Autumn makes me think

Let's get one thing clear: it's always summer in Bangkok. From September through March it is about 85 or 90 degrees F, sunny, clear, beautiful. April it gets v v hot -- temperatures of up to 115 degrees F are not unheard of. May through August it rains. When it doesn't rain the sky is often gray, and it's humid. It is almost unbearable, sticky, cloyingly humid and the temperature ranges from 90 to 100 degrees F.

Well, it's September and autumn is coming to Bangkok. The days are clearer and sunnier and there's an unmistakable yet ineffable sense of change. I feel the sadness of closing up the summer house, even though I'm not. Although I'm halfway around the world, I AM in the northern hemisphere and it IS fall and I DO notice.

Combine the seasonal weather with Scott's death and you have a recipe for melancholia. Things change, all the time. One of the most fundamental teachings of yoga is that nothing lasts, and god knows I've spent enough time lying on my mat with tears rolling into my ears as I thought about it. People come and go. Babies are born, friends die, circumstances change, people move, nothing lasts. I wouldn't want it to, but every now and then I do the Lot's wife thing and look back. Not much, not often, but it happens to all of us, me included. I look back.

I spent the afternoon wandering the city. It was a gorgeous day and now it's becoming a beautiful evening -- there is a long and gentle gloaming in Bangkok, the sun seems to settle more than set. It sinks down slow, enjoying the slide, and the light fades and the birds make all their crazy noises and the bats come out. It's lovely.

I spent the afternoon thinking about Scott. When I met him he was dee-RUNK. It was at a show at what used to be called O'Connors, down on 2nd Avenue in Portland -- I think Chiva Knevil was playing. Scott came up to me and said, "Hi, I'm Scott, and I'm an asshole!" I liked to point out to him in later years that he had never let me down on that front, but I said it with admiration and respect. Scott was the best kind of asshole, the kind that says what he thinks and tells you where he stands and calls a spade a spade (why do we say that??). And a rake a rake, for that matter. We got along and I loved him.

I spent the afternoon praying for Stacy. I have two prayers: thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou and helpmehelpmehelpmehelpme. I said them both. Thank you for letting Stacy and Scott have each other. Help them to deal with the separation, give them the grace and strength to do whatever comes next. Feel free to join me in the praying -- no worries on my end regarding to whom your prayers are directed.

Now I'm spending some time with you, missing you, wishing you were here to talk with me about all of this, and about all there is to come. Another move to another country. Another climate change, a different wardrobe. More travel, more exciting surprises, more things to learn. Which reminds me: I need to buff up my French and will be looking for a tutor when I get back to Portland. Let me know if you know anyone.

You and I may never see each other again, or we may live together next year. You might become a parent and drop out of the world for a while, or you could enter a monastery. You might start a new business that hits just right and become fabulously wealthy, or one of us could get hit by a bus. It's all so frangible, life is so tenuous, the future is so wide open!

I recently finished re-reading "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by the incomparable Sr. Gabriel Garcia Marquez. At the very end you realize that the pages being deciphered throughout the book tell the tale of the pages being deciphered throughout the book, and just as they become clear we are able to read about the end of it all as it ends -- it is breathtaking. And that is where we all are, deciphering our stories at the same time we spin the tale of ourselves deciphering our stories.

Life is so short. Go tell someone you love them. And do something fun today. I love YOU. xo