Persistence of Vision Read Online Free PDF Page A

and imagination. It wasn't like any national style I've eaten. They improvised, and seldom cooked the same thing the same way twice.
    I sat between Pink and the fellow who had almost run me down earlier. I stuffed myself disgracefully. 'It was too far removed from beef jerky and the organic dry cardboard I had been eating for me to be able to resist. I lingered over it, but still finished long before anyone else. I watched them as I sat back carefully and wondered if I'd be sick. (I wasn't, thank God.) They fed themselves and each other, sometimes getting-up and going clear around the table to offer a choice morsel to a friend on the other side. I was fed in this way by all too many of them, and nearly popped until I learned a pidgin phrase in handtalk, saying I was full to the brim. I learned from Pink that a friendlier way to refuse was to offer something myself.
    Eventually I had nothing to do but feed Pink and look at the others. I began to be more observant. I had thought they were eating in solitude, but soon saw that lively conversation was flowing around the table. Hands were busy, moving almost too fast to see. They were spelling into each other's palms, shoulders, legs, arms, bellies; any part of the body. I watched in amazement as a ripple of laughter spread like falling dominoes from one end of the table to the other as some witticism was passed along the line. It was fast. Looking carefully, I could see the thoughts moving, reaching one person, passed on while a reply went in the other direction and was in turn passed on, other replies originating all along the line and bouncing back and forth.
    They were a wave form, like water.
    It was messy. Let's face it; eating with your fingers and talking with your hands is going to get you smeared with food. But no one minded. I certainly didn't. I was too busy feeling left out.
    Pink talked to me, but I knew I was finding out what it's like to be deaf. These people were friendly and seemed to like me, but could do nothing about it. We couldn't communicate.
    Afterwards, we all trooped outside, except the cleanup crew, and took a shower beneath a set of faucets that gave out very cold water. I told Pink I'd like to help with the dishes, but she said I'd just be in the way. I couldn't do anything around Keller until I learned their very specific ways of doing things. She seemed to be assuming already that I'd be around that long.

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    Back into the building to dry off, which they did . with their usual puppy dog friendliness, making a ,game and a gift of toweling each other, and then we went into the dome.
    It was warm inside, warm and dark. Light entered from the passage to the dining room, but it wasn't enough to blot out the stars through the lattice of triangular panes overhead. It was almost like being out in the open.
    Pink quickly pointed out the positional etiquette within the dome. It wasn't hard to follow, but I still tended to keep . my arms and legs pulled in close so I wouldn't trip someone by sprawling into a walk space.
    My misconceptions got me again. There was no sound but the soft whisper of flesh against flesh, so I thought I was in the middle of an orgy. I had been at them before, in other communes, and they looked pretty much like this. I quickly saw that I was wrong, and only later found out I had been right. In a sense.
    What threw my evaluations out of whack was the simple r fact that group conversation among file:///G|/rah/John%20Varley%20-%20Persistence%20Of%20Vision.txt (9 of 24)
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    file:///G|/rah/John%20Varley%20-%20Persistence%20Of%20Vision.txt these people had to look j like an orgy. The much subtler observation that I made later was that with a hundred naked bodies sliding, rubbing, kissing, caressing, all at the same time, what was the point in making a distinction? There was no distinction.
    I have to say that I use the noun "orgy" only to get across a general idea of many people in close contact. I don't like the