Mikes Thoughts

Sweet times

Like I wrote yesterday gonna embark on some posts about now and then. Mostly about Vietnam. So just ignore all this cruft if you’ve a mind. Today I sit with a beer in Siem Reap and find myself remembering different times. Times perhaps when I wandered some street. Found this small barbershop where the men lined up. Laughter and jokes. Hellos in Vietnamese.

There was some essence of it in 2018. Or was it 2020. Those years all blend together. The year spent going and then two years spent locked down with no way of leaving and returning. Going to America was no option. Even though I finally did. I knew then I would ultimately go to Mexico because it was “the thing”. Without Mexico though there would be no now. I may have stayed in America suffering through all the carnage of a life slowly ebbing away. With nothing I could see of benefit. No Edge to comfort me. So I did not do that. Instead I took a year. A year in Mexico to do something. To calibrate. Or mystify. To find. Or lose.

I did all those things but ultimately I found Merida. My city there they wowed me. Gave me a life for 9 months. Sometimes surrounded by tacos and cold beer. Talking about beer I’m getting low. I need the fuel. I’ll ask for another in my faulty Khmer. Then I can continue. Beer is the power today. Somehow it lightens up this Sunday with this peaceful buzz. This sense with the cheap beers at viva that nothing can go wrong. We will see where all this goes.

Oh yeah. Vietnam. Sorry. I had an old retired guy moment.

Vietnam in the rear view

Sometimes the days blend together and become like objects in the rear view mirror. Larger than they appear. I see these times then when life was less. The tapestry in Hanoi seemed woven with a simple blend. Coffee mornings. Almost always West Lake. Sometimes though I’d decide to vary the mix and go to Goc cafe. Managed by a cheerful Vietnamese man I was forever welcomed. When I went back after years he remembered and hugged me. It was this way in 2023 almost anywhere I’d go. Went to get bun cha at the corner place and the owner rushed over and told Van in Vietnamese how happy she was to see me. The bun cha is a simple thing really. Grilled pork on an outdoor grill. Veggies and a wonderful savory broth. It goes well with Nem or spring rolls. I sat there and Van smiled her mysterious and powerful Vietnamese smile.

So many events seemed to transpire then. The mirror was then crowded with two years spent living there during this global pandemic. In all honesty I had no desire then to go back to America. From the day I left it was a battle to go back. Finally in 2021 though Vietnam faded. The mirror became clouded over. I doubted I would be able to go back any time soon. Flying to Japan then felt like a painful surgery. I would have just stayed. Instead I had other plans for me I did not know yet.

Vietnam to Mexico

I hoboed around America on a second Amtrak voyage for about two months. Ride the famed California Zephyr to Chicago. Stopped along the way as I wanted. I had bought the USA Railpass so I got 10 segments in 30 days. All told I did 8 of the 10. Ended up back in Los Angeles and flew to Austin Texas and then on to Puerto Vallarta Mexico. Yeah. Became a beach bum for months and had a helluva good time there. I spent the last three months in Merida which became my all time favorite place. So I went back after a visa run to Houston Texas. Stayed all six months. Mexico kindly gives 6 month entries at a time so I just partook.

Then I left. And that gets me to the final installment. Now I’m sitting at V Cafe after one too many beers last night. Feeling the desire to both write and move. That end of 2022 seemed weird and wonderful. Only 3 days in California. I did what I wanted in those days. Saw my daughter and we drank beer together. Saw some friends. Then I flew. Off to Phnom Penh by way of Korea. A long ass flight folks.

Cambodia became home. I felt Siem Reap was the final incantation of the wanderer. Like I cast this final spell. I met my wife one night drinking way too much. We have not been apart since. Cambodia gave me a single thing I thought I’d never have again. I’m grateful. And puzzled. And I question forever.

Those memories and now

It all has blended together. One month in Vietnam for Tet holidays. Another shorter trip to da Nang with my wife. Then this slow unraveling of days. Days with no marks. No need to define a start. I just go now. Left things behind that should have been. Others like family in California I once felt bad about. But then the deceptions started happening. Somehow I was blamed for my wife’s adultery. In retrospect, it was amazing it took almost 20 years to surface again. I guess lies have painful half lives and just when we think they were silenced some remnant radioactivity seeps out to both poison and create more. My mom used to say

If you lie you must have a perfect memory. You will tell one lie and another to back it up. Sooner or later something will go amiss.

So true mom. Sweet times. Cloudy skies. Iced americano. This thing is over.