Word: ancient
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Ever since they first peered into the night skies, humans have been awed and intrigued by Mars' baleful red glare. Ancient civilizations bestowed on the planet the name of their god of war. It was named Ares by the Greeks, Mars by the Romans. When the first telescopes revealed that the planets were neither specks of light nor gods but worlds, perhaps like earth, the notion grew that Mars might harbor life. Noting variations between the bright and dark areas of the planet, British Astronomer Sir William Herschel in 1784 attributed them to "clouds and vapors" and concluded that Mars...
...have still not abandoned hope of finding life or its remnants deeper in the Martian soil. There life forms might have access to water and be protected from the fierce solar ultraviolet radiation that rains down on the surface, virtually unobstructed by the Martian atmosphere. Sedimentary rocks in the ancient riverbeds would be an ideal place to hunt for fossils of organisms that may have lived when Mars was more benign, with a thicker atmosphere, warmer climate and running water on its surface...
...awoke early -- too early, barely able to breathe. There was fur in my mouth and an ominous purring sound in my ears. It was Sakhmet, the family cat, sitting on my face. Might today be the Twelfth of Tybi, which commemorates the massacre perpetrated by the Feline Goddess of ancient Egypt? It was too horrible to contemplate. "Get out of here, Sakhmet!" I shouted, sitting bolt upright. My wife Libra opened an eye. Her scales of justice, as usual, were at the ready. "About your behavior at the party last night...
...bloodsucking god of Chile with the long, flapping ears? Shuddering, I stepped into the shower. As the hot, healing liquid bathed my shoulders, I felt like . . . like . . . like Kappa, the solemn little Japanese water demon, renowned for his punctilious manners. Or perhaps like Ahto, the water god of the ancient Finns, who lived under a sea cliff. (But then perhaps not. Ahto's beard was made of moss, and I had shaved already...
Along and across the border there remain real conflicts, real fears. But the ancient tear separating Europe from itself -- the Catholic Mediterranean from the Protestant north -- may yet heal itself in the New World. For generations, Latin America has been the place, the bed, of a confluence of so many races and cultures that Protestant North America shuddered to imagine...