Evan's Journey to God's Land

The sound of the ocean was always a comfort to Evan’s soul. He had spent most of his life in the United States, and the water there wasn’t nearly as warm as it was here. He drew in a deep breath and held it for a few seconds, savoring the warm spray against his face, before exhaling slowly, listening to the distinct sound of water gushing from his mouth. His body needed the cool water after being in the sun all day.

He opened his eyes and looked around. The beach was mostly empty at this time of day, which was perfect since he had wanted to be by himself. He stretched out his arms and twisted his neck around, feeling his muscles relax even further. After spending a few minutes sitting in the sand meditating on God’s creation and thanking him for allowing him to enjoy it with such ease, he decided to get up and head back home.

Evan walked down the beach to where he had left his clothes and towel earlier that day. Even though he hadn’t been gone very long, he was sure he could still find them where he had left them. As he approached where he thought they would be, however, something caught his eye. The pile of clothes and towel was still there alright, but it looked different than when he had left it. He picked up a pair of blue swimming trunks that were laying on top of everything else, bent over to pick up some clothes that were lying on the sand right next to where everything else was supposed to be, and noticed a green object wedged between some rocks just beyond where everything else had been left.

It couldn’t have been there yesterday when they returned home from the beach, otherwise they would have noticed it then. Evan went over and carefully grabbed one end of it with both hands and pulled it out from between two large rocks that were partially buried in the sand. When the object came free from the space between them, so did a small cloud of sand into the air that concealed what Evan now held in both hands: an ancient-looking book covered in strange markings that Evan instantly recognized as cuneiform writing like he had seen before in many museums among various Sumerian items.

His first instinct was to run back home with whatever this thing happened to be so he could show it to Samir and find out what it might be worth or if perhaps someone here in town might want to buy something like this off of him so that he could use some of the money toward paying off some of their debts from student loans that Samir already knew about but which were starting become more pressing lately now that their business wasn't doing quite as well lately as they had originally hoped due to all manner of unforeseen expenses they kept having to incur while running their restaurant together on weekends while they both worked full-time jobs during the weekdays.

As Evan started walking back toward their house along with whatever this thing turned out to be anyway after only taking one look at it because his curiosity wouldn't let him go without finding out if maybe someone here might want something like this in their house even though Evan had no idea why anyone would want some ancient looking book sitting on their bookshelf unless they were into collecting stuff like this or perhaps just liked unusual things like some people do who don't always seem to mind wearing t-shirts with weird sayings printed on them or clothing styles that are different than what everyone else is wearing these days regardless of whether or not those things make sense or not because "different" is sometimes treated as a good thing instead of as something bad which has caused plenty of people who seem way too presumptuous for their own good because they think they're making themselves seem more interesting than everyone else when really all they're doing is making themselves look like idiots who don't know how ridiculous they actually look whenever they choose not to act normal which seems pretty foolish because normal isn't bad or anything even though most people don't seem particularly interested in acting normal anymore these days because they'd rather try being "different" instead because apparently being different is better than being normal which seems silly if you ask me because I've never understood why anyone would prefer being different anyhow especially since I've never really cared much about being different either although I can see how someone who didn't have any real friends might feel forced into acting differently just so they don't feel so lonely all alone which probably explains why most people choose not to act normal nowadays but I'm certainly glad I haven't ever felt lonely enough myself to feel forced into acting differently just so I could pretend I wasn't lonely when I didn't have any real friends because I love having real friends even though I don't always seem particularly good at making friends with other people but then again neither do most other people these days so maybe we're just not meant for each other or maybe most people are just too busy trying to be different from everyone else instead which seems silly if you ask me because if you ask me most people are already plenty different enough already without having to try adding more differences onto themselves especially when those differences aren't usually very attractive either which isn't necessarily true for me since my parents keep telling me I'm at least somewhat attractive although I'm also told I look very strange whenever my hair is long but then again no one really wants long hair anymore except for maybe girls who wear their hair long but then again lots of girls cut their hair short these days too so there's no reason at least not nowadays why anyone should have long hair anymore unless maybe you're trying to look different from everyone else which might explain why lots of kids these days wear their hair long because lots of kids seem pretty desperate these days about trying hard not only looking different than everyone else but also acting differently too despite how pointless it usually turns out being anyway especially being different doesn't really help anyone feel better about themselves when everything eventually catches up with them once age starts catching up anyway along with all kinds of other things so really why bother trying so hard looking different when you realize you can never truly escape your past no matter how hard you try pretending otherwise?