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By Root 9308 0

and he sighed. I'm too old for this kind of thing. It's all right for someone like Wilson or Ridges or even Goldstein, but it's not for me. A wry smile played over his mouth. I figured that Goldstein out wrong, he said to himself, for his height he's built very well, he's a strong fellow, but he's changed, I don't know what's the matter with him. He's very gloomy all the time, he's got a chip on his shoulder. There's been something the matter with him ever since that first squad came back from the front; it's the combat, I suppose, it makes changes in a man. But when I first met him he was such a cheerful fellow, a regular Pollyanna, I figured he could get along with anyone. First impressions, it doesn't pay to follow them. Someone like Brown, he's too sure of himself, he goes on first impressions, that's why he has it in for me. Just because I stayed on guard too long one night; if I'd tried to cut off a few minutes for myself, then he'd have a case, but this way I think he just has it in for me.

Roth rubbed his nose and sighed. I could be friends with them but what do I have in common? They don't understand me and I don't understand them. To pal around you have to have a species of confidence I don't possess. If it hadn't been the depression when I got out of college. . . But what's the use of kidding myself, I'm not the aggressive type, I never would have been much of a success. You can kid yourself just so long. I can see it here in the Army, all they know is that I can't do as much manual labor as they can so they look down on me. They don't know what goes on inside my head, they don't care. What are finer thoughts to them, intellect? If they'd let me I could be a good friend to them, I'm mature. I've had experience, there're things I could tell them, but would they listen to me? Roth clicked his tongue in frustration. It's always been this way with me. Still, if I could get a job which fitted my qualifications, I could make a success of myself.

He passed by the strip of beach where the kelp had washed ashore, and curious, he went over to examine it. Giant kelp, I should know something about that, it was my major only I've forgotten it all. The thought made him bitter. What's the use of all that education, when you can't even remember it? He looked down at the kelp, and held the head of one in his hand. It looks like a snake. Such a simple organism. It's got an anchor in its tail where it fastens onto a rock, and it's got a mouth at the top, and a connection between them. What could be simpler? A basic organism, brown algae, that's what it is, if I were to try it would all come back to me. Macrocystis something, that's what it was called, common name Devil's Shoelace, or is that something else? Macrocystis pyrifera, I remember we had a lecture on it. Maybe I should do something with my botany yet, it's only twelve years since I had it, I could refresh my memory and there'll be better jobs now in that. It's a fascinating subject.

He dropped the head of the kelp. That's an unusual plant, I wish I could remember more about it. All those marine plants are well worth studying, plankton, green algae, brown algae, red algae, I'm surprised at how much I remember. I'll have to write Dora and ask her if she can find my botany notebooks, maybe I should start studying it again.

He walked back, examining the seaweed and driftwood along the beach. All dead things, he thought, everything lives to die. Already I can feel it, I'm getting older, thirty-four, I'm probably through half my life already and what do I have to show for it? There's a Yiddish word for it, Goldstein would know. Still I'm not sorry I never learned any Yiddish, it's better to have modern folks the way I did.

Oh, my shoulder aches, why don't they ever leave us alone for a day? In the distance Roth could see the men, and he felt a pinch of anxiety. Oh, they're all working again. They're all going to be making cracks and what can I tell them, that I was looking at some kelp? They wouldn't understand. Why didn't I think of coming back sooner?

Wearily, timorously,