Fiction of Ideas_And I Awoke and found me here on the Hill's Side

     James Tipree Jr's And I Awoke and found me here not he Hill's side takes place in a loading/unloading area with a bar in it- in a future where the universe is riddles with all different and communicated Aliens and Alien planets. The older man in the story appears to be an older version of the main character. They discuss the amount of work it takes only to get this far out into space. How much education, money, work, and degrees it takes only to clean and do maintenance in a relatively close section of space. It seems humans in this world put all this effort and money and time into these degrees to get these jobs just so they can see aliens. It almost seems as a drug or an addiction- as if someone could be addicted to something without ever having even seen it before. They talk about humanities need to capture everything different and yet the argument is that its too much. That all of the aliens are so different that its overwhelming. That humans no longer have anything special or unique about them. However strange or interesting they are naturally, there are aliens that are stranger and more unique. The only interest they hold in the universe is that of "junk like Micky Mouse watches" and the desires of humans. The older man claims that humanity is wanting things and setting goals that they can never have, that are entirely unattainable but that humanity will never stop trying. He claims that humanity is bleeding itself out for the simple experience of these aliens and he seems to be no exception. He seems to mention that he cannot even touch his own wife- as if he himself had fallen for the allure of the aliens. 

To me it seems that the humans in this story are rather selfish. Their problem is that they cannot escape their wants. The older man claims these are built in but I’m not so sure that is necessarily true. These humans see an alien move as it naturally moves and finds it overwhelmingly sexual. They do not try to understand or change their views- to look for something more. They refuse to change how they interpret things and the ways in which they want to enjoy the things they interpret. They talk about not being to have sex with some of the overwhelmingly sexual aliens. Not only do they interpret a sexless being wrong- but refuse to even accept it as sexless. They continue to pursue such a thing until they eventually die trying. I have a hard time accepting that the entire human race, faced with new and unfamiliar beings, would force it’s interpretations and expectations on them so whole heartedly and without any kind of curiosity for the being’s own interpretation of themselves. 

Bridgette Olavage