Stranger in the House
by Laurence Windham

Meet Mr. Evan Gelical. Like the whole Gelical clan, he is a rather ordinary man. Evan is married with three children, ages 5, 12 & 16. He has just returned from an adventure at the local Try-N-Save Superstore. The family gathers around as Evan opens his trophy, a large cardboard Pandora's box containing virtual reality. After all the wires are connected properly, the family seats themselves in anticipation. This is it. Now the Gelicals will enter the real world, just like the neighbors.

Then without caution, the head of the household, with a push of a small red button, changes his family forever. The sirens do not sound, they sing. The alarm remains silent. Sights, sounds and images immediately escape into the house. Suddenly there are foreign voices in the home. They speak in the tongues of strange and sensual ideas. They are phantoms that invade the mind. And they continue to speak even after the portal is closed. As the dreamy sleep of hypnotism descends on the family, they all dream of tomorrow, when they can do it again.

At first, the whole family laughs at the people who live in the boxed universe sitting before them. That's what they're there for, after all. Often, the specters say and do things that Joe and his wife wince at. For a while they interrupted the magic genie to warn the children. As the genie insisted that it stay front and center, as the family rearranged schedules, commitments and furniture for the sake of the box, the warnings were corked up in a bottle. But after all, none of this is real, Evan shrugs, so what harm can it do?

Soon things begin to change.

The 5-year-old has ten times more toys than before, yet plays with them less and is always complaining that he wants more. He's still too young for Thursday night's "Must See TV." For him instead it is Saturday morning's, "Must Have TV. "But what he really wants is a box of his own. He's too busy watching Woody pine for his owner to notice that his toy cowboy likewise now wears a frown.

The 12-year-old has lost her sweetness. She has begun dressing and acting older than her age, and well beneath her former dignity. Her room has become a collage of the vapid priorities of twenty different personalities that have coached her on how to think and live. Her collection of Little House books are gathering dust. Now, when she can find time to read, it is only the magazines that talk about the people from the box.

The 16-year-old has found his independence, or rather has become dependent on the box. He is still somewhat respectful on the outside. But in his mind he knows how much smarter he is than his parents. Just like in the box. He resents having to put up with them until he can get out on his own. Just like in the box. He lives out his life now in an unjust world that will not recognize his entitlements nor sate his lust. It is only in the box that he gets what he deserves. He is unaware how deliriously the spirits enjoy reinforcing his rebellion while never rewarding his worship at their altar.

Evan's wife has changed too. Though she resembles the woman that he married, she thinks and acts and dresses like so many different pretend characters he has seen before that he no longer knows who she is. Not that he thinks about it much. After all, he's so busy now. In fact, Evan has also changed to the point that he knows more about the women his wife is emulating than the woman herself.

Yes, Mr. Evan Gelical has changed. He now accepts religious and political and social ideas that anyone with a healthy noetic structure would have dismissed with a laugh because of their silliness or rejected outright for their vileness. The ideas can't be that foolish, he emotes, or else they wouldn't have been allowed on the box. And besides, he's a free man. He always knows which side of the Crossfire he would be on, as he watches pundits pose.

The closeness and laughter and communion that his family once enjoyed is only briefly remembered when the spirits perform a drama that reminds him of what has passed. He, after all,
loves his family. That's why he got the box in the first place. Those who labored under him had complained "We want a king like all the other nations." But still they grumbled. "We need to spend more time together as a family", he feels, "I wonder what's on that we would all like to watch." But these strangely disconcerting yet seemingly familiar emotions soon dissipate as the box distracts him into laughing at someone else's misfortune.

Evan now sees through the Technicolor kaleidoscope. This prevents him from seeing that his life is laid waste. He cannot see the desert of What Once Was. All is gray and drab. He is only vaguely aware of how empty his soul is because of the steady stream of distractions.

The programs that he and his family have exposed themselves to have programmed them. The "shows" have shown them how to live. The spirits from the other dimension now inhabit the people who were real. Making them unreal. Evan Gelical and his family are shadows of their former selves and a reflection of the non-characters that they have stared at for so long.

The irony is found on that little box that gives life to the big box. It is called remote control. Years ago, in the beginning, the box would stare at you- one large dark eye hypnotizing you from across the room. A staring contest few ever won. The conquered would have to cross the room to ignite the fire on which the demons danced. Now the temptation is stronger than ever before. Now the box can control you from across the room. Now that's progress!