"Thomas M. Disch M. - Come to Venus Melancholy" - читать интересную книгу автора (Disch Thomas M)

my maiden name. I use it now that IтАЩm divorced.
Why donтАЩt I tell you my story? It will pass the time as well as
anything. ThereтАЩs nothing much to tell about the time I was human.
I wonтАЩt say I was ordinaryтАФnobody ever believes that of
themselvesтАФbut I probably didnтАЩt stand out in a crowd. In fact, I
tried very hard not to. IтАЩm the introvert type.
I was only thirty-two when I found out I had leukemia. The
clinic gave me six months. The alternative was this. Of course I
chose this. I thought I was lucky I could qualify. Most people donтАЩt
have an alternative. Of those who do, few refuse. In a way it
seemed like an afterlife. The operation was certainly a good
facsimile of death.
After the surgery they used fancy acids that attacked the body
tissues selectively. Anaesthetics didnтАЩt help much then. They
whittled me down to the bare nerves and dumped me into this tank
and sealed me in.
VoilaтАФthe Cyborg!
Between the sealing-in and the shipping off there were
months and months while I was being wired up with the auxiliary
memory banks and being taught to use my motor nerves again. ItтАЩs
quite a traumatic experience, losing your body, and the tendency is
to go catatonic. What else is there to do after all? Naturally I donтАЩt
remember much of that time.
 They brought me out of it with shock treatment, and the first
thing I remember was this room. It was stark and antiseptic then. I
suppose it still is, but then it was starker and more antiseptic. I
hated it with a passion. The walls were that insipid creamy-green
thatтАЩs supposed to prevent eyestrain. They must have got the
furniture from a fire sale at the Bauhaus. It was all aluminum tubes
and swatches of bright-colored canvas. And even so, by some
miracle of design the room managed to seem cramped. ItтАЩs fifteen
feet square, but then it seemed no bigger than a coffin. I wanted to
run right out of that roomтАФand then I realized I couldnтАЩt: I was
the room, the room was me.
I learned to talk very quickly so I could give them directions
for redecorating. They argued at first. тАЬBut, Miss Hoffer,тАЭ theyтАЩd
say, тАЬwe canтАЩt take an ounce more payload, and this furniture is
Regulation.тАЭ That was the name of their god, Regulation. I said if it
took an act of Congress theyтАЩd redecorate, and at last I got my way.
Looking back on it, I suspect the whole thing was done to keep me
busy. Those first few months when youтАЩre learning to think of
yourself as a machine can be pretty rife with horror. A lot of the
cyborgs just go psychoтАФusually itтАЩs some compulsion mechanism.
They just keep repeating the Star-Spangled Banner or say the rosary
or some such thing. Like a machine.
They say itтАЩs not the same thingтАФa cybernetic organism and a
machine, but what do they know about it? TheyтАЩre not cyborgs.
Even when I was human I was never any good at mechanical
things. I could never remember which way you turned a
screwdriver to put in a screwтАФand there I was with my motor