Hammock Snapshots are short flash fiction pieces, accompanied by an original illustration that aim to capture a moment, a feeling or a fragment of something without the pressures of longform writing. The series began on Instagram and now also features on our site.

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If you think about it, whatever  science fiction can imagine eventually comes true. You can speak to somebody a million miles away. You can send pictures, videos, watch them at any moment, as though you’ve been teleported in an instant. Machines can speak to you, analyze your every thought, bots who chat like human beings or vast systems of information that know you better than you know yourself.

You can watch any era, read about it, learn about every known moment in history, see a painting or  sculpture or artifact, probably even hear the music, travel through time. You can understand and translate any language, you can see any part of the globe, even outer space. We landed on Mars and the moon, we are circled by satellites, we have drones to record or deliver or attack, our cars are driving themselves.

We can communicate with anybody, we are on the verge of chips that replace your mind. There are supplements for everything, pills that make you happier or calmer or more energetic, infinite ways to alter your mind or body. But although all these possibilities have become real, why does it feel so hollow? Why is this future the shallow imitation, an empty adventure, a disappointing simulacrum instead of a thrill?