None of that's it.
You see, I talked to Cliff the next evening, to tell him Mary Ann and I were going to marry and to thank him for giving me the idea. And after staring at me for a minute, he swore he hadn't said it; he hadn't shouted for me to propose marriage.
Of course, there was something else in the room with Cliff's voice.
I keep worrying Mary Ann will find out. She's the gentlest girl I know, but she has got red hair. She can't help trying to live up to that, or have I said that already?
Anyway, what will she say if she ever finds out that I didn't have the sense to propose till a machine told me to?
We all have our lovable eccentricities and I have a few that are all my own. For instance, I hate nice days. Show me a day in which the temperature is just 78, and a light breeze has the lush foliage of June, or the just turning leaves of September, rustling with a soft murmur; a day in which there is a drowsy softness over the landscape, and a sweet freshness to the air, and a general peacefulness over the world, and I'll show you one unhappy fellow-namely, me.
There's a reason for it, a good one. (you don't think I'm irrational, do you?) As I said in the preface to "Sally," I am a compulsive writer. That means that my idea of a pleasant time is to go up to my attic, sit at my electric typewriter (as I am doing right now), and bang away, watching the words take shape like magic before my eyes. To minimize distractions, I keep the window-shades down at all times and work exclusively by artificial light.
No one has any particular objection to this as long as we have the sleet of a typical New England late fall day darting through the air, or the blustering wind of a typical New England early spring day, or the leaden weight of Gulf air that splats out over New England in the summer, or the dancing flakes of that third foot of snow that blankets New England in the winter. Everyone says, "Boy, you're lucky you don't have to go out in that weather."
And I agree with them. But then comes a beautiful day in May-June or September-October and everyone says to me, "What are you doing indoors on a day like this, you creep?" Sometimes out of sheer indignation they pick me up and throw me out the window so I can enjoy the nice day.
The niceness of being a writer, of course, is that you can take an your frustrations and annoyances and spread them out on paper. This prevents them from building up to dangerous levels and explains why writers in general are such lovable, normal people and are a joy to all who know them.
For instance, I wrote a novel in 1953 which pictured a world in which everyone lived in underground cities, comfortably enclosed away from the open air.
People would say, "How could you imagine such a nightmarish situation?" And I would answer in astonishment, "What nightmarish situation?"
But with me everything becomes a challenge. Having made my pitch in favor of enclosure, I wondered if I could reverse the situation.
So I wrote "It's Such a Beautiful Day"-and did such a good job at convincing myself, that very often these days, sometimes twice in one week, when I feel I've put in a good day's work, I go out in the late afternoon and take a walk through the neighborhood.
But I don't know. That thing you people have up there in the sky. It's got quite a glare to it.
First appearance-Star Science Fiction Stories #3. Copyright, 1954, by Ballantine Books, Inc.
It's Such a Beautiful Day
On April 12, 2117, the field-modulator brake-valve in the Door belonging to Mrs. Richard Hanshaw depolarized for reasons unknown. As a result, Mrs. Hanshaw's day was completely upset and her son, Richard, Jr., first developed his strange neurosis.
It was not the type of thing you would find listed as a neurosis in the usual textbooks and certainly young Richard behaved, in most respects, just as a well-brought-up twelve-year-old in prosperous circumstances ought to behave.
And yet from April 12 on, Richard Hanshaw, Jr., could only with regret ever persuade himself to go through a Door.
Of all this, on April 12, Mrs. Hanshaw had no premonition. She woke in the morning (an ordinary morning) as her mekkano slithered gently into her room, with a cup of coffee on a small tray. Mrs. Hanshaw was planning a visit to New York in the afternoon and she had several things to do first that could not quite be trusted to a mekkano, so after one or two sips, she stepped out of bed.
The mekkano backed away, moving silently along the diamagnetic field that kept its oblong body half an inch above the floor, and moved back to the kitchen, where its simple computer was quite adequate to set the proper controls on the various kitchen appliances in order that an appropriate breakfast might be prepared.
Mrs. Hanshaw, having bestowed the usual sentimental glance upon the cubograph of her dead husband, passed through the stages of her morning ritual with a certain contentment. She could hear her son across the hall clattering through his, but she knew she need not interfere with him. The mekkano was well adjusted to see to it, as a matter of course, that he was showered, that he had on a change of clothing, and that he would eat a nourishing breakfast. The tergo-shower she had had installed the year before made the morning wash and dry so quick and pleasant that, really, she felt certain Dickie would wash even without supervision.
On a morning like this, when she was busy, it would certainly not be necessary for her to do more than deposit a casual peck on the boy's cheek before he left. She heard the soft chime the mekkano sounded to indicate approaching school time and she floated down the force-lift to the lower floor (her hair-style for the day only sketchily designed, as yet) in order to perform that motherly duty.
She found Richard standing at the door, with his text-reels and pocket projector dangling by their strap and a frown on his face.
"Say, Mom," he said, looking up, "I dialed the school's co-ords but nothing happens."
She said, almost automatically, "Nonsense, Dickie. I never heard of such a thing."
"Well, you try."
Mrs. Hanshaw tried a number of times. Strange, the school Door was always set for general reception. She tried other co-ordinates. Her friends' Doors might not be set for reception, but there would be a signal at least, and then she could explain.
But nothing happened at all. The Door remained an inactive gray barrier despite all her manipulations. It was obvious that the Door was out of order -and only five months after its annual fall inspection by the company.
She was quite angry about it.
It would happen on a day when she had so much planned. She thought petulantly of the fact that a month earlier she had decided against installing a subsidiary Door on the ground that it was an unnecessary expense. How was she to know that Doors were getting to be so shoddy?
She stepped to the visiphone while the anger still burned in her and said to Richard, "You just go down the road, Dickie, and use the Williamsons' Door."
Ironically, in view of later developments, Richard balked. "Aw, gee, Mom, I'll get dirty. Can't I stay home till the Door is fixed?"
And, as ironically, Mrs. Hanshaw insisted. With her finger on the combination board of the phone, she said, "You won't get dirty if you put flexies on your shoes, and don't forget to brush yourself well before you go into their house."
"But, golly-"
"No back-talk, Dickie. You've got to be in school. Just let me see you walk out of here. And quickly, or you'll be late."
The mekkano, an advanced model and very responsive, was already standing before Richard with flexies in one appendage.
Richard pulled the transparent plastic shields over his shoes and moved down the hall with visible reluctance. "I don't even know how to work this thing, Mom."