We ate like there was no tomorrow . We didn 't talk . We ate . We scarfed . We grazed the table . We were into serious eating (Carver 223 . The bare style of the language and of the matches the theme of the story . The symbolic elements are present throughout the story , although they are obviously ignored by the narrator . In the beginning , the narrator is unable to see beyond the surface of things . Blindness and prejudice are two of the main themes...