8:16 am December 23 2006 Bangkok time
7:16 pm December 22 2006 Chicago time

When I land it will be 11:00 am December 23 Chicago time. The International Date Line is returning the day it stole when I came to Thailand.

I'm on the plane to Tokyo right now. When I left Krabi I cried on the bus for all that had happened, all the pain. But when I got on this plane they were playing Christmas music, "Oh Holy Night", and I almost started crying, of joy. It's not that I feel so strongly about Christmas, but to hear something familiar after all this time made me realize, even more, that I am doing the right thing. Standing in line behind two annoying American girls with Chicago accents gave me another taste. Annoying, but familiar.

While the security people were going through everyone's bags looking for "liquids" (I haven't flown since all that shit happened), the lady next to me, another American, kept complaining loudly every time the Thai man opened another pocket on her backpack. She finally turned to me, threw her hands up, and said loudly, "THIS is why I don't live in the U.S. anymore!" She had that smirking air of a lot of expats who take every opportunity to let everyone know that they are *living* in Thailand, not just on holiday. I admit I've done it a few times myself, but I tried to avoid mentioning that I lived there unless it was actually relevent.

THIS is why she doesn't live in the U.S. Well SHE is why I don't live in Thailand: not only am I unable to handle being so far from my own culture, but the few people from my culture who end up living there are almost all people I would not want to know beyond casual conversation. It was fun to go out to bars with them, and have long conversations about our travels. But it would have taken me a long time to find someone I wanted to *know*.

I was sitting at the airport having a long instant message conversation with Donna while watching crowds of people walk by, and I wrote, "I think the prerequisite for a Westerner coming to Thailand is that they must be loud, obnoxious, ugly, pretentious, and prone to bragging. Does that apply to me?" She said, "No, because you only came with Brian."

Maybe I will write more later. I feel strangely rested even though I only slept for 3 hours on a hard bench, shivering because it was so cold in the airport and I was extremely underdressed. The sweeter rest was mine.

Well I am here. It's 5:30 pm in Chicago and it's been dark for a few hours already. I stepped out of the airport into what felt like frigid wind, but it turned out it was only 40 degrees. This is going to be hard to get used to. I suppose I could have switched my shoes when I picked up my baggage, but I rather enjoyed the shock of walking into this culture still wearing flip-flops from the last culture.

When I walked off the plane, the Japanese flight attendent said, "Welcome home," and I started crying.

Now that I am here, it's strange. I still need sleep, badly. My thoughts aren't working. I got an email from Brian that made me upset and I'm trying not to think about it until I've had some sleep. I did get to talk to Donna on the phone -- my old phone still works! You can call me, the number is 612 741 8934.

It's strange here because it's not strange. I was here for Christmas last year so it feels exactly the same, except that now I've been clean for 8 months and last Christmas I think I managed to be clean for the one week I was here, and relapsed as soon as I went back to my parents. Speaking of which. I have to make sure I'm aware of whether I'm in danger or not. I'm too tired to tell right now.

Anyway, last time I was shivering and sweating and crying at every TV commercial, and taking a lot of klonopin to deal with it, which makes me melodramatic and too talkitive. Now I'm just jet-lagged and traumatized. But if I forget everything about Thailand, I feel like the last twelve months didn't happen. I never went to Portland and did heroin for however many months, never took a bus to Palo Alto in April and ended up married, never became an English teacher. Christmas in Chicago is the only real part. Wherever I go from here is the only real part.

We are now exploring different quadrants of the universe but we pool our information. Create the world and the clues follow. Soon the clues will start to reappear and the new home will reveal itself. Our home is with him without him now. Suspended in music. Love. Strange world but -- will be coming home again shortly. I'm probably in almost the same time zone as most of you. It's night for me and probably for you too.