Here's a public service poster from the Future That Never Was: the Retropolis Civilian Conservation Corps' TREES FOR TOMORROW program endeavors to replace all the trees we foolishly chopped down before we realized that we needed them.

Under the watchful eye of a Corps member, even an inexperienced robot is able to plant a new, living sapling out in the wilds beyond the wind farms and thereby make his own investment in breathable air for Tomorrow. Which he won't need to breathe, of course - being a robot - but that's just proof of his selfless dedication to a good cause.

This sprung up (if anything that took this long can be said to have sprung) out of my thinking about how Retropolis can do better than we've done not only when it comes to flying cars and faithful robots, but in making sure our planet stays a nice place to fly our cars around in. I'm ditching the worst mistakes of the retro future (highways? cars?) and trying to reimagine it into something that makes a lot more sense than what we've actually done. So far.

One of the things I like best about the future is that there's still plenty of it, after all.