From the day
Perspective: The Future Historian · Tactile
The bite of the December wind cuts through my heavy wool overcoat, a coarse weave of sheep’s wool that smells faintly of coal smoke and wet horse tether. My numb fingers fumbled with a single thin dime to pay for a gallon of gas at the apothecary—ten cents for a jar of fuel feels nearly usurious when one considers Carnegie’s grand talk of taxing a man’s very legacy. My word, the friction of the cardboard Rook cards in my pocket is the only warmth I find as I hurry past the newsboys. The world is pivoting toward a future of invisible airwaves and income tallies, yet all I feel is the grit of the sidewalk beneath my boots and the weight of a changing empire.