My fondest memory of the Eco-Rationing was the tree planting. We were all little back then and it seemed like a block party, with everybody out in the streets picking up their saplings from the government trucks and getting checked off the list. They'd size up your house and give you the trees that looked like they'd work the best, like how much sun you got and how dense your yard already was. Everybody had to take a dozen, and then we all dug and dug and got our hands dirty together.

There were a couple of arguments with people about having to tear up their fancy lawns or pull out their azaleas or rhododendrons or whatever in order to put the trees in the best spots (not to mention the fertilizer restrictions and water rationing for grass and ornamental plants), but mostly I remember it was fun. And that they let old man Ruggles keep his prize roses, even though the azalea people complained.

My daddy loved his meat, but he never got involved in the anti-anti meat protests. Instead, he made sure we were in the county's Meat Club, because it was the only legal way to buy meat after the rationing. We'd save up, and once a month went to the supper club and had the best local free range grass fed non-gmo meat anybody ever had. I grew up eating it. Daddy said it tasted better than any meat he had even before the rationing started up.

Frankly it seems weird that people didn’t used to ride bikes as much. Or walk. Even in a town like I grew up in, where everything’s far apart. You just have to give yourself more time. I mean, there was still a bus for the old people, but it wasn’t really faster.

School starting later was nice. And that’s when stores started opening later too, and offices. And closing earlier. My parents would grumble about the reduced hours but you could tell they were way more relaxed.

I guess we got used to not having phones? When they started wearing out and nobody could afford replacements we ended up just sharing them for games. That’s when the whole Night Chat thing got started, because it was all at night at home on soggy laptops. And of course no way to post pictures so not so fun.

I still dream about having one though. I mean, in my actual dreams. Dream Phone.

Personally guys, I have no fond memories of The Eco-Rationing. My mom was a real pain in the neck about the whole thing. In order to save water she made us drink the "un potable" water that the dehumidifiers collected during the Great Swamp Wave.

Gross. There was a reason it was considered "un potable"!!!!

I don't understand how we didn't all die. I mean, geeze, basically it was like drinking mold and fungus water. We even had to use it to shower. All the other neighborhood kids got to collect water near the spring by the cemetery. They had cool filters that they concocted from old sheets and the water tasted so much better! I loved getting invited over to their houses just to have a decent glass of water.

My mom insisted that the spring water was way more contaminated because of the radioactive pollywogs. I don't know. It just seemed way less gross to me.

Also I hated having to spin the cat hair into yarn for winter clothes because of the "Cotton Plant and Wool Animal Liberation" protests. It took forever to gather enough cat hair just to have enough to knit mittens.

I think the whole time was just so stressful for us because my mom was worried all the time. She grew up during the depression and that shit was hard. It felt like she was going through the whole thing again. She would not let us attend the community Garden Gathering Hymn singing nights. If she had maybe I would have fonder memories of that whole time.

I am glad Earth got better and healed through those days. Don't get me wrong. We are in a better place now even though we have to drink what we have here on campus at Psy High, Happy Recycling Urine Clean: Better Water for a Better You! At least we now know The Scientists know what they are doing!

Getting over the Entertainment Implants being removed. That was sure fun. I still have big holes in my head that no amount of puppet shows or epic poetry can fill. But I like the Flotsam River Circus, and a lot of the other skit players that come through town now.

I miss the Gorf. I mean the first-gen, original Gorf. They only came in fluorescent colors because they were still experimental. I mean now you hardly notice them because they can do that camouflage thing. But ours was this big happy bright green blob outside where the garbage can used to be.

It absorbed all the garbage we could dump on it, and it would kind of gurgle and ooze when it was digesting, but we never saw it "move" move. Like our neighbor. Once he tripped over the cables and he swore his Gorf lurched at him. My mom said he was a drunk. And that squirrel we found half sticking out of ours must have fallen in on its own.

It didn't hold enough charge to keep the lights on past 8. But we loved playing hide and seek in the dark. A lot of people my age remember those hide and seek games.

My mom says she used to pick up garbage in front of our house all the time. Fast food wrappers, fast food cups and lids and straws, disposable diapers, Swisher Sweets wrappers, candy wrappers, cigarette butts. "It definitely wasn't rich people garbage," she says. "It was all stuff created specifically to sell to the poor and middle class."

People threw it out of their cars, I guess.

Now of course there's lots less cars, and things either don't have wrappers or they're wrapped in hyperbiodegradables. Or reusables. Mom says there just isn't as much cheap crap to buy, but isn't clear on if there's less cheap crap because there's less income inequality, or if there's less income inequality because there's less cheap crap to produce.

I really have no idea what she's talking about.

Want an apple? I've got a sack and they need to get eaten before they go bad.

I miss gum. All aspects of the gum supply chain were deeply impacted by the eco rationing, and then they converted the factories to Gorf production.

None of the local artisanal gum makers really hit the spot, know what I mean? It all just kind of falls apart in your mouth after five minutes.

My dad had a job in the destruction industry. He was a designer at one of those companies that made autonomous deforestation vehicles. Won the “Most Innovative Multi-channel Impact” award for a combination clear-cutting strip-mining air toxicity generating unit that could also inject waste product into the water table. It was powered by an ingeniously small nuclear generator that allowed the vehicle to run non-top for 50 years maintenance-free.

There was a glut of industrial engineers of all kinds after the Eco-rationing, but he found a job at a bicycle shop. I think he likes it better.