Loving in the Park

* note that my Thailand blog posting are out of order at this point. Each one is dated and titled like this one, for clarification.

March 8
Her foot is intertwined with his, locked into the dark crease of his knee. They sit folded up into each other on the park bench in front of me, laughing over who-knows-what or just sitting quietly, happy in the silence. To my left, reclined against the park’s western edge of concrete blocks and seats next to the river, another couple nods off in the afternoon sun, heads tipped in and held upright by shoulders warming in the sun. This park is full of lovers, each time I visit, heavy with the Thai essence of pairing off, the intensity of love and connection that seems to be everywhere.
I’m here not as part of a dynamic duo, in this sense of romance and love, but with a friend, so I get to observe, sit and write and think about that it means.
If I were here with a boyfriend, or in some sort of relationship that was anything other than just here for myself, I’d probably be caught up that and what it means to be in love with someone In Thailand and on vacation. But because Kyle’s not my lover-- and is at the dentist, isn't even here in the park with me-- I’ve got the whole afternoon to myself to do exactly what I want, however I want, without the complications (or yes, comfort) of another.
That’s not to say that I feel like I have to entertain him, or vice versa. We have our own comfortable silences to get caught up in. Like a couple of old friends-- which is what we are-- there’s no need to impress or worry or put too much effort into being with each other. The perfect travel companion.
I’m here doing this for myself, looking at my opportunities to write and think away from Chicago and the “real world” as an inner experience achieved through outer stimuli. As silly as that might sound, I really hope that it actually really is all that. And more. I’m trying to decide if grad school will be in my near future; will it be a job, any job at the RIC, just to have a job, or will it be the internship I’ve been banking on since last summer? And if it’s school, is it gonna be speech distorders/therapy, or the MFA, the writing path I’m trying to tell myself is the right one. Speech therapy seems so solid, so secure, so permanent, in a different way. Writing, storytelling- that will always be mine, so why get more schooling in it? I could travel then, and write, yes, but where’s the money for that in writing? Therapy though, solving the riddle of communication and speech and though problems, that’s a commitment. A long-term choice in the making. And I’m not sure I’m ready for that. Or a real job. But I do want some sort of direction.
I want clarity, closure, an understanding of why and how this trip actually ended up happening after two years of thinking and talking about it.
Only a couple of days into this vacation, I’ve already had a chance to experience the warnings of the guidebooks, the thrill of Thai traffic, the scheming, shifty salespeople and stalls on every corner. I’ve had ideas of my own about all of this, but like travel to any unknown world, like simply going to Chicago’s south side for the first time or walking into a pharaoh’s tomb, Bangkok thus far, has been outside of any of my possible expectations.
Not that I really had too many expectations. I expected the crowds, the traffic, the congestion of Cairo or Colombia, but Bangkok has it’s own, overwhelming flavor.
“Should we stay for three days or so, get your dentist stuff done, then go to Chiang Mai?” I asked Kyle this morning. I think that I’m going to be completely overwhelmed by then, with this craziness.” In theory, it sounds great. Whether or not that happens, I’m not sure. Maybe we’ll fall in love with Bangkok and overdo our stay, cut short something else.
The people are friendly, everyone does, indeed have a smile, as promised in the tour guides and stories and experiences shared. During breakfast on the first morning, at the hotel near the airport, I talked with a Frenchman about the islands he’d been to and the places he’d stayed. With no plans, the entire country is ours, so I’m happy to learn what other people have to say in building our plans.
I have a cousin who studied here recommending a more sophisticated way of traveling that will not happen for us, a book to follow in chasing my own “perfect moment,” and an open month’s worth of time to explore and learn. If this adventure is anything at all like the rest of my travels and trips, it should be a good one. And with the agreed on level of “keeping it platonic,” the tangles and rewards of a relationship should be as far away as the looks in these people’s ayes as they gaze into smiling, brown faces opposite.