Stranger in a Strange Land

Honey Bun's reward for being a good girl; she expects to cuddle up to Mama. I've got a class starting almost at once, so I'll walk the rest of the way with her on me and let her stay on me until the last possible second. It's not a goodness to disappoint a snake; they're just like babies. They can't grok in fullness, except that Honey Bun groks Mama...and Michael, of course."
                They walked the fifty yards or so to the entrance to the Nest proper and at its door Patricia let Ben take off her sandals for her after he removed his shoes, He wondered bow she could balance on one foot under such a load . . . and noticed, too, that she had gotten rid of her socks or stockings at some point -- no doubt while she was out arranging Honey Bun's stage appearance.
                They went inside and she went with him, still clothed in the big snake, while be shucked down to his jockey shorts-stalling as he did so, trying to make up his mind whether to discard the shorts, too. He had seen enough to be fairly certain that clothing, any clothing, inside the Nest was as unconventional by these conventions (and possibly as rude), as hob-nailed boots on a dance tloor. The gentle warning on the exit door, the fact that there were no windows anywhere in the Nest, the womblike comfort of the Nest itself, Patricia's lack of attire plus the fact that she had suggested (but not insisted) that he do likewise-all added up to an unmistakable pattern of habitual domestic nudity . . . among people who were all at least nominally his own "water brothers," even though he had not met most of them.
                He had seen further confirmation in addition to Patricia, whose behavior he had discounted somewhat from a vague feeling that a tattooed lady might very 'well have odd habits about clothing. On coming into the living room they had passed a man beaded the other way, toward the baths and the "little ~"-and he had worn less than Patricia by one snake and lots of pictures. He had greeted them with "Thou art God" and gone on, apparently as used to buff as Patricia was. But, Ben reminded himself, this "brother" hadn't seemed surprised that Ben was dressed, either.
                There had been other such evidence in the living room: a body sprawled face down on a couch across the room-a woman, Ben thought, although he had not wanted to stare after a quick glance had shown him that this one was naked, too.
                Ben Caxtofl had thought himself to be sophisticated about such things. Swimming without suits be considered only sensible. He knew that many families were casually naked in their own homes-and this was a family, of sorts-although he himself had not been brought up in the custom. He had even (once) let a girl invite him to a nudist resort, and it had not troubled him especially after the first five minutes or so-he had simply regarded it as a silly lot of trouble to go to for the dubiOus pleasures of poison ivy, scratches, and an all-over sunburn that bad put him in bed for a day.
                But now he found himself balanced in perfect indecision, unable to make up his mind between the probable urbanity of removing his symbolic fig leaf . . . and the even stronger probability-certainty he decided-that if he did so and strangers came in who were dressed and stayed that way, he would feel all-fired silly~ Hell, he might even blush!

                "What would you have done, Jubal?" Ben demanded.
                Harshaw lifted his eyebrows. "Axe you expecting me to be shocked, Ben? I have seen the human body, professionally and otherwise, for most of a century. It is often pleasing to the eye, frequently most depressiflg and never significant per se. Only in the subjective value the viewer places on the sight. I grok Mike runs his household along nudist lines. Shall I cheer? Or must I cry? Neither. It leaves me unmoved."
                "Damn it man!, it's easy for you to sit there and be Olympian about it-you weren't faced with the choice. I've never seen you take off your pants in company."
                "Nor are you likely to. 'Other times, other customs.' But I grok you were not motivated by modesty. You were suffering from a morbid fear of appearing ridiculous-a well-known phobia with a long, pseudo-Greek name with which I shall not bore you."
                "Nonsense! I simply wasn't certain what was