Goines On: Had he died but not realized it?

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As Goines began the day’s walk, he wasn’t sure he hadn’t already died and was just walking around in a daze imagining he was still alive. If that were so, then – in some sense anyway – there was life after death. If you could call the way he was feeling life.
    Why do you feel this way? He asked himself – aloud, for he was dictating his thoughts into his iPhone. The day before had been one chore after another from getting out of bed at 6 a.m. until 4 p.m.: he did the usual daily household chores before they drove to Chapel Hill and Durham to do errands, and then carry in and put away their purchases at the Wild Bird Center (a 50-lb bag of sunflower chips, which the spunky young woman tending the place had easily carried to the car for him, but which he struggled to even get out of the car at home) and at Costco. And then help Mrs. Goines prepare lunch, and then eat lunch and clean up the kitchen again before doing a few more chores he couldn’t even remember now. But he did remember feeling at times as though he might fall down – not fall down and break something, but fall down dead, no delay.
    And today he was feeling pretty much the same so far, maybe even worse because of those two ridiculous trips to CVS and Walgreens to see whether they had any of the six OTC (over-the-counter) products they currently wanted that their medical insurance now covered to the tune of $95 a quarter. Between the two pharmacies, he had found only one of the items. And it had been no fun looking in both stores for the items they didn’t have. 

    Screw it, Goines had told Mrs. Goines uncharacteristically loud when he returned home; he’d just wait until he went to a better-stocked Walmart than the one in Mebane. Anyway, they didn’t need any of the things urgently.
    Well, could that be about the size of why I feel like this? he asked his iPhone. A few steps farther on, he thought he heard someone calling his name. He looked up at the windows of the house he was passing, where his Nigerian friend lived whom he had worked with over 20 years earlier at UNC’s Office of the President, but he didn’t see anybody, so he kept walking.
    But soon again he heard his name. This time he looked back down the street, and there came his friend who often gave the Goineses tomatoes and peppers from his garden, and to whom they had given persimmons from their abundant 2021 harvest.
    The garden friend held out a small jar and said he made some apple and persimmon jelly. “Would you like some?”
    Of course they would! And Goines took the jar and said thanks. He even smiled.
    And he smiled to himself again as he continued on. He felt better, even felt well enough to remember now that it was a 100-push-up day, and the electrical box he usually pushed off was not far ahead. Oh boy! Callooh! Callay! Goines said aloud, without remembering to activate dictation on his iPhone. And he started to mimick running without ever having both feet off the sidewalk at the same time, taking short little dance-like steps and bending his knees and letting his body swing and sway. Of course, anyone who saw him doing this would think he was bonkers.

    But I am bonkers! Goines thought with an even bigger smile. He had become William James; his body was moving the way he wanted to feel – and he was already beginning to feel that way.
    Callooh! Callay!

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