Marto woke mid-morning, feeling groggy. Thomas Ng's ale had been delicious, and he had been in a mood for celebrating, but now he remembered why the Merited shunned alcohol. Leave aside the fact there were plenty of ways to lower inhibitions for those who knew how to access programs for mental and physical highs. The after effects of fermented drinks lowered one's effectiveness over time and could lead to lower Merit. Marto chastised himself and checked his ranking.

He felt a shock run through him. Overnight he had lost 31.25% of his followers. His Merit was down 9.87%. He felt sick. ["This was a mistake,"] he thought to himself. ["I've blown it. This visit was too soon, too soon."] He sat on the steps of the Ng home, hungover and worried.

To counteract the hangover, Marto decided to get minty. He focused on the word "minty" and shortly his tongue tingled with peppermint. Marto preferred a peppermint mintiness over spearmint or wintergreen. There were those who were into other subtle mints like cilantro, or catnip, but Marto liked the strong shivery sense of peppermint. It spread to his face, neck, chest, and his whole body. It felt fresh and cold. He walked out into the town in search of water or tea to spread the mintiness to his insides.

At the town square, he sat to watch the activity of the town around him. After several minutes, none other than Lily approached and handed him a cup of tea.

["I heard you. I heard your desire. I was making this for friends. It's Milk Thistle and Angelica. You need it, I think."]

["Thank you, Lily."] Marto was impressed and a bit sad. ["This is just what I wanted."] He rated her and the tea highly, knowing it had far less effect on her Merit than it would have had just the night before. The tea was mild, and a little chalky, but combined with the mintiness it cooled his throat even as it warmed his stomach. He knew it was what his liver needed after last night. He wondered how long it would take to recover from this sickness. He needed to get going.

When something is easy to measure, it often becomes the only thing which gets measured. One's weight, height, and monetary wealth were the key indicators of self-worth in the previous century. The greatest emphasis was on the numerical measurement of wealth. This key focus became so monolithic that other factors for individuals, corporate entities, and countries were ignored. Countries with highest monetary income were considered well off, despite rampant poverty, health problems, conflict, and suffering. Efforts were undertaken by a few countries to affect indexes focused on general well being, happiness, or better living among their populations, but the majority continued to focus on what was known as Gross National Product. The problem was happiness and well being were hard to measure and difficult to improve.

A shift happened with the advent of social networks. People began to see their self-worth as partially connected to the number of followers they had online, as well as how much money they had in the bank. The world became addicted to connectivity via electronic gadgets, computers, phones, watches, and glasses until biological integration made the process seamless. In only decades, monetary measurements of self-worth gave way to social measurements of self-worth. Nations couldn't adapt. Gross Domestic Product plummeted as less and less money changed hands, taxes evaporated. Deflation ran away with no end in sight as money became irrelevant. For those who focused only on pecuniary metrics, the unthinkable had begun.

For those who now engaged in the currency of popularity, a new metric had taken hold. The combination of the number of followers, satisfaction ratings, karma scores and engagement levels combined to become the general Merit rating on which we currently rely. Once again, a singular metric took hold among the Interconnected populous.

The question now is: how certain are we our new metric governs our general well being? Have we rid ourselves of the old monolithic measurement only to replace it with a new one? Are we sure our new metrics serve the purpose we desire? Do we ever stop to wonder, or like our predecessors, are we lazily monitoring an index which may or may not serve us?

This is the reason, dear readers, I decided to stop here in Glenville. Millennia ago, Plato said, "the unexamined life is not worth living." I can only hope that by looking more closely at all aspects of our interconnected life, I have helped to strengthen our communities, not weaken them.

– The Wakeful Wanderer's Guide, Vol. 6, lines 235 - 239

Marto examined his writing on the paper of the old Royal typewriter on the desk in the virtual Keys. He did not want to apologize for his actions, but try to give context to the direction his travels had taken. Perhaps he was only digging a deeper hole by raising more questions. He had to decide whether he was going to be a source of light entertainment and escape for his followers, or whether he was going to give a genuine accounting of his travels, both in the world and in his heart. He remembered one of his mentors; a chef named Herbert « Jennifer « Caroline « Fey « Alexa « etc, who taught him the key to living a Merited life was being authentic. ["People know when you are putting on a show for them. Just be yourself. It's plenty."] Marto knew that keeping things light when he had questions in his heart would only lead to failure. Feeling content with the new lines, he published them and then exited to the town square bench where he still had a half cup of tea to finish.

The tea gone, he walked back to the Ng's home. They had crafted a tube for him, with a string to go around his shoulders to hold the painting Bruce had made him. He took it graciously, adding further ratings and went to look for his unicycle.

It was gone.

He had left it leaning up against the side of the house, near the kitchen entrance. It was not there. Thinking someone had borrowed it to ride on, he asked the children of the town whether they had seen it. They had not. He went looking for Lauren.

["I will be right over,"] she thexted him.

It was hard for Marto to accept someone had stolen his favorite means of transport. It was flabbergasting. The idea of theft was perfectly outrageous to him, but not so much for the people of Glenville. They had seen a few of their members unable to share and give things in their town. The thieves would take items of value and run off to another community, or escape to a feudal enclave.

["Do you ever catch them?"]

["Sometimes we find them headed down along the coast. We have no real means of punishing them, so we just take what was ours and send them on their way,"] thexted Lauren. ["Mostly it's a sign they are not right for our community."]

["There is an insight there, I think,"] Marto replied, hoping Lauren would take his meaning.

Marto's remaining followers became amazed and enraged at the theft. ["Who would do that?"] ["Don't they know what it does to your Merit?"] ["What a stupid act. What were they thinking?"] Encouragingly, the novelty of the theft perked up his followership slightly. Marto took solace in this.

["I suppose I will have to walk,"] sent Marto to the town and his followers. The unicycle was a complex piece of hardware, a self-balancing interfaced system with a powerful motor which took several days to print and assemble. It had been designed by Trig « Martha « Helena « Tabatha « Evelyn « etc of Naper Great Lakes tribe and Marto had ridden it since the second of his tours. It had a positioning element within it, but it had been disabled by whosoever had rudely taken it. The uni's whereabouts were unknown.

["Put out an APB!"] sent Barb from Concord South. She was making a joke and sent references from old police television dramas. The meme ["All Points Bulletin" : "APB"] was echoed by Marto's other followers, checking the visual recorders attached to trees in a 30-kilometer radius. A discussion began about how far a thief with an unfamiliar modified uni could get in the hours estimated from its last recorded position. Always in search of a novel project, the Interconnected started multiplying the APB and soon it took on a life of its own.

Lying is a unique form of human expression. The natural world may or may not have had its analog, but we humans have elevated the art of lying to new heights. It has been said we, as augmented humans, have evolved beyond lies and deception. That is, in itself, a bit of a lie.

It starts innocently enough. In delivering feedback on a gift we might choose to soften our tone, offering constructive criticism, when what we really think is we hate it. We do this so as not to appear overly harsh in our review, knowing abject honesty might blow back on us in future reviews of our own gifts. We use softeners in our terms of displeasure so as not to seem unkind. Politeness and amiability are virtues in our way of life, after all. So, we are honest, but to a point. There are those of us who prefer not to soften our responses at all, this is more common among the super-mods, who value accuracy above all in the data they send. If you have ever gifted to a super-mod, you may have encountered this uncomfortable directness in their feedback.

Outright deception is harder to find among our kind, but this isn't a product of a philosophy of truth. Rather, we are honest because we know we cannot get away with any deception which can be falsified. Since we know that everything we express which contradicts the data available can be falsified, we choose our expressions carefully. Outright lies carry immediate consequences. Anyone who has spent any time disconnected from communications, apart from witnesses, may return to the connection free to embellish the preceding events however they like. Such tales of things unseen can be gleefully concocted from pure imagination, satisfying the deep desire we have to make up our own truth, freely and without the yoke of verifiable facts. Still, these tall tales are not without risk. Our friends are fond of making forensic models of events unseen, and if your story veers too far from these models, you might be branded as unreliable, and your Merit may suffer.

Lying may be a necessary exercise for the human mind. Perhaps it is linked to human creativity. We forgive the flights of fancy by children for example, because we know they need to play with their reality to grow. Once they come of age, however, we expect them to be accurate in their recollections. I see a caution here. A culture which never lies is a culture that cannot imagine things other than as they are. If we don't lie about reality, how do we push beyond our own comfortable boundaries? How do we avoid stagnation? Luckily for us, we are able to create games, dramas, and virtual environments which veer from reality at will, dreaming them up and inviting others to join in. Perhaps this is enough to keep us from becoming automatons of facts and figures. Absolute adherence to the truth can be utterly and devastatingly boring.

To take something which was not given, and use it as if it were, is a high form of deception, both to one's self and to others. I can think of nothing more isolating and exiling. Perhaps it provides its own form of punishment. Perhaps also, it is an expression of absolute freedom.

– The Wakeful Wanderer's Guide, Vol. 6, lines 240 - 244

Marto accepted breakfast from a new family, with the surname of Harris. They brought a delicious dish of grasshopper flour, sunflower seeds, and fruit preserve. They had also created dried versions of the same, wrapped in paper for him to take on his trip. The meal was rich and restorative. Marto rated this as highly as he could as he was in extreme need of calories and protein for his walk.

When he had finished eating his breakfast, he found the entire town had gathered to see him off. It was moving to be able to view them all at once again. Members of Sherwood and Cos had returned to their tribes in the early hours of the morning. Now he saw once again the whole of Glenville standing and looking at him.

["You have done a great thing here Marto,"] Lauren told him. ["We are no longer invisible to the other tribes in our area. We know you have sacrificed a lot for this. If we could we would reward you, but we know it is not your way."]

["It is not our way, Lauren. Rewards belong to the past. Just keep giving, and be more in Flow like we discussed yesterday. I am glad I stopped here. My story is far richer for it. That is enough for me."]

["Pie in the sky, pie in the sky,"] thexted Lily. ["That's what my mother would have said."] She smiled. Marto took it with the humor he hoped she intended.

["Well, I only mean, I wish we had another unicycle to give you,"] thexted Lauren.

["Ah, well, yes. I will miss the uni, it's true. Thank you anyway."]

["Could you just hop a ride on one of the caravans on the Merritt?"] asked Steven.

["It's not good to do that,"] replied Marto, ["It throws off the energy expenditure for the delivery of goods. Sitting on one might mean it won't reach its destination. Lots of people could be affected. It would be greedy behavior. Not an option for me."]

["You can have my bike,"] Bruce Ng offered.

["Although I would love to accept your gift Bruce, I think it's right for me to walk for a while. I have faith something will turn up. Perhaps my journey should slow down a bit for a day or two. It got off to a speedy start. Don't worry about me, I will be fine on foot for a while. But I sincerely thank you for your kind generosity."] In reality, Marto would love to have a bike for the trip, but he had to draw the line at taking one from a kid. Bruce's bike was well crafted, with a frame of bamboo and wheels printed in carbon. Unfortunately, now that he had turned down Bruce, he couldn't accept one from an adult without looking like a hypocrite. He was going to be on foot for a while.

Bruce smiled at him. Marto felt a renewed strength, starting to accept the new direction and pace his journey was about to take. He posted thanks and gave appreciation to all the town. Then he headed north between the two higher tribes through the woods. Ahead was the old Merritt Parkway, less than a day's walk away. The tube holding the painting bounced between his shoulder blades.