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and thus by definition art was an attack on pure functionalism ... but in the
name of greater pleasure and higher rationality.
The aintellects of the General Consultancy fought back and forth about that
for a truly amazing amount of machine time, but with the help of
Aimeric's father (who seemed faintly amused by the whole business) they had
made an airtight case, and the
Inessentialist Movement was registered as a legitimate, rational
tendency within
Caledon thought.
I don't suppose anyone thought that one of the major corollaries was going to
matter quite so much as it turned out to; there was an argument implicit in
Inessentialism that one ought to do a certain number of things on
whim, just to experience them, particularly if no one else had ever
experienced them. As Aimeric pointed out, if there had been Inessentialism
when he was younger, he, Bruce, and Charlie would have had no problem getting
permission to hike over Sodom Gap.
"Indeed, and quite a number of other good things might have come
of it," old
Carruthers said. We were all gathered in the Main Lounge, as we now always did
in the last hour before bedtime; it was an occasion for campfire-style
sing-alongs, or trading jokes and stories, or occasionally for political and
religious arguments that I had a hard time following despite Margaret's
best efforts to get them explained to me. This particular time no one
had yet pulled out a musical instrument, and most people were just talking in
little groups so far. I had gotten my preferred corner, and Margaret had slid
onto the bench next to me, so that I could rest an arm on her shoulders while
we talked.
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Aimeric seemed astonished. "I thought you were opposed to our making the trip,
and didn't like anything we were doing "
The old Reverend grinned and sipped his beer. "Of course I was. I was a
stiffnecked old swine at the time. Some of us take decades to acquire any
youth, and some of us require a terrible shock."
Clarity Peterborough had recently gotten permission to come to the Center to
visit on occasion, so she was there as well, sitting close to Aimeric and
constantly glancing at him as if he were her bodyguard. "You're exaggerating
the difference between then and now, also," she said. "Be honest, Luther. Much
of the clash between you and Aimeric was just because you had two males in
one household "
"And no woman to mediate, yes, I know, I used to say that regularly,"
Carruthers admitted. "It was true too. You know, I've never thanked you for
coming to visit so often in the first few years after Ambrose sorry, but at
the time you still were
Ambrose had left. I was dreadfully lonely, and your visits were very good for
me."
Peterborough smiled, and somehow twenty or thirty stanyears vanished.
"The pleasure really was all mine. Oh, I know a young apprentice minister is
supposed to spend a lot of time with her mentor, but you know how
rarely that's actually the case most of them end up as unpaid personal
servants. In the first place, you really did help me form my own vision of
what I ought to be doing, and since I really was learning something, it was
natural for me to stick around. And in the second place, it was my main way
to get any news of Ambrose."
Aimeric sat up as if he'd unexpectedly gotten a splinter from the bench.
Old Carruthers grinned even more, and took an uncharacteristically long pull
on his beer. "I always sort of suspected that might be the case."
Once again, Aimeric's relatively youthful appearance, due to suspended
animation, a
quarter century less exposure to ultraviolet, and perhaps most of all to
having led a less embittering existence, had fooled me into thinking of him as
younger than he was. He had to be almost the same age as the Reverend
Peterborough. Just as I was making that connection, she said, "Oh, yes. A
terrible crush on the local rebellious heretic ever since I
was about twelve. Good girls who get scholarships and do all their homework
and want to get everything right have a certain fatal interest in smart bad
boys."
"I don't think I've ever seen Aimeric turn quite that color
before," I said casually.
Margaret stuck her elbow into my ribs.
Thorwald was tuning up with Valerie, and to my pleasant surprise they
started to play some ballads from my Serras Verz group, doing some
very nice duet work on them. We all turned to listen and appreciate.
As they finished the group, Thorwald gestured to me to join them. I was
about to politely decline I was enjoying their work too much, and
having taught two music classes and played for the appreciation class that
day my fingers were a bit sore and tired when Valerie's face went briefly
slack and then reshaped slightly, "D-do Oc-citans really do tha-at? Go on long
walking trips out in the forest just because it's nice and it's pretty?"
"Yes, Betsy, they do," I said. "It's one of those things that's
hard to explain the attraction of until you've actually done it and
then once you have done it, and do understand, you can't explain it to
anyone else." I don't know whether my own songs had made me a bit homesick, or
whether it was just the awareness that if I had stayed home I would probably
be up in Terrbori to see the first wildflowers on the southern coast and fish [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]