A Lucky Bag of Popcorn
A retrospective
I am once more upon my couch, but this time, the pollution has improved. It is a Sunday, and there is a distant hum of buses, cars, and motorbikes intermixed with a man on a megaphone speaking in Thai, and a soft thump of a bass beat—the music itself is nowhere near the loudness of the bass accompanying it.
There are all sorts of different kinds of luck in life, but I have often found, for myself, tremendous luck in the number thirteen, and in things that others seem to find unlucky. A black cat crossing my path is sure to be a good omen. A broken mirror must bring seven years of immensely good luck for me. A monitor lizard sighting is, by far, the greatest of good portents.
I mention the monitors, because some here see them as the same as black cats. I certainly don’t. And to be called one, especially by someone who I have taken an issue with already, is in a way a bit of an honourable title.
So what is luck, good or bad? Wait long enough and your good luck will sour, or your bad luck will begin to sweeten. And who is to say, what is really worth eating when it comes to your luck? This is Asia, and sweet and sour often goes hand-in-hand.
Especially here, in Thailand. Within a short amount of time living here, one will be confronted with the realities of life here. Some pack their bags, and others learn to understand life under the guidance of the Buddha. Still others devolve into a spiralling web of their own madness. But the same can be said of anywhere, really.
Speaking of madness, I’ll tell a wild old story. But it comes from childhood. You’ll have to wait to hear from me of anything that has happened to me recently. (In which I have largely played the spectator, clutching my bag of popcorn as my eyes brighten to the ongoing narrative.)
A girl I once knew had a wild sort of life. She would buy drugs from this dealer, an African American guy who looked like Dr. Dre but was way less cool. Anyway, one thing led to another and she, a homeless wreck, spent a night at his house. She was raped by him, by her own account. After that, she continued to buy drugs from him. Only now, one of us guys usually came along. So I remember picking up a ten-sack of weed, and after he walked away, she verbally berated me for not checking if he skimmed some off the top.
But I suspect she was really mad that I didn’t hit the guy for what he did the week prior. This was, however, the same girl who was basically using me for therapy and for verbal abuse. Well, it was a long time ago. I doubt anyone remembers any of these people or things as much as I do.
A few days ago, I popped up a big helping of popcorn for myself. I put honey in the pot, to make a sort of poor man’s kettle corn. It turned out wonderful, but some of it burned, and of course I ate it anyway. I initially popped it to watch a film with, but I found myself with enough on my mind to string together a narrative far more interesting than that which I could have watched. There were even hedgehogs involved.
When I was living in Long Beach, I didn’t see any hedgehogs, and I never really had any trouble with criminals or anything, although I don’t suspect those things to be related to one another. People were real gangsta there, none of this OC nonsense wannabe crap.
But also, I think it was just a healthier environment. And I was older, and things like getting yelled at for existing by angry women years prior had certainly steeled me a bit, and I wasn’t really looking for companionship with a woman aggressively, because I was in love with a red-haired Australian woman who had someone already and wanted to get rid of me so she never responded to anything I ever said. More on that stupid story later.
Well, that’s about the long-and-short of what I feel like talking about now. Down below me, a little boat putters down the Chao Phraya River. It’s evening, but the sun is only beginning to set. It will rise tomorrow, and shine brilliantly throughout the week. So there’s something to look forward to.
With any luck, there’ll also be reasons for popcorn.
