The Bell Curve:

My neighborhood held its annual Easter egg hunt Sunday, just as it has for the 25 years I’ve lived here. The agenda was pretty much as it has always been, only the faces had changed.

The hard-core veterans who have lived here as long or longer than I have still run the show. But young families are moving in and putting down roots and preparing for heavier duties. And a new generation of small people is learning how to get inside the heads of the people hiding the eggs — especially eggs with money in them.

I’ve had some passing thoughts about the propriety of commercializing Easter by filling eggs with money, but decided that there are too many other more deserving windmills to tilt. I haven’t allowed such thinking to get in the way of my enjoyment of the palatial tables of home-prepared food that kept the street party going until near dusk. We have enough lawyers in our neighborhood better equipped to weigh such arcane questions. Besides, there was a concern of much greater import that made this Easter very special indeed.

It happened when the party was at full strength. Kids poking through shrubbery for eggs, the street full of groupings in animated talk, front yards offering plastic chairs for the weary.

I was engaged in talk on a tailored front lawn when I felt the first movement underfoot. I have only fainted once in my life, and I remember it vividly. And for a few seconds I played it all over again. The Earth disengaging itself from me, a sudden awareness that I was no longer in charge of my own body, a clutch of fear at that recognition. Then it was over.

The street was quiet for a few seconds before feelings were shared and questions asked. How close was the center of this dude? And what should we expect as an encore? We couldn’t know then that all this Earth movement started several hundreds of miles distant.

But within a few minutes speculation at our party ceased. The crisis had passed. There were eggs to find and sausages to eat, and earthquakes no longer demanded our full attention. It was over. We were safe ’till the next time. Or maybe forever.

That feeling seemed palpable to me, making it clear how difficult it is for the people engaged in convincing other human beings of the importance of preparing for catastrophes.

The odds will always say “it won’t happen to me.” To someone in Mexicali, yes. But not me. The flaws in that thinking didn’t send me home from our block party to get ready for the next earthquake. But at least the possibility has been called to my attention.

I have some good friends out there who would have grounds to believe I didn’t want to be their friend if they buy into denpointe@triconet.org or Facebook or a half-dozen similar organizations.

Such a conclusion is the logical extension of the pitch that urges me — and then follows up if I don’t respond — to demonstrate my loyalty to these friends by signing up with one of the collectives who convey that message.

Since I haven’t — and won’t — comply, this is to tell all of you who nominated me that I love and respect the warm bonds of friendship deeply, and when I feel the need to express those feelings — or a good many others — it won’t be through a third party. I know where you can be reached, and you know how to find me. We don’t need any help. Or nagging aggravation.

This all goes back to a new and fervent embrace of the oldest, and most effective, marketing tool.

It’s called guilt, and it can be aroused in the breast of the marketing target by requiring him (or her) to look at their own personal shortcomings, then offering a means of compensating for them by contributing to a dubious cause or pledging loyalty to a friend who already enjoys it.

I may be slow, or even criminally forgetful, about such expressions, but this is a character defect better exposed and addressed by almost any other emotion than guilt.

Even substituting good intentions for action. Or writing interminable lists. Or expressing friendship on a card through a third party.

I know that all of this negativity hides a fundamental laziness. E-mails demand answers. They just sit there on my conscience, awaiting action.

And the prospect of stirring up more e-mails in the name of friendship just as the baseball season is starting simply is bad planning. So, go Angels, and we’ll check the friendship situation along about mid-season.

JOSEPH N. BELL lives in Newport Beach. His column runs Thursdays.