"No, wait a minute." For some reason, Noonan felt cheated.
"If you don't know simple things like that … All right, the hell with reason. Obviously, it's a real quagmire. OK. But what about the Visitation? What do you think about the Visitation?"
"My pleasure. Imagine a picnic."
Noonan shuddered. "What did you say?"
"A picnic. Picture a forest, a country road, a meadow. A car drives , off the country road into the meadow, a group of young people get out of the car carrying bottles, baskets of food, transistor radios, and cameras. They light fires, pitch tents, turn on the music. In the morning they leave. The animals, birds, and insects that watched in horror through the long night creep out from their hiding places. And what do they see? Gas and oil spilled on the grass. Old spark plugs and old filters strewn around. Rags, burnt-out bulbs, and a monkey wrench left behind. Oil slicks on the pond. And of course, the usual mess—apple cores, candy wrappers, charred remains of the campfire, cans, bottles, somebody's handkerchief, somebody's penknife, torn newspapers, coins, faded flowers picked in another meadow."
"I see. A roadside picnic."
"Precisely. A roadside picnic, on some road in the cosmos. And you ask if they will come back."
Comments
that … All right, the hell with reason. Obviously, it's a real quagmire. OK. But what about the Visitation?
What do you think about the Visitation?"
"What did you say?"
meadow, a group of young people get out of the car carrying bottles, baskets of food, transistor radios,
and cameras. They light fires, pitch tents, turn on the music. In the morning they leave. The animals, birds,
and insects that watched in horror through the long night creep out from their hiding places. And what do
they see? Gas and oil spilled on the grass. Old spark plugs and old filters strewn around. Rags, burnt-out
bulbs, and a monkey wrench left behind. Oil slicks on the pond. And of course, the usual mess—apple
cores, candy wrappers, charred remains of the campfire, cans, bottles, somebody's handkerchief,
somebody's penknife, torn newspapers, coins, faded flowers picked in another meadow."