-on-the-earths-moon

Jax Lunar Lumber Chapter 1: Birth of The Colony

For some reason, this post originally attracted some 1200 hits. I'm ready to get back to it now, but I'll start with this...

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Knox was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways), the rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.

When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what..."

I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”

We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!”

Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings begin below.

As we rolled down the driveway, I snickered. We were on our way to pick up supplies for our early May project in the backyard. This year, her first as a Retired Person, she had exploded from the gate with dozens of plants ready and waiting to be transferred outside. An early spring blizzard had chased anxious Minnesotans back inside twice this year and so the porch was a jungle of young tomato, squash, herb, cucumber, zucchini, chamomile, beans, onions, and carrot plants. She said, “What?”

“I just had a weird thought.”

She rolled her eyes and with a justifiably long-suffering tone, said, “What?”

“Well,” I started, hesitating. It was a strange idea, but the more I thought about it, the more I thought maybe… I said, “You remember how, when I worked for Knox, they said if you waited a year, you could buy everything you needed to…”

“…build a house. Of course I remember. What about it?”

“Well, I was just wondering if it would be possible to buy everything you needed to build a Lunar colony.”

At first she snickered, but after a pause, we both said in unison, “Yes.”

That was the birth of Jax Colony, and I sit here looking past a pile of Lunar regolith outside the main airlock of the colony, I’m amazed that someone didn’t think of it thirty years ago during the “rush” to go to Mars.

I know that Weir Base on Mars is a going concern, but they only have fifteen people and they’re mostly scientists and engineers. We have those here at Jax, but we also have fifty-three other Waqans, Khadijahs, Toms, Katherines, Mayras, Miguels, Dayvons, and a bunch of other people who cook, patch, build, and like me, maintain the plumbing…

Resources: http://anynewsbd.com/lunar-lava-tubes.html

Image: http://anynewsbd.com/images/lunar-lava-tubes-3.jpg

POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAYS: The Original Idea for JAX LUNAR LUMBER

On the way to the neighborhood Home Depot for the obligatory weekend project as well as a load of flowers and potting soil, I started musing on my hitch as a “yard ape” for a company called Knox Lumber. We, too were busy this time of year, and it was a familiar feel whenever I went to one of these stored. Know was one of the original “Do It Yourself” (aka DIY) stores, a precursor to today’s Lowes, Menards, and Home Depot. Eventually bought out by Payless Cashways (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payless_Cashways), the rumor in the store was that you could build an entire house by waiting patiently for a year while EVERYTHING went on sale…Rolling down the driveway, I suddenly had a thought and snickered.

When my wife asked, “What?” I shook my head. “No, what?”

I reiterated the train of thought above, then added, “I was wondering if it would be possible to build a colony on the Moon using just what you could buy at Knox?”

We pondered it for a few moments, then suddenly said in unison, “Yes!”

Inspired by Matt Weir, the result of my musings begin below.

As we rolled down the driveway, I snickered. We were on our way to pick up supplies for our early May project in the backyard. This year, her first as a Retired Person, she had exploded from the gate with dozens of plants ready and waiting to be transferred outside. An early spring blizzard had chased anxious Minnesotans back inside twice this year and so the porch was a jungle of young tomato, squash, herb, cucumber, zucchini, chamomile, beans, onions, and carrot plants. She said, “What?”

“I just had a weird thought.”

She rolled her eyes and with a justifiably long-suffering tone, said, “What?”

“Well,” I started, hesitating. It was a strange idea, but the more I thought about it, the more I thought maybe… I said, “You remember how, when I worked for Knox, they said if you waited a year, you could buy everything you needed to…”

“…build a house. Of course I remember. What about it?”

“Well, I was just wondering if it would be possible to buy everything you needed to build a Lunar colony.”

At first she snickered, but after a pause, we both said in unison, “Yes.”

That was the birth of Jax Colony, and I sit here looking out over a pile of Lunar regolith outside the main airlock of the colony, I’m amazed that someone didn’t think of it thirty years ago during the “rush” to go to Mars.

I know that Weir Base on Mars is a going concern, but they only have fifteen people and they’re mostly scientists and engineers. We have those here at Jax, but we also have fifty-three other Waqans, Khadijahs, Toms, Katherines, Mayras, and a bunch of other people who cook, patch, build, and like me, maintain the plumbing…

Resources: https://www.space.com/moon-colonists-lunar-lava-tubes.html

Image: https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/YkAeUwwE2aksDqd5tgwyec-970-80.jpg.webp