A Day in the Life of Chaos

  As you age everyday is a mystery.  In the morning you wake up and like a computer booting up do a systems check.  Knee working, back not hurting, headache nope feel fresh, urinary system functioning, the list goes on… everything okay… check… it’s going to be a good day.  Then the morning routine kicks in.  A handful of pills and a cup of coffee.   Salvador Dali At some point there is a certain realization that nothing will ever get better.  When you have a car you can at least buy a new set of tires.  There is a good chance that they will work as good as the original ones if not better.  Every time I have to replace some part of my house I always ask the service man how this new version of whatever I had will make my life better.  Typically they will shrug and give me a look that says, “Just wait for the bill.”  Sometimes, not to be defeated, I will pore over the service manual or promotional material and relish the smallest detail.  I definitely did this when I had to spend 13,00

One night I was out to dinner with my now thankfully departed former-former boss.   It was his goodbye party and he chose the restaurant.  The food was excellent and speaking with him I told him how delicious I thought it was.  He responded by saying it was one of about six places in Chiang Mai where you could find good food.  At the time I had only been living in Chiang Mai, Thailand, for two weeks.  "Are you kidding?" I thought.  I wanted to vomit on his shoe. Thailand is a nation obsessed with food.  Food is everywhere.  Before I arrived, my Thai teacher told me that if they raise the price of food staples in Thailand the response is wide spread social unrest.  This is a country that feeds itself and does a good job at it.  In Thai a greeting saying "Hello" is literally "Have you eaten?"  If you say no they will find you food.   Most Thais don't even cook.  There is a network of family run food stands on the sides of the roads that cater

The King is Dead! Long Live the King.   The King of Thailand just passed.   He was eighty-eight and has been sitting on the throne since 1946 making him the longest serving monarch in the world.  I guess it is now up to Elizabeth to best his record.  He was a good king and very much beloved by the Thai people.  It is difficult to imagine having a focal point in a society like a monarch for 70+ years.  Very few Thais lived before him, making him all they have ever known.  Much of the world knows something we don't.  They know how to have institutions that unite societies rather than divide them.  America has no equivalent.  In sport it is the World Cup.  A once every four year tournament that is made up of national teams.  In America we think only of our regional favorites.  Go Cowboys... love you Gamecocks!  The Olympics is the only thing that comes close and for the most part it is a tournament of individuals.  Names we don't really know until they poke their head up

Freshman Orientation The older I become the more circles I see in life.  Really it is the consequence of time and living.  Both intertwine and the result is the definition of a pattern once invisible to the mind.  Nothing brings this home like being a parent because in your child you see a shadow of your own life.  Not only do you re-live the stages of life through the eyes of your child they become a reflection of your own life and experience. My son recently began study at a university yet his course is quite different from most.  Rather than follow in the footsteps of his friends and attend college in the place he was raised he has followed his nomadic father on an unconventional journey through life.  I have tried to give him everything I had, because in truth I regret little about the path I have followed. My parents gave me a home in Alaska.  It was a place for me to bloom that was not to big to breath. A small city where I could learn to appreciate life, friends

Everyone defines Shangri-la differently.  One of the first films I came to love was a 1937 epic by Frank Capra called Lost Horizon.  Despite being one of the best and most thoughtful films of its time ever produced not many people know about it.  The movie contained a message of peace and pacifism at a time when the world was gearing up for war.   In it, actor Ronald Coleman escapes the violence and turmoil of China to find the mythic Shangri-la lost in the Himalayas.  Shangri-la for Coleman was a peaceful place filled with beauty, thought and contemplation, yet for others it might be something completely different.  We all have our own definitions for everything in life.  Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart famously replied in 1964 when answering the question what is Justice Potter Stewart pornography? "I know it when I see it." In truth Shangri-la is a concept so intrinsically personal only you will know it when you find it.  It is very much like Buddhist enlighte

Bangkok is a city of a million faces and a million stories.   Each person lives a life independent with his or her own complications, anxieties, depressions and laments.   Joy often gives way to a daily existence of life and work interwoven in a fabric of traffic and noise.   Every day when I awaken I feel like I want to explore and understand.   I want to comprehend what drives each individual.   I want to learn about their lives however joyful or miserable.   I think in a hidden voyeuristic sort of way it encourages me to look beyond myself and discover a world I might otherwise never see. One day while walking down a busy Bangkok street the city of a million stories decided to give me a glimpse into a very different life. One of the great curiosities of Thailand for the Western mind is what here is known colloquially as the “Third Sex.”   In the west we view transgender issues as interwoven with gay rights.   It exists as a subset of the society.  Most people when confronte

Every nation has their sports.  American's love football, basketball and baseball, the world loves soccer.  This said, Thailand and sport is something I am still trying to figure out.  I do see a lot of jackets emblazoned with the names of English Premier League teams.    Chelsea, Manchester United... the list goes on.  That said I am still not sure there is a true passion for the game.   I am increasingly becoming convinced however that there is an unofficial sport here, the art of scooter riding. Perhaps it is the same way around South East Asia but with only the Philippines and a brief time in Shanghai to compare I must say, Thailand is on the cusp of this emerging sport.  Okay, maybe it will never make the big leagues but if each commute is equal to a game how many athletes can say that they survived death in the course of their match?  As a current resident of Thailand I have embraced this life or death struggle with all the veracity of a shark feasting upon a helpless swim

For better or for worse people come to Thailand to escape.  Oh some will emphatically tell you they came to find something but in truth there is a fine line between the two.  The very essence of escape allows us a chance for discovery. I grew up in the northern most outpost of the nation.   Living in Alaska there was always a long standing truth hanging over everyone's head.  With the exception of us who were born or simply raised there just about every adult moved north to get away from something.  My parents used to always joke that moving to Alaska was as far away as they could possibly get from their parents and still be in America.  I suppose Hawaii would have been farther but the logistics of crossing an ocean versus loading up their cars made Alaska the appropriate choice. As we age the weight of life tends to add up.  I think we don't really know that it is happening and many never really realize that it did.  We start to compensate in useless ways attempting to

What follows is an intensely personal entry.  I have asked myself many times why I am willing to expose these thoughts to the world. After much contemplating I decided it is because I want people to understand what is possible.  How a moment in time can give clarity to life in a way nothing else can. Despite living in Thailand, I spend my life with a work week like most others.  Monday through Friday I hop on my scooter and navigate the Thai traffic for my eight to five job.  I confess the monotony of routine is far less for me these days however, for the most part I live a normal working existence.  Weekends are my chance to be a tourist.  A chance to venture out on a path of discovery and find the hidden secrets that are all around me. This Sunday while many of my countrymen crowded the pews in their chosen churches, I ventured out of my house seeking a shrine of Theravada Buddhism that sits nestled upon a mountain behind Chiang Mai.  The mountain Doi Sutep looms over Chaing Mai