May you always drink deep

“May you always drink deep” is a blessing associated with water-sharing, the Martian ritual through which Smith and those around him express trust and become closer. Its repeated use traces a movement from an unfamiliar gesture between Smith and Nurse Boardman to an established language of kinship, welcome, and communal belonging.

First Encounters

When Smith translates Nurse Boardman’s offer of the water ritual, he recognizes that she wishes to grow closer. He struggles to find suitably ceremonious words in his limited English and answers, “I thank you for water. May you always drink deep.” She is startled by his sweetness, fills a glass, and hands it to him. His next instruction, “You drink,” begins the exchange that gives the blessing its practical meaning: water is not merely offered but shared.

The ritual recurs with Jill after Smith comes out of the bath. He calls her his brother, cups water in his hand as though it were precious, and offers it to her. Jill initially mistakes the gesture for an invitation to drink bathwater; when she barely touches her lips to it, Smith answers, “May you never thirst!” The alternate wording makes explicit the wish embedded in the canonical expression: the exchange carries a blessing, even when Jill does not yet understand its significance.

Trust Made Reciprocal

Later, Smith, Jill, and Patricia Paiwonski turn the same practice into a deliberate bond. Smith sends a glass of water into the bathroom and returns it to Jill, who explains to Patricia that sharing water means mutual trust, openness, and partnership that cannot be broken. She also makes clear that Patricia may refuse without losing their friendship, and warns her not to participate if the act conflicts with her faith. Smith reinforces the seriousness of the offer, describing it as everything marriage is and more, and tells Patricia not to drink if her heart gives her reason to decline.

Patricia chooses to accept. Jill drinks first, saying, “We grow ever closer,” and passes the glass to Smith. He drinks, thanks Patricia for the water as his brother, and offers it to her with the blessing, “May you always drink deep.” In this scene the phrase accompanies a freely chosen commitment: its force comes not only from its ceremonial wording but from the possibility of refusal and the trust established by accepting.

From Invitation to Communal Welcome

The phrase’s significance extends beyond individual encounters. At the Nest, Patricia shows Ben Caxton the Innermost Temple, a circular room with a pool at its center, where new brothers are received. She invites him to share water and grow closer, or simply to swim. Ben declines for the moment; Patricia accepts his hesitation with, “Waiting is.” The exchange presents participation as something approached in its own time rather than demanded.

Duke later explains how the Nest’s circles prepare members for this step. Smith sometimes recognizes readiness early: Sam and Ruth, for example, received water from Smith when they had just entered the Third Circle. The formal Sharing Water service comes later, when the whole Nest welcomes new brothers—usually a couple—into the community. The blessing therefore belongs to a wider progression from learning and practice to lasting membership, not just to a single private exchange.

Ruth’s account gives that progression a vivid culmination. She recalls entering the Innermost Temple with Sam, frightened by the prospect of joining the group, then being welcomed into the pool by its members calling to them in Martian to come and share the water of life. She describes submerging and never coming up again. Against this communal welcome, the blessing’s wish to drink deeply resonates as an image of entry into a sustaining bond: a greeting first offered with difficulty becomes part of a ritual that receives newcomers into the Nest.