Bangkok

I have been in Bangkok with my wife for the past few days. We are staying for two weeks. The serviced apartment we are using is in the same street, Soi Saladaeng, as the first apartment I stayed in when I arrived in Bangkok 30 years ago. That old apartment block is still there. It still looks the same, a brooding white tile building with lots of unorthodox extensions mad by owners. I was happy there but didn't stay long.

Saladaeng is still a nice area although development has removed many of the old houses in compounds that once lined the street. But there is still enough that is familiar to make it feel like it did when I lived there so many years ago. Fortunately many of the trees have been preserved so it is still a bit leafy.

Thailand is preparing for the funeral of King Bhumipol. His funeral will be on my birthday, just before we leave Thailand. Bangkok is in a high state of preparation.

Back again

My little blog once again fell off the back of the truck. This time for quite an extended period. A shame really because I have been on quite a journey.

I think the news from the hospital tests in August that I wasn't sick was a big boost. In August I started feeling more like myself again. So I stopped writing for a while.

This big internal tussle has been about whether I made the right decision leaving my employer and what to do next. That could have made for some tedious posts.

It's not resolved yet but what's done is done so I'm not sure what the postmortems are achieving. My wife is certainly over it. I need to move on. Slowly a new life is unfolding. I feel much better in myself on the whole. My life is not over.

I have become more aware of the world around me. The little things that happen, time, which seems to have slowed down.

I wrote a poem after walking the dog on the weekend.

The Path

An old pavement

Cement specked with blue metal

Leading through the gum trees

By the sealed road

Past the houses

Laid down 40 years ago

Messages left in the pour -

Children's footprints, worker's boots, dog paws

LC loves CS

PB loves .....

Grass has encroached

The blue metal shines

Polished by wear and time

Cracks and bumps craze, chip

I leave no visible mark

My little dog's feet "tap, tap"

Perhaps a little wears away

A stone scrapes and scratches

The path endures.

We move on along it

Hardly noticing it everyday

Its many clues and signs

The excitement of the pour

Rare as an eruption or eclipse

Where are those people now?

Do they remember that day?

It was important enough

To mark with spontaneous effacement

A little joy on a sunny day

A rare event in a new suburb

Now sun and moon and rain

Bath the path each day

And many will pass and be gone

While the path will remain.

MQ
16/9/17

Pristine

The blog took a back seat for a week while my troubled son was here. The time we spent together was very good. He said it was better than the last time he was here. He filled me with joy, opened up, smiled, improvement was evident. He loves our new dog Sheba and she loved him too as only dogs can. They seem to have an uncanny nose for those who need love. She stayed close to him. So did I, without crowding him.

We (Mrs Horse and I) didn't hassle him about getting a job, just tried to love and enjoy him as he is. There is a lot to enjoy. We love him so deeply, as with all our sons. The Irish have a belief that those like him are "touched" by God, which makes them extra special, a kind of measure of how we are doing, caring for the troubled.

I've been turning over in my mind my decision to leave my career, other possible futures which I felt might out his future at grave risk. As I spoke or did things with him I was reminded of the words of an old song:

I don't care how much it cost,
I don't count the loss,
As long as I
Can see your face again.

That about sums it up don't you think? There are so many lost unloved souls today, I don't know why. But we are called upon sometimes to reach out and be there for people.

Oh! I had my delayed heart tests - my arteries were described by the specialist as "pristine". So much for my worries! Pristine is my word for the day, a beautiful word.

Tests

I went to the hospital today to have a cardio CT. There was an elaborate process of preparation. First abstinence from anything with caffeine for 24 hours, then nicotine and alcohol for 12 hours, then food for four hours before the test and finally any liquids for two hours. I followed the instructions to the letter. I found out later that idea is to empty the stomach and bowels because the dye they use to view the heart arteries can make you ill.

There were three people having the test that morning, an African lady, a former mid wife from the same hospital and myself. Mrs Horse came with me to give moral support. We were prepped for the test and placed in hospital beds, ready to go. Our pulse rates were lowered to between 50 and 60. Mine was pretty low already but I was given a beta blocker to get it down below 60 consistently.

Catheters were about to be inserted when a technician came around to announce that the CT machine wasn't working and a technician had been called. Mercifully the nurses decided not to administer the catheters until the status of the machine had been determined. I slept during the wait and had strange dreams, possibly influenced by the drugs administered.

There was time to observe what was going on in the ward. A man was wheeled in next to me with throat cancer. He was facing some heavy duty chemo therapy and a catheter was being inserted into his stomach for pain relief. His wife was with him and could barely contain her distress. They had already been on a painful journey. Then he was wheeled away and gone, probably forever from my life.

Across the way was an older Scottish gentleman. He was 67 and a veteran of trips to hospital. It wasn't clear what he was in for, but it was a cardio ward. His pulse rate was at 173 at one point. He put up with the inconveniences of hospital admission with great dignity and often looked across at me with a friendly expression. The only thing that disturbed him was when a clearly deranged young woman became upset somewhere nearby, just outside the ward. She was demanding to see the doctor and then to go home, with lots of expletives.

Otherwise the ward was peaceful and the nurses and staff looked after us very well. After about two hours, our tests were all rescheduled for the following week.

Go Fish

In addition to Sheba the fox terrier, we also have two goldfish, Martin the mainly silver one and Aung the more multi-coloured one. The petshop was delighted when we took the silver one because for some reason customers didn't want him. They want colour I imagine. I was only too happy to take him because the two fish seemed to be friends and I think ghostly grey is a striking colour.

It was raining in Canberra today so it was a good opportunity to change the water and clean the beautiful Chinese vase or pot that they live in. I caught a lot of rainwater from a leaking roof gutter. Enough to fill their vase and an old aquarium which I put them in while cleaning was in progress.

Meanwhile their Chinese vase got a good clean, with Sheba taking a close interest in proceedings.

She one of her little doggy coats on today because it was cold. I imagine she may blog about it.

Trimming

I went out to buy new belts today. Since leaving work I have lost weight. My waistline has shrunk. I'm eating less junk food, less generally. I'm exercising more. My appetite has returned recently but I'm eating healthier.

I'm better able to cope with my troubled son, who is with us at the moment. He helped in the garden again today. The weather wasn't as nice, overcast and raining now and then. It was good to see him active. He even started getting a bit bossy about the work and how it should be done. But by the afternoon he had slipped back into his stupor, drawn back into the imaginary world of the computer.

It will take time, now I have it. This week we will do more cleaning up and gardening.

Sheba our little fox terrier has helped keep Dom and I moving. I use her to get him up in the morning. She jumps on his bed and licks his face. She is so exuberant and full of life.

Deeper into the garden

Today we cleared the trees and shrubs that were getting up under the gutters of the house. It was a warm day for the Canberra winter. There was a lot of biomass to remove. Mrs Horse and Dominic helped.

We have a lot of fruit trees. The garden was planted out by the Italian who built the house or someone in his family. I have often wondered who it was. Grape vines run through the trees. The vines had used one of the trees to get into the roof gutters at one point, about forty feet up, an extraordinary effort.

Mr Horse concentrated on the fruit trees while Dom and I worked on the trees fouling the gutters. We soon had about a truckload of cuttings, which we will make more manageable this week before removal. It was good to get out in the garden. There is peace in the garden.