in me with perfect reliability that he would marry only when he found just the right girl. That 'right girl' seemed a long time in coming. I felt rather sorry for him that he was so hard to please, for there was much joy in having a wife.
"Since our full stomachs gave us a new kind of lusty good health, our energy was boundless. We attacked with full and gusty zeal any challenge given to us by the Gods of the Mountain. We were determined to outdo the expectations of those mighty, unknown ones who lived on the mountain, and our easy successes were indeed a rich and heady wine.
"For the first time, we on El Sod-a-Por thought of ourselves as something other than struggling toilers, expendable nothings of no real importance or meaning. For the first time we had the means, we had the strength, we had the will to resist, to fight, to win! We weren't just going to hang on--we were going to ride! For the first time, we were men! In time, we grew to think of ourselves as even more than men: We had the power now to rival that of the Gods--or so we came to believe foolishly. But I am getting ahead of myself again....
"We had ploughed, seeded, planted, and grown, then harvested and eaten. Then came an even greater discovery: Until this time we had been eating the pufars raw, or drinking them down like water or wine, experimenting in all the flavors of their growth. It was my own wife, along with her mother, Lee-La, who accidentally dropped a pufar into the fire. Very upset, the two women hauled the fruit out quickly, for such was our ingrained tendency to waste not, even when there was plenty, and they were afraid the fruit would be spoiled. My wife cut open the fruit with the burned black shell and tentatively tasted of the half-cooked fruit.
"That evening when I came home, she greeted me exuberantly. 'Sal-Lar, you'll never guess! Today I dropped an orange pufar in the fire--quite by accident--and it came out tasting like nothing I have ever eaten before! It was soft, and mushy, and so sweetly divine. Mother and I quickly threw a few more pufars in the fire, and we gave some to Far-Awn, when he stopped by. He loved it! He named it a pudding, and suggested we women start cooking the pufars in different methods. "Puhlet meat is not the only thing that can be roasted," he told us, and then he winked his eye.' She stopped and smiled sadly. 'You know, I wish he would find a wife. He is growing old, and he doesn't have a child to inherit his talent.'
"Far-Awn was growing old. He was sixteen now, and unmarried, an unheard of age to remain a bachelor. Baka Valente himself once said that at sixteen he had already fathered seven children--few of whom still lived.
"Do I speak overly much of my friendship and closeness to Far-Awn? I hope not, and seek not to impress you with this. But remember, I was the husband of his sister. I was his closest friend. I was his most trusted confidant, more so than any of his brothers, or even his father. The love I had for him was different from the love I had for my wife, but very large, nevertheless. Still, he was for me always an enigma. He could sit staring thoughtfully into the fire, his brows wrinkled in a look of anxiety, when all was going so well. Though he worked as hard as any of us, he was given to overlong periods of just thinking, of daydreaming, of planning for the future when every day was so perfect now. We accepted this oddity of his personality as part of his talent and character, and respected the differences that were his. Still, his thoughtful frowns when he thought of the future put a few thoughts in my own head, trying to ponder on what could be the cause.
"While Far-Awn thought of the future, of ways to defeat the storms when they came, the rest of us combed our brains to devise, invent, and originate different methods of cooking and preparing the pufar fruit. You see, we were very much enthralled with the needs and demands of our stomachs, for never had they been so cherished and
"Since our full stomachs gave us a new kind of lusty good health, our energy was boundless. We attacked with full and gusty zeal any challenge given to us by the Gods of the Mountain. We were determined to outdo the expectations of those mighty, unknown ones who lived on the mountain, and our easy successes were indeed a rich and heady wine.
"For the first time, we on El Sod-a-Por thought of ourselves as something other than struggling toilers, expendable nothings of no real importance or meaning. For the first time we had the means, we had the strength, we had the will to resist, to fight, to win! We weren't just going to hang on--we were going to ride! For the first time, we were men! In time, we grew to think of ourselves as even more than men: We had the power now to rival that of the Gods--or so we came to believe foolishly. But I am getting ahead of myself again....
"We had ploughed, seeded, planted, and grown, then harvested and eaten. Then came an even greater discovery: Until this time we had been eating the pufars raw, or drinking them down like water or wine, experimenting in all the flavors of their growth. It was my own wife, along with her mother, Lee-La, who accidentally dropped a pufar into the fire. Very upset, the two women hauled the fruit out quickly, for such was our ingrained tendency to waste not, even when there was plenty, and they were afraid the fruit would be spoiled. My wife cut open the fruit with the burned black shell and tentatively tasted of the half-cooked fruit.
"That evening when I came home, she greeted me exuberantly. 'Sal-Lar, you'll never guess! Today I dropped an orange pufar in the fire--quite by accident--and it came out tasting like nothing I have ever eaten before! It was soft, and mushy, and so sweetly divine. Mother and I quickly threw a few more pufars in the fire, and we gave some to Far-Awn, when he stopped by. He loved it! He named it a pudding, and suggested we women start cooking the pufars in different methods. "Puhlet meat is not the only thing that can be roasted," he told us, and then he winked his eye.' She stopped and smiled sadly. 'You know, I wish he would find a wife. He is growing old, and he doesn't have a child to inherit his talent.'
"Far-Awn was growing old. He was sixteen now, and unmarried, an unheard of age to remain a bachelor. Baka Valente himself once said that at sixteen he had already fathered seven children--few of whom still lived.
"Do I speak overly much of my friendship and closeness to Far-Awn? I hope not, and seek not to impress you with this. But remember, I was the husband of his sister. I was his closest friend. I was his most trusted confidant, more so than any of his brothers, or even his father. The love I had for him was different from the love I had for my wife, but very large, nevertheless. Still, he was for me always an enigma. He could sit staring thoughtfully into the fire, his brows wrinkled in a look of anxiety, when all was going so well. Though he worked as hard as any of us, he was given to overlong periods of just thinking, of daydreaming, of planning for the future when every day was so perfect now. We accepted this oddity of his personality as part of his talent and character, and respected the differences that were his. Still, his thoughtful frowns when he thought of the future put a few thoughts in my own head, trying to ponder on what could be the cause.
"While Far-Awn thought of the future, of ways to defeat the storms when they came, the rest of us combed our brains to devise, invent, and originate different methods of cooking and preparing the pufar fruit. You see, we were very much enthralled with the needs and demands of our stomachs, for never had they been so cherished and
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