the dream
july 2021
this morning i had a strange dream. it was year 2050 or 2060. i should have been 110 or 120 but i did not feel like it. i felt as if i was thirty. just then a woman came in who looked as my wife did when she was twenty. in fact, she was my wife. the mystery did not last long. she told me that with the wonderful 3 d printer, the human parts - heart, liver, brain etc. – could be made and fitted for the old parts. this certainly explained our youthful bodies.
the room was so speck and clean. normally my room is littered with books and papers and what not and wife is always complaining about it. but i could not see any books around. i thought she must have done away with them. anyway that can be attended to soon. but i felt hungry and thought it was time to go out and buy some snacks. coming out of the home, stood before where the lift should have been. but there were no buttons to push to call the lift. the doors suddenly opened and i went in. no buttons there also. the lift suddenly started moving. i wondered where it was taking me since i had not said a word. but it took me to the ground floor alright. stepping out, i saw unusual number of cars. the air was sweet and full of fragrance. no dust. the road was paved from end to end, beautifully clean and smooth. there were no drivers in the cars, no bikes, no pedestrians. nothing but cars moving up and down. and there were no shops for snacks even though i walked about a bit. in fact there were no shops at all. i went back. sttod before the buttonless lift and the door opened. i entered wondering how without buttone, would it know which floor to take me to. but it landed me on the correct floor, the twenty first. perhaps it recognized me and knew about me.
as i wondered how all this was there, i woke up feeling slightly uncomfortable. after a while i realised the discomfort was because electricity had taken a break. consequently the air conditioner accompanied it. to get back to sleep and have that wonderful dream again proved to an impossible job.
so though wide awake now, i endeavoured to continue my dream, such as it was.
went back to the house, hoping to get something out of the fridge. the fridge was empty. i turned around to ask my wife why was it empty. she asked what i needed it for. obviously for some food. name it – she said. bread and cutlets only – i said. she went to something which looked like and a mirror and said – bread and cutlet for two. minutes later, there was a whir. a drone appeared and deposited the wherewithal on the table. she thought of something and said to the mirror like thing – and two cups of hot tea. minutes passed as we ate our cutlets and toast and no tea appeared. just as i wondered and was about to finish up eating, the drone deposited two cups of tea – piping hot. it was just in time. it was as though drone was waiting around the corner for the delivery.
it appeared there was no need to cook anything. you name what you wanted before the mirror and it was delivered by the drones. you could say the time also and it was observed to the minute. the drone, or whoever controlled it, knew about how much salt and pepper was needed, how much fats were to be there.
but how do we pay for it. no need. the bank accounts were there for the automatic deduction of the exact amount including service tax and carriers dues.
having eaten the food and drinking the hot excellent tea, it was time to read a newspaper. would the mirror provide it, i wondered. my wife, who knew more about it, went before another screen and talked to it and the newspaper appeared on the screen. lie back in the comfortable sofa and read. just say the word and it turned the page. just say the topic and it appeared on it.
perfect. but the newspapers were boring. no news worth reading. no leaders had called other leaders toothless or corrupt or inefficient. no one accused any one of lying about anything, i suspect, because all information was coded and available.
one needed to share this wonderful world with someone. wife called up her sister and brother in law on a screen and we exchanged greetings. they were looking as fresh as can be. but then came the kabaab mein haddi. the brother of brother in law appeared on the screen, obviously in a mood to chat. i could never stand this person, vainglorious and always full of himself. he was proverbial pain in the neck. of late he had developed some problems and it was difficult for him to move around thus sparing me discomfort by his presence. thanks (is it thanks?) to the 3 d printing, he was now as hale and hearty as could be. it was a pain in the neck again. i would have liked to switch off the screen but then wife is so fond of hearing this guy talk, it was not possible. i suffered in silence. my thoughts drifted elsewhere.
there were plenty of drones around, appearing out of nowhere and disappearing again. they dropped the necessary rations where it was needed - to the poor, to the unemployed. there were plenty of them around. since men were not needed to deliver goods, to clean up the room (it was done by robots – incidentally i have one now in year 2021), no domestic help, no drivers, no lift operators, the number of unemployed had multiplied. having nothing to do, they were living on doles. no charges. it was all looked after by the powers that be. the jobs were few because the machines did all of them. the machines even repaired themselves knowing which part needed to be replaced and doing it promptly.
no matter how comfortable the house is, one longs for outdoors. so it was decided to take a trip around. calling the driverless car was no pain. asking it where to go was. it demanded a destination. 'just take us around' did not have any response. so named a place outside the city (at least it used to be out of the city). it still was. that was good.
going to the countryside was another beautiful experience. even there, there was no dust, no littering around. the trees were all green and so were the fields. we saw the robots sowing the seed, we saw the robots operating sprinklers to water them. we saw the reapers reaping it with not a person hanging around. it was all done by remote control by the farmer sitting in his own house. trucks appeared and carried away the vegetables and fruits. robots loaded them onto them. where they went was again controlled by remote.
on the way back, i noted that there were no gyms, no spa, no gadgets for physical exertion. obviously, if you can just replace parts, why bother about keeping them in shape by exercise. eat, drink, and be mery was the watchword.
i wondered where the energy for all these gadgets came from. when i went back to the aforesaid screen, i asked it, just like that, for the information. it obliged. the use of fossil material for producing energy had done its job and gone away for twenty years or so back. it was all solar energy, wind energy, tidal energy. the generators for the wind energy were up in the sky at about four to five kilometres height so you could not see them or hear them but the electricity they generated was available. it was informed that there is always winds blowing at that height and ensuring a constant flow of electricity.
i would have liked to see how the food grains were converted into food delivered by the drones. but the electricity betrayed me once again. the air conditioner started whirring signalling that electricity was back at its job. i disliked it as it shattered my virtual dream but could not help it. i was back to the tired old body with all the previous just about to expire parts.
the dream faded away but i do hope that my grand children will be there to enjoy it in reality.
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