The Gift is another classic written by Ray. In this story two parents wish to give their child a gift he has wanted for a while, a tree. To their dismay a tree isn't allowed to be taken on a flight. Not an airplane flight, as you might think, but a space craft. His father, desperate to save his son's Christmas, shows his son the stars and says they are his Christmas tree. As with the Veldt I wondered how far from the truth this story actually was. Once again a little bit of research went a long way. A commercial space flight industry is working on making space travel available to the general public or at least to those with $200,000 or more to spare.
Space tourism is gradually becoming more practical. In June 2004 scientist launched a fifteenth and final test of a prototype of a commercial space craft, SpaceShipOne which was a success. So once again Ray's inventive and futuristic ideas have proved to just be ahead of their time.
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