I love serendipity. I love it when time comes to put stories into issues, themes just naturally fall into place. It's like finding gems hidden in plain sight. We're so focused on other things, we don't see an obvious connection between the stories at first.

By lucky coincidence we accepted two stories that had connections to Indigo Girl songs and that was enough for us to find the same kind of connection in two other stories. Like the songs of the Indigo Girls, the stories in this issue aren't necessarily predictable or easy to read but we hope that they are entertaining and thought-provoking. And like a good Indigo Girls song, we hope these stories stay with you longer than it takes to read them.

The first story, "Vapors," is a science fiction tale written in part while the author listened to "Trouble." The second story "It Is the Right Thing to Do" flows between the world of a modern-day college professor and Native American myth. The lyrics from "Closer to Fine" fit this story very well. The story "Watershed" is about a modern day tangle of attractions and shares a title with an Indigo Girls song.

We felt we needed a lighter story to conclude the issue. Mindancer obliged us with "Gift of the Buccaneer." She swears she was listening to "Cold Beer and Remote Control" when she wrote it but we suspect she was actually drinking cold beer and using the remote control to flip between the scifi station and the cartoon network. All joking aside, the song "1 2 3" best matches this science fiction tale about a space pirate.

I hope you enjoy this issue as much as we enjoyed putting it together.

Carrie