Structural Flaws

So who was the half-brain, nitwit, incompetent baboon that invented this place?! I have spent countless days, dollars and gallons of sweat trying to find a nice little corner of the world and it turns out that this pathetic excuse for a world is ROUND! There are no corners, not even here in Laos. Now this lapse into unparalleled stupidity would not be so bad were it not for the fact that the world is worse than just round. If it were simply round I could at least walk off the edge but the world is actually a maddeningly perfect sphere. No corners, no edges and it is impossible to be anywhere but in the center. Everywhere I have gone I have looked around and seen nothing but planet stretching out in every direction. In Boulder I am in the center of the world with beer, college students and wanna-be-Olympians running up the mountains and a geopolitical mess stretching as far as the mind's eye can see in the background. And here in Laos I am in the middle of the world with orange-clad monks slowly walking the streets at dawn collecting their day's sticky rice in begging bowls while walking in perfect silence. The background looks just the same here as it does everywhere, stretching out into the same frustrating enigma.

Despite this fundamental structural flaw in the construction of reality some things here in this not-corner of the world are refreshingly different. Last night Suzanne and I sat on a sidewalk drinking Lao-Beer (pretty good beer actually) and chewing on grilled chicken skewers when a stray dog took exception to her use of his spot on the side walk. He marked her chair and dress as his own and walked on to his next errand. And in this not-corner of the world we paused for only a moment, shrugged and kept eating. In some centers of the world it is easier to shrug than in others.

So far the shrugging in Laos has been particularly easy. Perhaps it is the constant sticky heat, the cold lager, or the stream of monks slowly and deliberately walking the streets that makes the difference. Perhaps I am just another sentimental tourist enjoying something that is different from my home.