Story:
Being one of the first to walk on an alien planet isn’t quite living up to Jen’s high expectations. But when she looks for someone with time to talk to her, the consequences might be more than anyone expects.
Author Bio:
Sheila Deeth grew up in the UK and has a Bachelors and Masters in mathematics from Cambridge University, England. She moved to the States with her husband and sons in 1996 and recently became a US citizen. She describes herself as an English American, a Catholic Protestant, a mathematician who can’t add up, and a writer who can’t spell.
Sheila started telling stories before she learned to talk, but only her mother and brother could understand. In school she spun tales to keep students quiet when teachers had to step out. Then the teachers threatened to record her stories on a reel-to-reel tape-recorder; Sheila decided the pen was less frightening than the microphone and learned to write instead.
On discovering that mathematicians get full marks for doing things right, and writers only get partial credit, Sheila chose to study mathematics at college. Of course, college mathematicians never get full marks. Afterwards she became a computer programmer, writing programs instead of stories. Then she took a job as a quality assurance engineer and was paid to make programs break.
Meanwhile Sheila told stories to her sons, to chess club, to Sunday school classes… and eventually, when her job was outsourced, even to the computer. Of course, this computer has spell-check and grammar-check, so it makes a useful listener. The internet lets her send stories to publishers, and publishers occasionally print them, thus fulfilling Sheila’s life-long dream of being listened to by more than just family and friends, without using a microphone.
