It's that time of year again. Pedro has taken the boys up to Surin, which lies about a 6-hour drive northeast of Bangkok, to see the Annual Elephant Round-up. Hundreds of mahouts bring their elephants every year to bond, network, share trade secrets, compete at football and tug of war, and re-enact military processions from the ancient days when elephants served in battle. The preceding list applies to mahouts AND their beasts. I'm sure that these noble, wise giants remember each other from attending year after year; they communicate among themselves while their human masters/trainers/companions are catching up at the same time. So it's a win-win for all.
This is the third year that Pedro has taken Nathan up there, but the first time that Alec has demanded to go as well. "I'm going to Surin, too. Me, too. I'm big now!" he proclaimed last week. He's old enough now to know when he's missing out on something, and as you might recall from an earlier post, he's certainly more keen on bonding with Dada these days, so we decided he could go, too...
...which meant that suddenly this weekend opened up ahead of me, like a great yawning maw of borrowed time to fill with whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted -- no schedules, no obligations, just me, me, meee! My mind was spinning with visions of sleep, sleep, and another helping of sleep; getting a facial; getting a foot massage (or two, if feeling truly decadent); reading on the opium sofa (see BKK Digs photo album in righthand column); reading in bed; reading at chic cafes; and reading my little brain out, period! Glamorous, eh?
So far the break has proceeded pretty much along the lines I'd hoped. Just a couple snags along the way. I stayed in pyjamas until 2pm yesterday: The horror! How slatternly! There has been much reading, loads of it, and yes, I indulged in a relaxing foot massage yesterday at the Soi 33 Wat Po branch and then again today (!) at Phunnee on Sukhumvit, near the Villa...
...which led to another treat I allowed moi-meme. A few steps away from Phunnee is a 20-year-old secondhand book store I've never entered. If ever there was a good time for a spontaneous book browse, this was it. After much dipping in and out of volumes (good practice for next Sunday's massive used book sale at the Neilson Hayes Library) and some pleasant bargaining with the proprietor, I left with Ruth Prawer Jhabvala's "Heat and Dust", Marian Keyes' "The Other Side of the Story", Woody Allen's "Getting Even", and a 1-week-old "Hello", all for 530baht. (For scale, a new "Hello" costs about 320baht at Villa.) So "ha!" to Distri-Thai, the distributor that marks up overseas publications to extortionate prices.
The major deviation from my plan, which included luxurious hours of shut-eye, was that I stayed glued to the computer until (gulp) 3am last night. After laughing my arse off at a pirated DVD of "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" (the Best of Carson disc) until about 11pm, I made the mistake of checking "just a couple blogs" before bed...and then got sucked into the Google vortex of looking up names from my previous lives, like high school, college, graduate school, old neighborhoods. Doh! Note to self: Next time I conduct a "This is Your Life" a la Google, I must do it when the sun is shining. I mean, 3am?!
What spurred me on, one name leading to another, was partly knowing that no one needed me to fix breakfast or help put on a toy Bob-the-Builder toolbelt when the sun rose, and partly that so many of the former classmates and neighbors I looked up are succeeding fantastically in the outside, regular world (i.e. John Dickerson, alias "Dickie" back in his Elmo days; Brittain Stone, the nicest guy at the Hall; Sheba Crocker, who terrified me at field hockey, etc.). Happiness for them segued to envy and then to pique at myself for not following through on the career fantasies I had expected, long ago, to make real. I was going to be editorial page editor of the Washington Post! I was going to be a Dorothy Parker, minus the tragic personal life! Take the publishing world by storm, and all that. Classis mid-life crisis. I know, I know, how do you make God laugh? Answer: Have a plan. Life is funny like that.
Along those lines, I hadn't planned to attend tae kwon do this weekend. The big idea was to abandon schedules and obligations. But after sleeping in until 11-frickin'-30am (what did I expect, after bedding down at 3?!), playing hooky was not an option. My gut led me right with this decision. Kicking, jumping around, and sparring for an hour got my blood moving and reminded my body that this is daytime, that means we are awake now. Bodies must be awake if they intend to read away the rest of the day!
Unexpectedly, sparring went well for the first time, ever. Relatively speaking, that is. I felt less scared of getting accidentally zapped by someone's foot or fist, more focused on tapping the target (i.e. opponent's chest protector) with my own foot or fist. I realized today that my legs are longer than most of the women's in the class, so I should make use of that length, tap them and slide away before they can get close to me. Hm. Interesting.
Well, enough about me. Must go call my boys before their bedtime in Surin. It's weird to think that at this time we're usually lying across Alec's bed, reading bedtime stories. Right now exactly. I can't wait to hear about their adventures with the elephants in Surin. But until tomorrow afternoon, I will continue to sleep and read and...no more Googling people!
Greetings, ladles and gentlemice. No, those are not typo's in the previous sentence. Perhaps you are not familiar with feline humor? Worry not, for I, Devster Sinrod Walter (a.k.a. Devistrina, Strinachow, Chow, Chowgirl, Polly Prissypants, and the Duchess), am capable of employing human-friendly humor as well as my native style. I am, after all, brilliant.
