~ Hal ~

I must get out of this funk. Too much to deal with in my head, especially since you’re in there as well. Too many things to think about every minute of the day. I’m caught up in a whirlwind of emotions—of frustrations with too many people, including my husband. Maybe myself, too.

Do you feel that way sometimes? Like you can’t get a grasp on everything going around you? Do you think life is careening by, and you can’t stop the Ferris wheel for a few seconds to pause and do absolutely nothing? To simply shut down?

“Denny?” I call up to the second floor of the townhouse. I should break the non-communication first, but why bother? He won’t answer; he’s probably still mad at me. He stormed off after our spat without helping me clean up the dinner dishes and went upstairs to his hallowed office, slamming the door for emphasis.

He loves to spend hours there, working on sales reports, purchase orders, commission statements, texts, and emails and connecting with all his company and social networks online. He’ll put on his high-end headphones and crank up his state-of-the-art, high-definition stereo system complete with the latest ultra-modern audio gadgets and wireless cable connections. Using his father’s reconditioned turntable with ancient LP record albums, he escapes to the musical world of 1960s and 1970s classic rock. Go figure that he’d go back to that era and the same music his father appreciated, especially the Beatles, Cream, and Iron Butterfly—not like the supposed garbage I ask Alexa to play throughout our house or listen to on my Bluetooth in my car.

When we were stuck at home during the COVID shutdown, we painted the walls dusty green and added a dark cherry wood desk and matching cabinets with an oatmeal-colored shaggy rug and brown leather executive chair. It’s his room, not mine. English golf clubs, including an old niblick, mashey, and antique putter, hang on the wall beside the framed photos of Denny’s trip to Pebble Beach years ago with John, his golfing buddy who’s a police officer. Golf balls with handwritten accomplishments line up neatly in a hanging rack with matching dark green chairs on each side. It’s his haven. He loves the comfort the four walls give him, as it’s where he spends most of his time when he’s not on the road working, which he has gotten used to since sales and service had to be done via video conferencing during the pandemic.

The office has a jack-and-jill bathroom connected to the second bedroom farther down the hall; a mini darkroom is set up in its walk-in closet where I also keep my photography equipment and coin collections. The bedroom is not fancy like the office; it’s done in tans and whites similar to the kitchen and great room. A large blown-up photograph I took of a silhouetted lifeguard station at sunset at the Santa Monica Pier is above the bed with a dozen of my black-and-white pictures identically sized and framed flanking another wall. Simple room, nothing spectacular, only functional. Like me.

I don’t dare go up the stairs and check on him. What if he found out about my condition? I don’t want to start another argument.

The door remains shut as always when he’s in there.

As I mentioned, he’s been acting peculiarly the past few days. I don’t want to ask him what has set him off; I have no interest right now in dealing with more drama.

Noticing my smartphone ding, I wipe my hands on another towel, swing my leg around to sit on the island’s barstool, and tap the start-up button to view what’s new.

Ah, the all-present world of electronic connections comes to life. Ever since Meta launched its AI Research SuperCluster supercomputer, going online to search for anything is faster and easier than it was mere months ago. State your name aloud on your phone and let it start searching; you’ll find there’re only a few things it doesn’t know about you. So much for privacy. At least only you can read my mind right now, not a computer. Yet.

Checking my emails, I run through the recent additions. Let’s see . . . three from my boss; another from Lily, a gal at work who tries hard to be kind to me; one that looks like a joke from Daddy that is automatically deleted; and one notification of a post on my Facebook account.

I’ve never been a fan of Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, or any other kind of social media, and I’m less likely to be than ever since Silvia is on a quest to post every stage of her children’s lives. Denny has embraced social networking with vigor. He’s into staying connected with his pals from college as well as from his private high school. To think how thrilled he was when friends from his Boy Scout days contacted him—come on, we’re talking friends when he was eight years old? Like I care what those people from back then do now? How do they relate to me? Honestly, I burned enough bridges in high school not to merit any friends. They and high school mean zilch to me now.

Do you have a social media account? If so, how many friends are on it? I ask sarcastically, like it decides how socially acceptable you are. Or should I ask you to friend me? No, sorry. No interest there.

Denny has over two thousand connected friends on Facebook, eight hundred on Twitter, and two hundred on LinkedIn. My Facebook account has fewer than twenty, including Denny, his brother, Silvia, Tom, and some of Mom’s distant relatives. I must have over eight hundred on LinkedIn, as it’s more of a professional site for job-seeking. In case anything happens to me at the Valley News, I keep my online resume up to date. Denny teases me, saying that because he has more connections, he’s more popular than I am. Fine, another point for Denny-boy. Big deal. I say it’s a waste of time, telling people what you’re doing every thirty seconds. Get real, fake friends. I prefer to spend my time in better ways.

However, I have found interesting things on these types of sites when I browse through Denny’s friends, like his old girlfriends, teachers, and coworkers he hangs out with occasionally.

Do you search the Web for old friends and flames of yours or your loved ones? Tell me; I certainly will not and cannot spill the beans. Is stalking one of the secrets that obsess you?

However, one can learn a lot about a person online.

Take Hal. Denny’s brother loves social media; he’s the one to blame for Denny getting involved in it.

Hal says it’s the best way to connect with multiple people at one time without having to do a ton of work. Having more than five thousand connections, he keeps in touch—yeah, that’s a fact. One comment on his page and everyone knows where he is and what he’s doing.

I click on Facebook and go to my main page: There are three new photos of Silvia and Tom’s Jack and Jasmine and one from Hal.

The younger bro is weird but nice, with the flare of a vagabond. You never know what to expect from him, in a good way. He says he’s a wanderer, but I’d call him a gypsy. As I mentioned, he’s two years younger than Denny, so he’s my age but single. He hasn’t settled down; he’s been gallivanting around the world, enjoying life to the fullest. Currently, he’s somewhere in Israel working at a language school, teaching Hebrew students how to read, write, and speak English. Good, solid, help-society guy and job. Of course, Amy calls him her “old-fashioned missionary.”

And yes—you guessed it—he has the same religious fervor his aunt has.

Take that knowledge with a grain of salt.

I must hand it to him; he doesn’t preach at you like the one and only Ms. Colton. He acts, not talks. He’s more subtle and not obnoxious, the type who stays out of your hair and life but is firm in his beliefs. Don’t you respect people like that, who are faithful to their beliefs but not pushing them onto others?

Look at this photo of Israel’s Western Wall and Hal’s post:

Now that is interesting. It’s history; I love history. To think that the Jews and Arabs may have real peace soon is a wonderful prospect, especially with the ongoing confrontations with Hamas and Hezbollah. Plus, the Jews are remaking articles to use when their temple is rebuilt. Cool. No building yet, and I don’t know how or when it’ll be established in that part of the world, but it seems the forever hatred of the Jews and the endless attempt at a peace treaty between Israel and other nations may finally be resolved.

I’ll believe the parts of the Bible that archeologists can verify, mostly Old Testament information like cities, artifacts, and historical events, but not much else. Some of those stories have to be allegorical or make-believe. Prove to me there was a flood, the parting of a sea, or the resurrection of Jesus, a mere prophet during His day. Go on, let’s debate, and you prove it to me. Try me.

I accidentally click on one of Hal’s friend’s responses to his post.

Up comes: For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 6:23.

Oops.

Didn’t mean to click on a Bible verse.

Wait. Let me think this through. I’m analytical enough to read this without getting all worked up, like Amy’s fire-and-brimstone attitude. Ah, a challenge. Or should I say a pregnant lady who’s in control of her hormones? That’s how I should start approaching issues. Pregnant and emotionally charged. Are you ready?

Here goes: “The wages of sin is death”—so it’s saying that I must pay because I sin? And then there’s this gift from God that gives eternal life. Okay, what does that mean? Denny said all have sinned, that even I sin. Okay, got that far, and have admitted I’m not perfect. Neither is Denny. Neither is Amy. Neither are you. Don’t understand the “wages” issue. If I work, I get paid. If I sin, the payment I get is my death? Payment for my sin is that I die?

Well, everyone dies, right? There’s no afterlife. Why would I die because I sin?

But God offers a gift that’s supposedly eternal life. A gift is free, with no strings attached, meaning I don’t do anything for it. Although I’m dead from this sin stuff, there’s life. An eternal life, although I’m dead. Unclear, confusing verse. Looks like Bible jargon to me unless I was in seminary and studied it.

To be honest, I’ve never seriously thought about Heaven versus Hell. I don’t believe in either one. When you die, you die. There may be a Superior Being who created it all at one point, and we evolved, but I’d have to say I’m stuck somewhere between atheism and agnosticism.

Do you think that way? Or are you a Jesus person? Well, as my dad would say, “To each his own.”

Life here on earth is a one-time-through buffet; you pick and choose what you want, what you need, and what makes you happy. Metaphorically, take the salad, the prime rib, some au gratin, or mac and cheese, fill up on some desserts—then you die. That’s it; no going back for seconds. You’re the one in control of your life, not someone else, some so-called Superior Being. And no Hell. Who and why would there be a God who creates a Hell? He isn’t an all-loving God if He made an eternal pit of fire for bad people.

The devil, demons, Hitler—bad, bad people, but not ordinary people. Not someone like me. Or maybe you. We’re good people.

I believe God, if He exists, would never make a Hell, especially for eternity. The concept of Heaven may be a little more conceivable or ideological, but Hell seems too harsh. Trust me, I’m not horrible enough to deserve such a place. I doubt that you are, either.

I’m unsure whether there’s a God. Maybe Someone or Something had to create the massive universe—but a God to whom people are to bow to regularly? A God we pray to for redemption or so that we’re not sick or poor or whatever meets our next need or fancy? Makes no sense to me. Thus it can’t be true.

Then there’s this new-age spiritualism my sister believes in. You know, the teaching Oprah Winfrey touted years ago that God is everywhere in the universe and within us. From what I understand, it’s based on Taoism and Hinduism; the main point is since God is everywhere and in everything, we can aspire to become a god within ourselves. With many flocking to the occult with its cosmic energy, chakras, and crystals, I’d rather believe in her thinking than Amy’s unrealistic, hard-core beliefs. If I work at it, I can become a god, and so can you. I’d consider that belief system. It’s all about me, an individual, like it should be.

Well, religion or no religion, I’m in control here and now, and that’s all that matters.

The little girls are still swinging back and forth outside the window. They look like sisters.

Thinking about sisters, mine is strong-willed, independent, and knows what she wants. Silvia is only eighteen months older than I am, but she often acts like she’s my mother. Once when we were young and eating at the dinner table, she flatly refused to eat peas. Daddy ran after her with a spoon full of them, spilling them all over the place. Banished from the table, she spent time in her room for the night. The next time we had peas, she snuck them in her napkin and jammed them under the table’s corner, only to have Daddy retrieve them later. He grounded her for a week without the Internet.

Silvia got her degree in art but never used it professionally. After she married Tom, they moved to Florida, where she works for an independent insurance agency that specializes in homeowner, automobile, and healthcare policies. Tom has worked for his father’s construction business near Orlando since he was a teen, and he now owns it, so he keeps quite busy.

When Silvia and Tom found out they couldn’t get pregnant (he had some hereditary issues with strange medical names I won’t attempt to look up or pronounce for you), she researched every possible option, and it took two years to find those two precious, parentless siblings. Somehow amid COVID, Silvia and Tom caught a red-eye flight to Korea to get the babies and have enjoyed every second since they took them into their arms. Silvia would do anything in the world for them, and so would Tom. My sister is one hopeful person—even more so with her newfound beliefs. But I’m not like her; having a baby would make me miserable.

Do you have siblings? I’ve told you about Denny’s and mine. Are yours younger or older? Have a good relationship with them? How I wish you could respond to me. It would connect us instead of being one-sided.

Letting out a sigh, I question why I’m the only one here using my brain but not getting anywhere.

What’s wrong with me? Should I be thinking about this thing, this child, inside me, instead of spiritual, philosophical, or relative-related mumbo jumbo?

As my mind jumps from topic to topic randomly, I wonder what I’ve gotten myself into this time.