The River Narrows

1:30 pm.
The ship shuddered as it bumped the edge of the lock crushing the tire a crew member had hung over the ship's edge. An hour later and the riverbanks have grown to cliffs. We are in the gorges.

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A Sudden Change of Direction: an Analogy of Dog and Life

There are times when you and Life are walking along, like good friends, and you think you know where you are going. You think that you and Life have agreed on a direction; that there is a plan; that you understand each other. And then Life decides that despite all the trees you have already visited, you really must see this new one. This tree is different from all the other trees and if you don't see it, you simply won't be the person you might be if you DO see it. And so Life changes direction. Except you don't notice. Because you talked about it. And there was this plan . And then you trip over Life. And Life LOOKS very indignant because you weren't paying attention and kneed her in the ribs. And you ARE very indignant because this is a stupid tree that you had no interest in ever seeing and you would chop it down and burn it if you could. Stupid tree. Stupid Life. Stupid little bits of gravel stuck in your palms. B...

Crazy T-Shirt Lady

My mom's oldest sister did not own cats, perhaps because she traveled so much. She was known in the family for bestowing interesting gifts, often acquired at international medical conferences and bearing the names of obscure drugs intended to cure diseases (thankfully) unknown to us. Because she spent so much of her time in Taiwan, another popular gift was T-Shirts with incomprehensible English translations. It has been suggested that since my aunt passed away a few years ago, I am now the appointed single-world-traveler-crazy-T-Shirt member of the family. Since I am not a medical person, nor do I spend a great deal of time in Asia, I am skeptical about my ability to adequately fill this role. But I will try. At the Beijing airport, after spending the last of my Yuan, I had vowed not to spend another penny. But that was before I saw this shirt. One member of the family will be receiving this for Christmas - hopefully it's the correct size. (...

Je reviens.

My red soft-sided suitcase is somewhere in France, and that's the most I can tell you. When I handed the suitcase to the nice man at Tulsa Int'l Airport, I naturally expected it to touch down in Montpellier at the same time I did. Life did not meet my expectations. In fact, this entire trip is somewhat unexpected. At the time that I resigned my position in the UK, I struggled to picture myself returning to an office, staring at a screen for hours on end. I had the idea that I would make a complete career change - to baking or event planning or film production. But in the end, I met some people who were particularly interested in all the things I used to know and who were willing to pay for that knowledge. They were also interested in sending me straight to France to work with my former colleagues. And given a job description which could not have been filled by anyone but me, I agreed to take the position. As I was eating dinner (and trying n...

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