Subjective Idealism posits that nothing exists unless it is perceived. A cornerstone of this philosophy is the existence of consciousness, a phenomenon that isn’t required by physicalism. From a physicalist perspective, if it walks like a human, talks like a human, and acts like a human, it’s a human, whether conscious or not. The idealist doesn’t accept this, claiming that consciousness is the key to being human and without it the physicalist’s human is nothing more than a zombie. They use some sketchy logic to prove that the physicalist argument is wrong, that there is no objective material world of which everything, including consciousness, is part of. Hence the title of this post. 

The gist of the argument is this: everything in the world is physical; physicalism predicts the existence of a parallel universe that is exactly the same as ours, but lacking consciousness [because it is not physical];  imagine a world full of unconscious zombies (if you can imagine it, it’s possible); thus physicalism is false by a logical method called modus tollens.

I find the assumption that consciousness is not a physical phenomenon somewhat self-serving and don’t accept it. I don’t think it convinces Physicalists either, but this introduces an intriguing idea, one I’ve been exploring in my Dao De Jing blog. I don’t think the philosophers took the zombie world thought experiment far enough. 

Let’s begin with my a hypothetical question: What would it be like to be a zombie?

I have my own thought experiment to address this, without using the word, consciousness, which the philosophers appear to be hung up on.

Imagine a day like this: you get dressed, have breakfast, and go to work, recalling a movie you watched the night before, so that you don’t recall the commute; you have a lot of busywork to do, forms to fill out and mindless emails to answer; your work day is interrupted by lunch with some coworkers talking about their new house, which they’ve been describing all week; you don’t recall the unmemorable drive home and make a dinner you’ve prepared a thousand times, talking to your family about school and other familiar topics; you clean the kitchen and watch TV until bedtime.

Question: Did you ever engage your prefrontal cortex in complex problem solving, analysis, or making plans? Remember this is a thought experiment, so brief interludes of thinking about a nagging problem don’t occur. This day was successfully traversed using only heuristic memory, your automatic behavior modified slightly using Bayesian estimation. This is a technique built into our cerebellum and thus requiring no active thinking. 

Are you a zombie?

Of course, I did the same as the philosophers, switching the definition of consciousness without telling you. My story defines consciousness as being aware (as in I AM AWARE thinking) of what you are doing. But if you can’t recall the drive to work immediately afterward, were you conscious of it? Considering the rest of this boring day, in which your mind basked in the afterglow of a movie you loved (an emotional response stimulated by memory), were you ever really conscious?

It seems to me, therefore, that the concept of a zombie world is an axiom rather than a thought experiment intended to show that Idealists are more clever than Physicalists. Such a world does exist, only not as a homogeneous universe filled with permanent zombies. We are all zombies, unconscious beings who walk, talk, act, and behave like humans much of the time.

The only prerequisite to being a zombie appears to be that the entity is unconscious. Zombies have brains with neurons, axons, and electrical signals flashing to and fro within their gray matter. Hormones are secreted by their limbic system. They have emotions. They are human. But they are also zombies, just not all the time.

I’d like to add a word on the sophistry of these arguments. There is overwhelming empirical data that demonstrates the neurological manifestation of consciousness. The brain reveals conscious acts through electrical activity. Thus, even if there is something vague called universal consciousness as proposed by Objective Idealism and there is a mind-body dualism, this unknown entity, whether physical or metaphysical, functions through the brain to create consciousness. It seems inescapable therefore that consciousness exists in the physical world as a concrete, measurable process–a process that acts on matter even if not itself a material substance. 

Next time, I’ll discuss another interpretation of the zombie concept, this time with a decidedly more idealist perspective.

No one replies. No one cares. John finally decides that he is alone in the universe. After all, is there a difference between not responding and not existing? No one exists but him, this moment is his entire life, not much to live for, getting on the subway for a short trip to the next stop. He glances at his inert phone, wondering if the internet has suddenly stopped.

He doesn’t know if it’s him or the world, so John smiles at the faces confronting him as he exits the car at his stop. Hundreds of other people join him and the dozens waiting for the next train, creating a maelstrom of humanity. John hated the subway because it was so confusing, suddenly standing on a concrete platform, surrounded by strangers, blinded by the shadows, unable to see the dimly lit exit signs. It is always the same.

Finally getting onto the brightly lit street, he reorients himself. His destination isn’t easy to find. Google didn’t know about it. John stumbles through the crowd, his iridescent, hazel eyes focused on the dim screen of his cellphone. He follows his phone’s directions, eventually finding himself standing in front of a pool hall…

Puzzled, he walks in. Was this shabby pool hall really the destination? John stopped,confused, glaring at the cell phone as its screen blinked into a new text message.
WELCOME, he read, TO YOUR FRESH HELL.
Before he could muster the towering outrage such a message deserves, John felt a sudden rush, a rude shove at his back and he plunged headlong, face first, into the pool table.
No, not into the table.
John had plunged into the 8 ball.
All of him.
John was one with the 8 ball now.
John felt the quick jab of the stick, then felt himself roll helplessly, haplessly, whirling and tumbling, his thoughts a mad jumble when with a sharp Clack! he felt himself bump and scatter the other balls on the table. He heard screams from two of the balls as they rolled into pockets on the table, and laughter, giddy relief, bubbling from the remaining four balls. 
With horror, John realized that each of the balls held trapped souls like himself.

8 Ball in the side pocket, rolling and slamming into the other balls, waiting in line in a darkened table. The clack of the cue ball slamming another ball above him drove his senses into overdrive. He could smell the beer-stale air from underneath the Pennsylvania slate table-top. The larcenous, unfeeling laughter of men, as John, expecting to be rear-ended by another unfortunate soul in ball form, cringed.

The next thing he knew, John smelled cold, open air.
A massive wall, like that of a church, rose at his feet. His eyes adjusted to the winking light and sounds of traffic, the vibrations of cars and trains. In Manhattan, his memory said, back in human form. He wheeled around looking for a clue, his body tensing for an altercation to come. He was alone, nearby, the farrago of the darkened river, by the tower of the Brooklyn Bridge

Standing on the wall, he remembered what had happened, at least what had happened before the hallucination had begun. He’d been unable to reach anyone during his recent depression attack and had come out to the roof of his run-down apartment building to jump in the river.

How had he not fallen after what he’d just experienced? Had his subconscious been aware of his every movement, leading him along the edge?

After his vision, he wasn’t sure he wanted to end it like this, drowned in the East River. He was climbing down from the wall when Sandra appeared from the door. “I just got your message, John. Are you okay?”

John sheepishly smiled and said, “Sure, but I got a great idea for that short film we’ve been talking about.”

I’ve been reading books about people with mental problems and this was a perfect choice. This book was published in 1962 and made into a movie in 1975. The movie won five oscars, so I was curious to see if it was faithful to the novel and watched it too.

This book delivers on getting inside the mind of a man who is one of the “Chronic” patients in a mental hospital. Chronics are long-term patients who are never getting out. The story is told in the first person by Chief Bromden, a half-Indian. The story never says why he’s in the hospital but he has serious problems with reality. He pretends to be deaf and dumb to avoid human contact, and he’s been there so long that nobody knows otherwise. The story is really about him.

The person we all know from the movie is a one-dimensional character introduced to change the environment in which Bromden lives, to wake him up. This happens over a period of months and to be honest, the author kind of fails to smoothly portray Bromden’s change in mental capacity. He’s suddenly a regular guy, although there are a few of his schizophrenic behaviors lingering throughout the book. As well as his paranoid fear of the Combine, the system of institutions, rules, etc that run the world.

The story is eccentric, with more than half the book devoted to Bromden’s life, especially his early life on the Columbia Indian reservation. However, he is not involved in the conflict, which is 100% centered on McMurphy and Nurse Ratched.

I don’t recall reading another book where a first-person narrator shared so much of their life while remaining mostly out of the plot.

The book is easy to read and very interesting. I would note that it got easier after the first few chapters, however, because the author had difficulty maintaining the narrator’s poor grammar and slang. That’s another inconsistency. If you start a character out speaking with a very specific accent, you’re stuck until the end.

The movie is a subset of the book, with a lot of action thrown in like a kaleidoscope.  Some scenes were completely rewritten. I can understand why it was done this way and it doesn’t lose much from the book. However, it seems at times to be based on the book rather than an adaptation of the book.

A good book and a great movie.

When I googled “how effective is verbal communication,” all I got were people telling me how to improve my verbal communication skills.

I think verbal communication is better than a dog barking, a bird or a whale singing, frogs clamoring for attention, but it doesn’t work well, certainly not well enough to sustain a complex society

I’m not a fan of evolutionary psychology because I think it’s an academic game designed to get tenure and publish papers (i.e., get more money). Thus, I’m going to avoid the anthropocentric viewpoint that “evolution” made us perfect, while admitting that some cognitive functions make sense because they are similar to those of animals. For example, the suggestion that a large prefrontal cortex allows more effective tracking of other members of a social group is reasonable.  Primates form the largest groups and we are the primate with the largest PFC and the largest group size, about 150 for humans and 50 for chimpanzees.

Being able to cope with more members of our group does not mean that humans have been transformed into amazing communicators. It just means that we can communicate poorly with more people. That might sound unfair; after all, we use symbolic representations to communicate complex ideas like plans and wishes, something other primates can’t do.

True enough, but we do most of those information transfers using written language. Human society didn’t make much progress until writing was invented, not so with language. I’m all for writing our thoughts down and discussing them with others. Oral communications has a  lot of problems that don’t occur with written language.

For one thing we don’t have time to listen to a speaker because most of us can’t remember what they’re saying long enough to formulate a reasonable response. So, we do one of several things: (1) try to keep up and forget everything, then respond based on past experience (i.e. memory); (2) focus on one thing, usually either the first or last statement; or (3) try to grasp the key point, if there even is one, and thus misunderstand most of what was said. This last is different from (1) in that it results not from trying the impossible (following in detail), but from trying to compile a summary as we listen, maybe one sentence. It’s different from (2) in that we don’t focus on ideas but on words.

The only time we can successfully listen is when the speaker is talking about something with which we are familiar enough to use any one of these three strategies with moderate success. This is what happens at workshops and conferences, where coincidentally a personal response isn’t necessarily required or expected.

Unfortunately that isn’t how daily communications operate. When we speak to someone, or they talk to us, a response is usually necessary. The thoughtful silence referred to in fiction is more like an awkward silence in reality.

Thus, we’re always thinking of our response, missing what’s being said, screwing up our understanding, and doing a poor job of responding because we used one of the listening strategies listed above. How poor a job we do depends on our unfamiliarity with the topic and how complex it is. Often, strategy (1) works fine because nothing new is being said, as is often the case with family or friends.

There are techniques that can be used to improve random communications; simple methods like listening carefully, noting key points, asking for clarification. But as we all know, a conversation is a two-way street, and our partner doesn’t always cooperate. They don’t understand why we didn’t understand what they said. Weren’t we listening?

Everybody gets flustered, and listening strategy (2) takes over; unfortunately, we each focus on a phrase or concept we didn’t understand, talk at cross purposes, and the proverbial apples and oranges problem results. How many conversations rapidly deteriorate when a simple question leads to an argument about semantics?  Having dictionaries and encyclopedias at our fingertips only makes matters worse, because we forget what we were talking about to begin with. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing.

My final point is more controversial. There are basically two kinds of people in the world: those who talk to themselves and those who don’t. Neither has an advantage when it comes to oral communication. The self-talkers are so accustomed to hearing nonsense rattling around inside their heads, that they are adept at tuning out spoken words. The non-self-talkers don’t practice enough and have to think to respond, which leads to the awkward silence I referred to above, giving plenty of time for any number of misunderstandings to arise.

Here’s the bottom line: spoken language is a natural extension of the communications systems used by animals. We have extended it a bit but it doesn’t work very well. Writing was invented to accurately communicate abstract concepts.

If you have something important to share, stop talking and write it down.

I read this book because it was referenced in several serious sociological and psychological treatises I’ve read during the last few years. I don’t think any of those researchers actually read this, however. My paperback copy was 1069 pages of 9 pt font. It took several months to finish, but I read it as carefully as every other book I’ve reviewed.

This is an example of why people become writers. Ayn Rand had a bone to pick with several aspects of American society in the 1950s, and she felt emboldened to rush into the fray without bothering to think about what she was saying. I’m fine with that because this is a work of fiction. Some people have become confused, however, naming her ranting diatribes a “philosophy” which she called Objectivism. I’ll say it now, before discussing the story and technical details, that I agree with many aspects of the views she shares through her protagonist characters. Who can argue with a slogan like, “Work hard and treat everyone with respect,” if it’s applied by all the members of society? This isn’t a political blog, so I’ll let that go, but it’s easy to learn more. As an aside, Atlas Shrugged is apparently some kind of scripture for Libertarians. Who’d have thunk it?

Technical stuff first. I don’t remember finding a single punctuation error, but I found several grammatical errors in the last third of the book. I think everyone, including the proofreader, was suffering from Writer’s Fatigue. Ayn Rand is wordy, to say the least. Her writing style appears to be “Always use twice as many words, especially in descriptive prepositional phrases, as you need. It got ugly towards the end. Here’s an example selected randomly (page 1058):

“They did not speak as they walked down the hill, with the darkness of the trees closing in about them for protection, cutting off the dead glow of the moon and the deader glow in the distance behind them, in the windows of the State Science Institute.”

Wow. The entire book was written in this style, but the author had lost it by this time. She just wanted to end the agony. It was her own fault because the characters don’t do a good job of conveying what was on Rand’s mind. The book is filled with rants and soliloquies given at the drop of a hat, but none of them elegantly summarized the speakers’ thoughts. Some of these digressions are more than 10 pages long, and they still fail to make their point (or maybe I forgot it by then).

I started off loving this book because the protagonists are just like me in many respects. I don’t retract that view after reading it. There were many scenes in the first third of the story, where the characters’ personalities were revealed in excellent style. This applied to several of the antagonists, those lucky enough to be introduced in the first part of the book. It wasn’t only the bad guys who got cheated. The man who epitomized what made this book into a pop-philosophy, John Galt, appeared too late to be seen as a real person. He was reduced to a Greek hero (he is actually compared to one near the end) with zero dimensions, the perfect man. I wanted to laugh, but I was too tired.

Summary. Okay…let’s see.

The author makes a lot of valid points about the importance of being rational, thinking, using our brains a lot more often, but she fails to show how this can be done by regular people. Her protagonists are all straight out of Greek tragedies. Or comic books. She has a gift for evocative metaphors involving all of the senses. Very good. I’m envious. She should have been a poet (maybe she was). The story wasn’t that complicated and was revealed early on, with no plot twists, not even red herrings. Straightforward story telling. There was no real conflict, a basic requirement of almost any story. It is a blow-by-blow description of the breakdown of society and the creation of a (communist) dictatorship. She was obviously concerned about the Soviet Union when she wrote this book. Did I forget to mention that the story is set in a fantasy United States that stands alone as the last bastion of capitalism?

Bottom line. I can’t recommend it unless you are like me, which I doubt. However, there was a miniseries made in maybe 2011, which is a pretty good rendition of the story, at least parts 1 and 2. I’ll watch Part 3 when I get a chance, but I don’t think it will follow the book as well because, by this time, Rand’s characters were on the path of verbal warfare with themselves (I’m not kidding…themselves), which doesn’t make a good movie. But she does destroy the world…oops, I forgot that too.

With all of the libertarian BS in this book, there are a lot of great glimpses of mental torment and anguish, not to mention the breakdown of society and a return to feudalism, described very well.

Rand ruined a great book with too much ideology. She lost it, just like her characters.

At the end, I didn’t agree with the protagonists’ decision. The bad guys won…

I’m glad to be writing a review of a novel written by someone like myself. The author recently joined the writing group I’m in, and he had published this story in paperback form. Other members of the group have published but I didn’t find any with hardcopies available. I’m not ready to commit to ebooks yet; I’m trying to give my eyes a rest. I didn’t start posting reviews of novels until recently, so I haven’t shared my views on the range of genres I’ve read. I read anything. This book falls into the category of stories I would never read if I cared. I know, that sounds crazy.

First the technical stuff. There were very few (if any) punctuation and grammatical errors in this book. The author acknowledged a proofreader’s assistance, and she did a good job. I mention this because, as an author and (mediocre) copy editor, I look for anything that doesn’t read smoothly. And I read slowly, so I don’t miss much. I noticed a little of what I call writer’s fatigue, however; the first half of the book is well-written, if a little wordy (I actually don’t mind that, but some people do), whereas the second half started to slip a little in tautness. By the last page, it was looking like an earlier draft than the first half. I’m familiar with this phenomenon from my own writing. The first part always get read more by the author and thus cleaned up. However, this wasn’t a problem in “The Tollkeeper.” I only mention it to be thorough.

The story is told in a very entertaining manner, with two threads, one in present-day Florida, and the second meandering through the central character’s life, describing events that brought him to Florida, where he’s a (you guessed it) tollbooth attendant. There were times when one or the other thread was more interesting, but I never lost interest in the story. The present-day is the main plot of course, and it was told by the central character in first-person using the present tense. I personally find this construction awkward because no one talks like that unless telling a short story (e.g., Janice says to Betty, “So I go over to the hair stylist and she’s like, out of it, and I go ahead and let her do my hair.”). See what I mean?

It almost works but I never got into the groove. I liked the narration other than that. Klaus is a very down-to-earth guy, who’s old enough not to take himself too seriously. A great antihero.

I’m not a fan of mythical fantasy novels, or even mythology in general. I had to use Google to learn about most of the Norse mythology referenced throughout the book. I didn’t mind because I felt like I was being introduced to an interesting (not really) aspect of Scandinavian culture. It was a learning experience that I can relate to (I try to put useful info into my stories as well), so I’m not complaining. Still, the quotes from epic poems and such at the beginning of each chapter could have been replaced by more informative background material.

The ending was unexpected but probably only because of my unfamiliarity with Norse mythology. I felt like it was rushed a little because so much time had been spent on Klaus’ early life that the author must have felt an urge to “wrap it up.” This brings up another problem with the structure. With so much time spent on Klaus’ early life, none of it related directly to the serious threat occurring in the contemporary world. It only supported the central character’s frame of mind, not the real conflict. With the knowledge the author obviously has of Norse mythology, I was disappointed that characters from Klaus’ past didn’t either show up in person or indirectly impact current events. Maybe they did and I missed it because I’m not familiar with Norse mythology.

If so, my bad.

The first movement of Sam’s daily atonal symphony always began with a buzzing alarm clock, momentarily silenced by his palm, which wouldn’t work on the garbage truck grinding down the alley behind his apartment, its diesel engine shaking the walls; the familiar whirring of hydraulic pumps raised steel lifting arms into place, screeching into steel cradles, tearing at his ears like fingernails on a chalkboard, leaving him cowering in bed, hands over his ears to muffle the bang, bang, bang of the dumpster being emptied before the cacophony reached a crescendo,  warning Sam to sprint for the bathroom and reach the comparative quiet of the shower before the 140 dB climax, played by a passing train engineer on his air horn, blasted him into quivering submission on the bathroom floor.

The second movement was performed in the kitchen by his wife who, apparently aware of the completion of the Allegro behind their apartment, began the clamor of Andante as soon as Sam sat down at the dining room table, her unwilling audience; bam, bam, bang, bang, went the pans, expertly wielded by Nona, her voice asking about his flight to Florida, perfectly timed to be understood between the microwave humming, beeping, the electric teapot boiling, adding its bubbling tones to the bedlam; the radio announcer shouting to be heard, despite her having a background role–the arrogance of some musicians.

The Minuet or third movement was usually performed in a vehicle, either Sam’s car, a bus or a taxi, but it would be different today; longer than usual, it would incorporate the efforts of musicians waiting along the route to JFK airport, where a new group of performers would add their discordant notes to Sam’s auditory nightmare.

Sam was accustomed to the formulaic beginning of the face-paced Scherzo; as always, it started as he descended to street level with loud cars accelerating into the morning, joined by a motorcycle engine hitting 9000 rpm; accompanied by blaring horns, the sirens of ambulances, fire trucks, and police cars, the apex arrived on cue; trash cans dragged by sleepy residents, scraped against the sidewalk–fingernails on chalkboards–profanities hurled at God and each other indicating the beginning of the Trio, making Sam wonder which dissonant instruments would join the Trio today as he climbed into the taxi, smiling as the first guest performer flew over in a helicopter, its spinning rotors marking the start of the interlude.

The neatly dressed and shaved taxi driver, speaking unintelligible English, was not a guest performer, but the splash of the tires through puddles, windshield wipers scraping on dry and mud-smeared glass, indicated that the second performer of the Trio was the rain and its aftermath; the taxi radio emitted semi-human sounds, barely understandable in the turmoil of the third movement; the final instrument turned out to be a pile driver that drove an auditory spike into Sam’s brain; thud, thud, thud, went the machine until the light turned green and the Minuet could resume.

Sam imagined the travelers rushing through the terminal as dancing to the third movement, now being played by the public address system; voices talking over each other, none of them intelligible, warned of the consequences of unattended baggage and cars, departing flight gate changes, gate agents looking for standby passengers going to Milwaukee or London, FAA rules with respect to carryon baggage; newscasters on TV monitors mumbled news designed to promote a sense of aircraft safety as silent golfcarts rolled by, beep, beep, beep, just like the dumpster and the piledriver; the background supplied not by cellos but by thousands of shoes echoing off the stone floor of the terminal.

The Finale began when Sam was seated in economy class, next to a middle-aged woman who was apparently meant to perform with her annoying, manly voice, asking him personal questions, making him want to get off the plane, cancel his business trip to Clearwater Beach; but he didn’t do that, instead he played the conductor, nodding at her monotonous comments, keeping time with the crew talking indecipherably through the public speakers which his neighbor apparently was unaware of; like the last violin of a sonata, she finally stopped talking, giving way to the slamming overhead bins, the final pleas of mercy from babies, hydraulic motors screeching, ventilation nozzles blowing full blast like a tornado, jet engines howling, screaming, takeoff, bumping, flaps up, more hydraulic whining, wind howling just outside the metal skin, headphones playing unintelligible sounds against background hissing, volume wide open, only hearing half the words, shrieked announcements warning of landing, welcome from flight deck, bang on touchdown, brakes screeching, thrust reversers deafening, more screaming hydraulics, motor high pitch, servos low pitch, start-stop, start-stop, whirring, brakes complaining, wait to get up, silent engines replaced by a quieter humming; his neighbor silent, her performance complete.

Sam suffered through the very long fourth movement in today’s atonal symphony, and finally found himself alone on a stretch of sandy beach.

Laying on a chaise near the palm trees well back from the clamoring of the breaking waves, Sam listened to the fifth movement, Adagio, a very slow movement played by a breeze rustling in the palm trees, birds singing, not too close, a distant car horn, not a train horn to be heard; the musical instruments of civilization could never be silenced, and Sam didn’t want to quiet the atonal musicians for eternity, but he did like to hear the fifth movement sometimes.

“Next.”

Encumbered by his backpack and winter coat, Howard shuffled toward the young man with short brown hair and wearing a black facemask and rubber gloves; the half-completed hotel registration form extended in his free hand was rejected. He was directed towards a low table and told to complete it and make any choices for optional accommodations. For 150 Australian dollars per night, he could get a room with a balcony. Howard had had a cigarette before entering the hotel with two other people who smoked, an attractive young Australian woman and an American guy. They were both paying for the breathing space. Howard couldn’t afford it and, besides, he’d been cutting back. This would be an opportunity to finish the job.

The twenty-six-hour trip from Jacksonville had been remarkably smooth and, boy, the Australians had their act together. The fifty people on his flight had been whisked into buses without delay and taken to the Sheraton Hotel. Soldiers had handled their luggage and were standing by to escort them to their rooms. VIP service.

“Next.”

His immigration form was accepted by a young Australian Border Force officer who began typing clumsily, asking Howard to clarify some of his written answers. Within ten minutes, he was parting company with Erica and Aaron, promising to meet for a cigarette in two weeks. Ha Ha. Howard wouldn’t be smoking anymore by then. He’d join them, however, to maybe get Erica’s phone number.

The room was nice, especially the black-marble-clad bath that included a walk-in shower and jacuzzi tub. But it wasn’t meant for long-term occupancy. The only drawers were in the closet. The main room was furnished with a king-size bed and work desk with office chairs. Not even an armchair. That would be fine with Howard, who was going to be teleworking during quarantine.

Several times during the first afternoon in his room, Howard caught himself picking up the pack of cigarettes and heading out the door to take a break, only to find himself facing a hotel employee sitting in a chair, enforcing self-isolation. He smiled sheepishly and waved at the bored employee, never the same individual. These Australians were clever. He couldn’t get to know his guard and bribe them.

The fourteen-day quarantine didn’t start until midnight, so Howard took the calendar from his backpack and numbered fifteen days; he would be released on 23 November. He resisted the urge to cross out the first day because it didn’t count. He felt cheated.

Howard faced Day One squarely, ready to do whatever was necessary to keep Australia safe. There was one thing he really liked about the quarantine: meals were delivered three times a day and left outside the room, accompanied by three knocks on the door. The food was excellent, the menu varied, but there was nothing extra. It was less than he was accustomed to eating and that worried him, until he read the information sheet from the hotel; he could order outside food for delivery, or even get selected items from the hotel kitchen. On the other hand, this could be an opportunity to lose a couple of pounds, secure in knowing that the Australian government would make sure he had plenty of calories during quarantine. Sweet deal. He’d stop smoking and lose a few pounds, maybe even adopt a healthier diet.

He breathed a sigh of relief when he finally crossed out Day One, but he was a little hungry when he slipped between the expensive sheets to see what was on TV.

Howard was an early riser. Thus, breakfast at eight a.m. was too late for his liking, so he kept something out of his meals to have a pre-breakfast snack: juice, some raspberries, a banana, a roll with margarine. Of course, saving something for the morning left him less-than-satisfied in the evening. He accepted that he was in quarantine, which was turning out to be a lot like boot camp, except for the lack of exercise. The hotel staff had thought of that, supplying a guidance sheet that included a list of exercises to help him stay healthy. He’d never thought about how active he’d been just moving around the house, the office, the city, and all of that was gone now. He started doing all of the suggested exercises. That made him even hungrier.

“Damn!” he exclaimed aloud, examining his paltry dinner, the roll and fruit he’d set aside for the next morning. “This is going to be harder than I thought.”

It was with relief that he crossed out Tuesday, Day Two, as finished.

Howard realized in horror that he had been brainwashed. He waited for breakfast to arrive, checking the clock constantly, opening the door to see if perhaps the delivery person had forgotten to knock three times. He picked up the phone receiver several times, ready to call, but waited; he would give them an hour before complaining. He hated people who demanded attention by complaining all the time. Maybe they delivery schedule was different; after all, everyone couldn’t get their meals at exactly the same time. Breakfast arrived at 8:55 a.m., five minutes to spare. Famished, drooling, he rushed to the desk and tore open the paper bag.

His anticipation collapsed like a deflated balloon when he removed the warm plastic dish. It was oatmeal, with some blueberry jam or something on top, with a couple of shaved almonds.

“What the hell?!”

Neither the bag nor the plastic container was marked as “DF,” which meant dairy free. God only knows what he was eating. This was a game changer. Now, he not only didn’t know when to expect his next meal, he didn’t even know if it would make him sick.

He plotted his revenge as he ate his gruel. Day Three crossed off the calendar.

Howard’s suspicions were confirmed the next day, when he spoke to his friend, Ted. Ted knew a guy who’d flown to Australia during the supposed Swine Flu pandemic of 2009. The guy had tested positive, according to the Australian experts, but had no symptoms. It was all a hoax, designed to get money from quarantined visitors and push the deep state agenda for global totalitarian government. Just one little piece of the big pie.

“Who’s this friend, the guy who supposedly witnessed this? Maybe he’s lying.”

Ted scoffed. “Man, he’s in hiding since he blew the cover off the story. I met him on the dark web. What he knows…”

Howard had heard enough sales pitches to be suspicious. “How does this guy know about the deep state…all that shit? I never heard about it.”

“Would I shit you? You don’t hear the truth on the news, Howie, that’s just b.s. for the masses. Use your head, man.”

“So, why do you think this guy got a positive test result but didn’t get sick? Isn’t’ that called asymptomatic?”

“That’s a word they made up to cover the truth, Howie. Asymptomatic is another way of saying, ‘There ain’t no fucking Covid.’ Get my drift?”

Howard didn’t but he let it go. Until the nurse came by to collect some samples from his throat and nose. He would know in within two days. They wouldn’t call if his test was negative. Time would tell. The rest of the day was uneventful, except that the meals came at random times, always within the hour he’d allowed for human error and laziness. They just made the time limit a couple of times. And some of his meals were labeled “DF.”

Something was going on as he crossed off Day Four.

The Covid test came back positive. Ted had been right. It was all a coverup for an international conspiracy. Howard examined several web sites Ted had suggested, and his worst fears were proven correct. How could he have been so blind?

The meal delivery became more inconsistent; sometimes his bags were labeled “DF” and sometimes not; sometimes they didn’t arrive for more than an hour late. He’d called and been told that his meal was on its way.

With his positive test, someone came around and probed Howard like an alien investigator, claiming to be checking for symptoms. There would be no symptoms. That was all bullshit. He didn’t think they were implanting a device in his head either; they were collecting DNA and other cellular samples that were being used to classify him. They wanted to turn him into a slave. He’d read about it. But there was nothing he could do until he could escape from captivity. Without external assistance he was trapped. Ted suggested he should remain calm and not let them know that he was onto them. Otherwise, he would disappear like so many others. Ted knew a web page that listed their names.

Day Five.

The food had been poisoned. Howard got diarrhea on the sixth day of quarantine and the people who answered when he dialed for information claimed not to know what had happened. He knew. His food had been mislabeled for days, to confuse him so that the experiment wouldn’t be disrupted. They were studying him, to see how far he could be pushed. It was about mind control. He’d read about it on a web page.

He decided to see if escape was possible, so quietly entered the hallway, blocking his door open with a shoe. He didn’t get three steps before a policeman, who’d replaced the hotel employee who’d been stationed in the hallway the first day, appeared and asked Howard if he needed assistance.

“No. I was just looking around.”

“Well, sir, that defeats the purpose of the quarantine, doesn’t it?”

Diabolical. “I guess so.”

Howard returned to his room and washed his dirty clothes in the bathtub with some detergent that had mysteriously appeared outside his door.

Day Seven proved the truth of Ted’s ominous prediction. Howard had been intentionally infected with an experimental bioweapon called Covid-19. It was all described on the QAnon web page. But Howard wasn’t going to be one of their patsies. When the nurse called to check on his status, he didn’t tell her about his fever, sore throat, shortness of breath, aching, no way. They would have to get their data from someone else because Howard wasn’t going to play along.

He was on his own. They weren’t going to break him, not in two weeks. The next few days would be critical.

The toxin they’d given him was strong. He spent Day Eight in the bed, or slouched across the day bed, shivering. But he was able to maintain his cover of not being ill, so no one came up to collect more data and probably reinfect him. He flushed most of the food down the toilet, to avoid more poisons and disguise his activity. That was one of the most important precautions he’d read about: don’t let them know what you’re doing, especially your efforts to circumvent their observational program.

He watched a lot of TV and got his work done. It turned out that he could complete a day’s worth of meetings in a few hours because of the time saved not driving all over. No one knew about his medical condition and thus his captors were unaware of the success of their operation.

He was already feeling better when he crawled into bed.

Knowing that his communications were being monitored by them, the unidentified cabal referred to by QAnon, Howard didn’t tell Kathy that he’d been poisoned when he spoke to her via WhatsApp on Day Nine. But he let his guard down and she was quick to attack.

“What do you mean, you’re the victim of a conspiracy, Howie? You never mentioned that before. What’s going on?”

He laughed and tried to sound nonchalant as he responded. “I was just kidding. This quarantine is some serious shit. I can’t leave the hotel room, not even for a cigarette. Nothing.”

There was an awkward silence. She was thinking. That worried him because Kathy thought of herself as rational, not easily fooled, and thus she was susceptible to the disinformation campaign being waged by “them.” Sure enough, she showed her gullibility with her next words.

“Have you been talking to Ted? You know, he spreads that crap for fun, to see how stupid people are. He’s some kind of anarchist. You didn’t fall for it did you?”

Howard had to lie to guarantee his safety. “No. Haven’t heard from him yet. I didn’t know he was into conspiracy theories. Who’d of guessed.”

He could hear her head shaking as she considered a response. Finally, she said, “At least you can’t act without thinking…you do remember your surprise birthday party, don’t you? When you called the police?”

He’d forgotten about that embarrassing incident. “You didn’t have to bring that up, Kathy, don’t worry. I’ll get out alive…”

“What the hell?”

On Day Ten, a nurse came to collect a sample for Howard’s second Covid test. His temperature had decreased so they didn’t have an excuse to take him to a secure facility for further testing. He got lucky there. It wasn’t in his hands anyway. If they wanted to keep him for further observation, all they had to do was falsify another positive test. He was at their mercy.

The police state called all the shots.

Lunch arrived late and Howard was pacing near the door, waiting for the clatter of a cart outside, three knocks on the door. Maybe he’d been distracted. He opened the door and was shocked at what he discovered.

The door across from him opened at the same time and Erica, the attractive Australian woman he’d sat near on the flight from San Francisco, faced him across the hallway. She quickly motioned for him to join her, so he slid a shoe into the door and covered the six feet separating their rooms in two steps.

Once inside, they shared their experiences. Erica led him to her private terrace where they smoked a cigarette. She had gotten a positive Covid test too, which made them wonder what the Australian Border Force was up to. His suspicions were confirmed by Erica, who had learned about the deep state from QAnon as well. Two people on one flight victims of the conspiracy. Far more than coincidence. They agreed to meet every day, but he’d bring his own cigarettes next time.

When the knock came at her door indicating that lunch had been delivered, Howard waited for the sound of the cart leaving before slipping out and picking up his own lunch, before entering his room, removing the shoe after him.

A salad and a bag of sea-salt potato chips.

Day Eleven made Howard wish he’d never left Jacksonville. It wasn’t the bioweapon he’d been subjected to, nor the contaminated food he’d been given, nor the psychological warfare that had been directed at breaking his willpower; he was finally broken by the microwave waves bombarding him day and night. Just like the embassy in Havana. He had stumbled into a field test of a new psychological weapons program using multiple assaults. The entire quarantine program was a cover up for a top-secret CIA black operation coordinated with the Australian Border Force.

His suspicion was confirmed by Erica when they met for a cigarette before lunch. They had come to the same conclusion: they would probably be released unharmed when the experiment was completed, but there was a small chance they would be selected for further tests. They didn’t want to risk disappearing, to be subjected to torture and mind control experiments for the rest of their lives.

There was only one way out. They went to the balcony rail together and looked down at the street 18 floors below.

Howard was ashamed of his weakness when confronted by the precipice of Erica’s balcony. There had been nothing to say. It was out of the question. A quick glance, exchanged in a moment, had sufficed to share the futility of escape. Trapped, they accepted their fate, getting little solace from knowing they were not alone.

“What are we going to do?” Erica asked hopelessly. She certainly didn’t expect Howard to have an answer.

“I don’t think we’ll be chosen for the advanced studies. After all, the odds are in our favor.” Howard scoffed and added, “We have as much of a chance of becoming long-term research subjects as we do of dying of Covid-19, if it were real.”

Erica nodded quickly. “It’s funny, isn’t it?”

“What?”

“How they can take us any time they want…we’re at their mercy. They can infect us with a bioweapon or use us as guinea pigs in secret research. And nobody will know or care…”

“There’s always tomorrow. We’ll know the truth, as long as we don’t let them know that we figured it out.”

Time was running out. They were scheduled for out-processing the next day, Saturday, Day 13. They would know then whether they were going to spend the rest of their lives as test subjects. Those unlucky enough to be chosen got the bad news the day before their release. It had all been discussed on the internet.

They had another cigarette in silence.

Howard faced an army officer and a policewoman the next day. They informed him that he would be released from quarantine in the morning, free to continue to his destination. He’d been unable to contain his frustration to the people who thought they were giving him good news.

“So that’s it? The experiment continues…if you even know what you’re a part of.”

“What?” asked the older man, wearing a camouflaged uniform.

The young woman interjected, “Oh, it’s okay, Sergeant, he’s referring to a conspiracy theory in which people in quarantine are being subjected to Covid-19 and other viruses as part of a secret government program.”

“Oh, is that all? Very well, sir, take care after your release. And enjoy your stay in Australia.”

They were smooth. Erica verified Howard’s experience, although she hadn’t mentioned her suspicions. They welcomed everyone, even those who would disappear after quarantine. She suggested they should stick together, maybe there was safety in numbers.

That was the plan at the end of Day 13.

Howard was in the early release group, between 4 a.m. and noon. He checked his room before rolling his suitcase into the hall, watching nervously as the door closed permanently. No re-entry. Erica appeared from her door and they headed to the elevators together. There was no one else in line to check out with the local police and New South Wales authorities.

Erica went first and was finished in a few minutes, before being escorted through the back door of the hotel, the same door they’d entered through two weeks earlier. Howard’s palms were suddenly sweaty as he faced the expectant face of the middle-aged policeman. None of the officials was smiling.

Bob looked up, shielding his eyes from the midday sun, and spotted the source of the droning, a helicopter approaching from the west. Helicopters didn’t fly over his quiet suburban neighborhood very often. Not much to see in Shady Heights. It was the police from the markings. His eyes followed the aircraft as it drew near at a surprisingly low altitude, maybe two-hundred feet. He instinctively looked down the tree-lined street, wondering what the police were looking for.

His curiosity piqued, Bob stepped out to the curb for a better look, his gaze anxiously sweeping the peaceful landscape. The noise of the blades cutting the hot air brought several of his neighbors outside. Manny waved from his front lawn across Hastings Street and joined Bob.

“What do you think is going on?” Manny asked.

Bob moved to the side for a better view of the helicopter hovering over Manny’s brick bungalow. “I don’t know, but they seem interested in your house.”

They were joined by Margaret and her husband, Franklin. Franklin sipped his beer and said, “I’ll bet they’re lost. They don’t have Google Maps for helicopters. I once had a neighbor the cops threatened from a helicopter, using a bull horn. They told him to get on the ground. A SWAT team dropped down on ropes.”

“What—” Bob started to interject.

“Yep. They were looking for a serial killer. Thought they had him cornered in his backyard, having a beer. Turned out he lived behind my friend. Good thing Ricardo hadn’t been a victim but still…”

The small group moved over for a better look. Bob didn’t hear anyone talking on a bullhorn, but the aircraft continued hovering over Manny’s house. Then, he realized what was happening.

“I’ll bet it’s a practice drill, like what Franklin said. They’re probably working on finding the correct address.”

“That’s it,” Manny added.

“You’d think they would have figured it out by now,” Margaret said. “Or a police car would have arrived to verify the address. I mean…they can’t see the house number from up there.” She pointed at the helicopter still hovering over Manny’s house. Everyone’s eyes followed her pointing finger.

Another helicopter was approaching from the north at a higher altitude. It wasn’t the police. Bob was the first to identify it.

“That’s a KBHF News chopper. Maybe this isn’t a practice. What the hell’s going on?”

“Those eyes-in-the-sky boys monitor the police channels, looking for a breaking story. They’re probably just here because the police are,” Franklin offered.

Margaret began, “Do you think they’re talking on the radio…” She didn’t finish her sentence when the police helicopter spun around and climbed rapidly, towards the KBHF aircraft several hundred feet above it, on a collision course. Everyone waved their arms frantically.

Bob grimaced and ducked instinctively when the two helicopters collided. The horrific scene unfolded in slow motion. The spinning blades of the police chopper disintegrated, shredding the KBHF helicopter. The two aircraft, locked in a deadly embrace, engulfed in a ball of flame, plummeted towards Manny’s three-bedroom house. The fireball missed his home but crashed into Tom and Brenda Martin’s house next door. They were out of town. Bob watched the scene unfold in a daze, frozen where he stood, until it was too late to duck or run.

The small group was knocked to the ground by the blast. Debris covered Bob’s yard, the front windows of his house shattered, but miraculously the four of them were uninjured. Bob’s ears were ringing as he stumbled through his front door, intent on collecting his cellphone and calling 911. He was followed by the others as if leading them to safety. The phone hadn’t been damaged.

Bob was speaking to the dispatcher while the others turned their attention to the television, intact between the shattered windows, tuned to a baseball game. The game was interrupted by a newscaster Bob recognized. The old guy who did the weekend afternoon newscast.

“We’re interrupting the game to report breaking news. The police have tracked a man who recently escaped from the state prison to Shady Heights. We’ll hear from the KBHF eyes-in-the-sky team for an update.”

“What the hell…” began Manny.

Margaret added, “This should be interesting.”

“They don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground,” was Franklin’s comment.

Bob finished his call to 911, looked out the front window at Manny’s house, now on fire from the explosion. He shook his head in disbelief at the stupidity of the newscaster.

My best friend, Winston, almost drowned when we were twelve years old. We had taken my dad’s skiff out on Big Lake in good sailing weather, a stiff northerly breeze whipping up foaming waves. We would have to tack to get away from the dock, so I took the tiller, Winston on the boom. I was the better sailor because I had been sailing all my life whereas Winston had just moved into the house next to ours. A landlubber. He had never been on a boat before that summer but was a fast learner. By fall, he was getting the hang of it.

We tacked into the middle of Big Lake, the sail close hauled, and turned with the wind on our starboard beam. The skiff heeled over, waves pounding the hull. Winston sat on the leeward rail holding onto the shroud, grinning.

The wind was becoming unsteady, making me wish we had put on life vests. I shouted to Winston to get down in the boat. He scoffed and waved his free hand, dismissing my concern. Suddenly, the wind changed direction 180 degrees, the boom swung around, hitting him in the chest. He plummeted backwards into the waves. Not thinking, I leapt from the stern and released the halyard, tossed the anchor over the side.

I was in the water before the buffeting sail had collapsed onto the boom.

Now, at sixty-five, recently retired, Winston is drowning again.

“You just need to focus on whatever you like to do, and do it, but now you can do it right. You have plenty of time. There’s no hurry anymore.”

His sunken eyes, shadowed by bushy eyebrows, rolled slightly in denial. “Those weren’t real interests. Just passing fancies. I don’t really have any hobbies like you, with your travel and reading history books. We can’t all be intellectuals.”

He always said that when we talked about what he was going to do besides cut the grass and visit his children with his wife. The family wasn’t his hobby. He didn’t talk about them all the time, show me pictures, tell stories about the things they did together. I’d had to prompt him to show me a photo of his grandson.

I’m trying to come up with a new idea. I’ve already tried the impulsive approach, but this isn’t like jumping out of a sailboat in Big Lake. This is harder. In the six months since he’d retired, I’d gone down the list of every hobby or interest he’d ever even mentioned but hadn’t gotten a response.

“That’s bullshit and you know it. Most hobbies are about doing things, like woodcarving, sewing, rebuilding an old car, shit like that.”

A brief, pained look flashed across his face. I’d been getting more aggressive in our conversations because I was beginning to not enjoy visiting him. Before his retirement from an electrical engineering company, he’d always talked about electrical circuits, computers, generators, how things worked. It was interesting. He never talked about that anymore. Didn’t want to, except to recall stories of particularly difficult projects, but I’d heard those too many times already. Maybe it’s just me, but I’m not ready to sit in a rocking chair. That doesn’t come until you have difficulty walking. I don’t like the idea of visiting my best friend, and just sitting on the porch, rocking back and forth. It was like visiting my grandmother in the nursing home when I was young. He’s waiting for the grim reaper.

“What does Sally like to do?” I ask.

“We have completely different interests. The only things we have in common are the children and this house. And we eat our meals together.”

“What about getting involved with cooking?” I ask desperately.

“I hate cooking. She can do it for all I care because I’m sure as hell not going to. I’d be happy to eat TV dinners and canned food.” He shakes his head and adds, “I worked all my life and now I just want to sit take it easy. I like watching TV. Just drop it.”

I can’t do that. What Winston doesn’t realize is that his actions affect others, like me. We’ve been friends since junior high. We went to college together, were each other’s best man at our weddings, lived less than a half-hour apart for forty years. All that binds us. It’s a two-way street. The idea of drifting apart in our retirement, all because he can’t find something to fill the forty-hour vacuum in the life he’d become accustomed to after so many years, is as traumatic as learning that he has cancer.

I can’t save him this time, but I’ll keep trying.