Walking Off Dinner

Posted on Thu 18th May, 2023 @ 6:31am by Lieutenant Damion Ildaran & Elizabeth Anderson M.D.
Edited on on Thu 18th May, 2023 @ 6:41am

1,085 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Neither Yours Nor Mine
Location: Brown Sector, near Dawnstar Clinic
Timeline: MD-1, 2100 hours

Damion stood up as Elizabeth returned from disposing of their used soup bowls and spoons. "Where would you like to go?" he asked, as she had suggested they take a walk.

"No place in particular," she responded. "It's a nice night ... though that seems odd to say when we are in an enclosed environment. Down here, I'd expect to notice that more, but I seem to feel it less." She ambled toward the courtyard gate. "Why don't we go down to the Bazaar and see if there's anything new? Maybe something else will come up along the way."

"Sounds good," Damion said. "I could do with a visit to the tea seller. I always like to see what new blends he's offering. Are you looking to shop or just to sight-see?"

"Oh, sight-see, I suppose. I don't actually need anything, but tea blends sound interesting. You don't always use the replicator? Or is he selling recipes of things you sample?" she answered, strolling along, holding his arm. Elizabeth didn't care what the conversation was; she only cared about relaxing with Damion, walking a little, letting her mind settle from the recent events.

"I don't use the replicator for tea; I grow my own basil and make tea from that," Damion said. "But when I get tired of basil tea, I do like to see what the tea maker down here is offering. I like his spiced chai teas a lot. Renato turned me on to him."

"Ah, Renato, I see," Anderson said neutrally. "I didn't realize we always had basil at your place. Perhaps I need to adjust my taste receptors. Or maybe it's because I have such a wide variety of kinds of herbal teas I like. I buy them by recipe, though. I suppose you already knew that."

As they entered the wide path between two sides of what the doctor thought of as the 'bazaar', she smiled with excitement. "I love this place. It always seems a little bit magic to me, with all the products, most of them made right here. No two booths have exactly the same thing, unless it's some of the imported snacks. I think the brass makers' row is my favorite, but I know you said you like the teas best." She couldn't help quickening her steps slightly.

"What do you like best about the brass makers' row?" Damion asked, "making the brass or making things out of it?"

"Oh, neither. I like what they make out of it. It's new, but it feels antique." She thought about that for a minute. "I suppose that, because I'm relatively new, I have an appreciation for things that have stood the test of time. The designs they stamp into brass vases have been used on Bajor, and I suppose other places, for hundreds of years ... maybe more. I did a little research the first time I saw them, and a few are reminiscent of designs used on Earth more than 3000 years ago."

Elizabeth's enthusiasm was obvious, and she bounced a little as she walked, as if she couldn't keep the excitement inside. As they came into brass makers' row, she slowed and they stopped by a table of tall narrow brass flower vases and, in front of them, shorter, more squat burnished brass pots with lines etched into the brass which depicted animals and plants of another place and time.

"I went to a restaurant on Earth once, where someone had made little bells out of brass and had tied them onto a length of cord, so they hung down and made sounds when the wind blew," Damion said as he looked over the vases. He picked up a small, lidded object. "This is an incense burner, isn't it?"

"Yes, I believe it is. I honestly haven't researched which items are native to Bajor, as in they use them there, and which are adapted to possible customers who wander down here." She reached out to touch the lid with one finger and traced the tiny swirled design. "It's quite lovely, and shows graphically why I love to come here."

Thoughtfully, she dropped her hand back to her side. "I don't think I have a chip that is labelled 'appreciate beauty', but I certainly have the ability, and these qualify."

"You've been able to appreciate beauty for as long as I've known you," Damion said. "You enjoyed that hologram of the Japanese garden I took you to while we served on Hermes. You appreciated lemon pie the first time we met, and what is that, but appreciating a beautiful flavor? And you appreciate God--which, if I understand it correctly, is supposed to be a being of love, and what could be more beautiful than that?"

Surprised, Elizabeth looked into his eyes. "I have become so comfortable with you, and you so familiar to me, I sometimes forget ..." she shook her head and smiled. "Isn't that a funny thing? For me to forget something? It's probably more that you seem to be a part of me, not something outside, or someone outside. I didn't realize you were the poetic part."

Absently, she took his arm again and began to stroll down the "block" of shops, no longer paying attention to what was around her, allowing him to lead them where he would. "Yes, God is a being of love ... a quote comes to mind from old Earth ... somewhere around 3000 years ago ...

It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed,
because his compassions fail not.
They are new every morning:
great is thy faithfulness.
(Jeremiah's) Lamentations 3:22-23.

Or what about this, from another people, a little later?

Maryam “Mary” : 96 – “Surely Ar-Rahman will show love for those who believe and do the right.”

"There's something about the old languages that expresses things ... almost as poetically as you do," she smiled up at him.

"I've never thought of myself as a poet," Damion said, quirking one side of his mouth up into a smile, "but sometimes I read good ones: You are not a drop in the ocean; you are the ocean in a drop. Said by an Earth poet whose last name was Rumi. I came across that in the remedial reading course I took before I could apply to Starfleet Academy. The teacher of that class used literature she thought adults would enjoy, with a mind to teaching us the difference between ignorance and low intelligence."

(To be continued.)

 

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