Her Catalyst: Part 13 of 25

In Part 13, Sharlene is worried about how retailers will respond to their product demo. A stop in a park to distract her anxiety causes her to be forceful in rejecting a young man’s attention. Then she’s not sure she can handle the company’s potential success. Angelisa finds a new direction for her education and more hope and encouragement from her friendship with Sharlene and her catalyst.

A peek inside:

Julie gives her presentation, then hands out headbands to the two lawyers and the two senior buyers and helps them to get them adjusted before she explains, “Just to make it clear we’re not doing any switch and bait, we’ll play the same recording we played last week for the buyers. We’ve had some adaptors built which allow two people to experience the same recording at the same time. By combining three adaptors, all four of you will be able to experience the same recording and your senior buyers can verify that we’re demonstrating the same recording to you. Are there any questions?”

“Not from me.”

. . .

“Okay, let me know when you’re ready and I’ll start it.” When she sees them nod their heads, Julie pushes the disk player’s start button, waits until the recording is complete then pushes the stop button.

“Is this for real?”

“Yes. Just to make sure there’s no misunderstanding,” Julie looks at the senior buyers and asks, “is that what we demonstrated last fifth-day?”

“It seems the same, but if it isn’t, it’s even better. Either that or I forgot how good it was over the weekend.”

“Better not let them try the others or they’ll give the farm away.” The other senior buyer winks to the senior buyer who spoke first.

One of the lawyers asks, “You have more?”

Julie nods her head, “We have two different ones which we demonstrated to the buyers last week and will demonstrate them if you’re interested. We also have a couple of other similar ones on the demonstration disk. If you need further convincing, we can demonstrate others which have arrived since the disk was made, but those on the disk are representative of the type of emotional recordings we have available and will provide to the public to be played from the online site.”

“How do you describe the one you just demonstrated?”

“Since emotions can feel somewhat different to different people and the meanings of words have different connotations, we’ve only loosely categorized them and the one we just played would be in the ‘comfort’ category.”

“I’ll agree with that description. What about the others?”

“The next one would be in the ‘joy’ category and the third one is unique in that it goes from a feeling of sadness due to a loss then transitions into comfort.”

“If nobody has an objection, I would like to try the other two you have available.”

When she sees that nobody objects, Julie asks, “If you’re ready?” Again they nod their heads then Julie starts the second recording and stops the disk when the recording is done to give them a chance to assimilate it or to respond.

“That is so good. . . . What about the third one?”

When she notices the others nod their heads, Julie starts the recording. Before she stops it, one of the lawyers lays her head on her arms on the table and bursts into tears. Mariam is quickly there to gently rub her shoulders and murmur soft words.

After awhile, the lawyer sits up, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to put on a scene.”

Mariam reassures her, “It’s okay. That’s what that recording is all about, feeling a loss and knowing it’s not the end of the world. I’ve played it several times while I cried every time and felt like I was finally experiencing healing after having been abused by my uncle as a child.”

The lawyer just nods her head in complete understanding.

Klara speaks up, “I certainly don’t want to make light of whatever loss you’re feeling, but it’s that kind of healing and comfort and joy we want to provide to hurting people. To do that, we want to distribute the headbands as widely, quickly, and as efficiently as possible.”