i wanted to say that my heart goes out to steph and her family. we are all thinking about you and praying for you.

i haven't written anything in ages because i've been hiding on my back porch. i'm not terrified to go out and experience 'america', i've just been enjoying sitting on the wicker chairs and staring out at the trees as they sway in the breeze. time seems to eek by when i'm sitting there. i don't have any worries but seem to worry about nothing. it ties my stomach up in knots.

the other day i was given tasks. my family has been wonderful about caring for me and respecting my situation. i was told to go out and get food for lunch.

i woke up after everyone went to work. what a luxury. i was feeling good about the day until i realized that i didn't have a car, i only had my bicycle that i used to use to commute to work two summers ago. the tires were flat and the seat had been lowered and i walked it to the bike shop.

at the bike shop, after an hour of walking with a backpack and feeling the rush of cars as they wooshed towards me and then sucked the air around me as they passed, i found a confusing array of bike pumps and locks. i spent thirty minutes choosing one, paying for it and then another thirty minutes trying to actually pump up the tires. i failed and had to push the bike back into the shop to have a friendly gentleman show me how much of a moron i really was. i thanked him and drove off to the supermarket.

i chained up my bicycle to a bike-rack that sat unused. there were hundreds of parking spots in the lot beside me and i parked in the bushes like an outcast.

pushing a shopping cart, i walked into the disturbingly cold store. i was confronted with a two hundred foot long lunch meat counter and thousands of vegetables and fruits to choose from. i walked around for about ten minutes not choosing anything, just looking at the selection. i walked and stared. i eventually called my brother, rachel and just about anyone else i could think of to feel more at ease. i talked about nothing. just hearing their voices made me more comfortable.

i finally escaped the vegetable section after about thirty minutes. i escaped with some lunch meat and some cheese.

i walked down every aisle. i spent the most time in the potato chip aisle looking at the different varieties of snack foods. low-salt, low-carb pretzels. salt and pepper chips. black corn tortilla chips. there were hundreds and hundreds of things to buy and i didn't want or need any of them but stood and looked at each. i fell in love with every other bag and its glamorous design.

i left two years ago and came back to everyone hating carbohydrates. there's low-carb everything and i never saw it coming. people used to hate fat, not they hate carbs and who knows what's next.

i left and felt a bit like i was home in vietnam. i had frozen pizza hanging from my left handle bar and bags of drink hanging from my right. my backpack was full of other odds and ends and i drove up and down lazy hills eventually gliding silently back up my driveway and feeling like i had finally made it. i conquered the supermarket. i bought the food and made it home in one piece. i smiled and walked back to the porch where i sat on the wicker chair and waited for my brother to come back. he smiled and said hello.

getting back in touch with my family at the beach. it's windy and cool and the water looks grey and blue like steel should. there are no birds, only loud cars and people walking by with no clothes on.

it's all distracting but family relations come first.

this group of people is where i come from, the stream of dna from which i was created. i owe them so much, and those who came before even more. i owe the dirt more and the sky even more.

i owe the root of it all the most.

last night i had a birthday party for me. that’s a partial lie. my mother helped buy the food.

me and mom finally had a day to spend together. i finally was able to sit next to her in the car and listen to her wisdom, glean from her experience. it was wonderful.

well, until she took me to costco.

costco, for those of you who aren’t familiar, is like a sam’s club. one must pay for a membership ($35, but you can share with people and you get a percent of your purchases back at the end of the year), walk into the giant warehouse pushing an obese cart and select food in bulk that is placed on pallets.

i was in charge of the cart. this was my birthday. i turned 24.

mom knew exactly what she wanted and walked off in the direction of the food. i stood near the door and watched a video about a new hot tub that you could buy that only weighed 75 pounds and was for less than $2000. you could put it in your bedroom, your lawn or probably even in the back of a pick-up truck. then there were televisions off to the side. they were huge. there were digital cameras. there was a sign that advertised buying new tires for your car while you waited. there were pimple-faced children selling hotdogs and pizza to fat people. there were piles and piles of shirts and pants. you could buy party trays of sushi. you could buy a 5 pack of ketchup. you could buy 500 plastic forks (we did). i decided that i could live in that warehouse for at least a year and a half and do so in great comfort.

i walked around and mom put up with me which was nice of her. i starred and almost had a little kid puke on me.

we left and drove home and prepared for the party. i went and got a new drivers license because it was my birthday. that and it was expiring the next day.

i stood behind some of the slowest people in the world who couldn’t answer questions about their current address and who couldn’t actually sign a piece of paper while staying within the lines. i had to wait an hour and people had picture after picture taken because they didn’t think they looked good enough or were disappointed at the quality of the picture or what not. it was a mess.

then there was a party and we stood around and talked about vietnam’s current cultural, economic and political state. it was a wonderful conversation and, the more i talk about vietnam to people over here, the more i understand about the place. i think it would be possible for me to return home and not take the time to really compare vietnam with my home. that transition would have been easier, but not as fruitful.

my head swims, but i smile.

this is the scene that greeted me upon my return home. this is placed right above the fireplace. i felt like i had already died.

it's only missing an urn.