Steamgothic

The story I was suppose to focus on this week was Steamgothic, by Sean McMullen. It's basically a story about a man who's day job is to customize ultralight aircraft motors. He is approached by a couple who have a 1852 Aeronaute, a steam powered aircraft, hidden inside their barn. They want the narrators help restoring it. The important thing is that if this aircraft had successfully flown around the time it was created it would predate the Wright Brothers by almost a half century. The most interesting part of the story to me was how similar it felt to the modern day world today. Besides the steam punk elements, which I have never been exposed to, the idea that this initiative of restoring the machine became a reality TV show is something I think we can all agree on happens regularly today. Especially how the author discussed the over exaggeration of the plot line, and the added drama elements that were made to create better TV. I have to admit that the armature burlesque club kind of confused me, but it reminded me of the paparazzi following celebrities around today. Another part of the story that I could relate to was on the second page, when Leon discussed how no one ever wrote letters anymore. "Anything that can be turned into text or pixels comes over the Internet". I relate to this immensely, as now the only time in my life I ever really receive hand written letters is around birthdays or Christmas. Overall, I enjoyed the story and how it was resolved in the end. My only question is, what do you think is the moral of this story, or is there one? I could not identify a clear message McMullen was trying to portray, but I'm interested in what the rest of the class thinks.