Reflections In The Sand – The Path To You

In full disclosure, and this is quite frankly, very personal. Much of our early time, and trips together are well documented. But it wasn’t, and for very specific reasons, shown in it’s romantic framing until the aftermath of our unexpected, and surprising wedding. For much of the early months of our friendship and ultimate courtship, we kept very private. In fact I can say the majority of people probably had no idea we were getting married, until the wedding pictures showed up on Facebook and statuses were updated. The calls, the questions, the overall congratulatory comments, some shocks, it was a mixed bag of reaction.

I can’t tell you that I knew from the beginning that I would marry her. That we were both head over heels in love when we met, as I would no doubt say about every other woman I’ve ever chased. But with Diem it was different. And not that she isn’t beautiful, or an awesome woman, but because she is those things and much, much more. The toughest woman I have ever met, but often looks like the most fragile. She grew up in a world where 10 cent instant noodles were a luxury. Her family dealt with a similar fallout felt in the US after our own civil war. Only it’s remnants are still in some ways palatable. Brother against brother, father against son, all in the name of what Abraham Lincoln called unity.

A Difficult Path Towards Enlightenment

It’s a story of a rise, and an indubitably and inevitable fall, and with some hope, a little redemption. Though all of these things can be seen very differently through different eyes. It seems like a recipe for a great Greek novel. I have ran from suffering most of my adult life. Ran from it through often self destructive ways. Feeling I was unique in my self loathing, suffering, and deep tragedies that haunted me throughout my life. I was not someone who grew up having to face the realities of life, and how cruel it can seemingly be. Burying a child, losing another, fighting against a life of imprisonment, losing everything I ever thought I was supposed to have more than once.

I am reminded of a quote from “Muhammad” by Deepak Chopra. “Which is worse, the wickedness of the world, or the curse of demons?  If you don’t know those stories that at one time defined so much of who I was, and what it meant, and how it almost destroyed me and everything around me, you can find those stories here.

“Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him.”

The Book of James 1:12

Diem is my Crown

My Prayer In Those Dark Isolated Nights

“O LORD, the God who saves me, day and night I cry out before you. May my prayer come before you; turn your ear to my cry. For my soul is full of trouble and my life draws near the grave.  I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am like a man without strength, set apart with the dead, like the slain who lie in the grave, whom you remember no more, who are cut off from your care. You have put me in the lowest pit, in the darkest depths. Your wrath lies heavily upon me; you have overwhelmed me with all your waves. Selah You have taken from me my closest friends and have made me repulsive to them. I am confined and cannot escape; my eyes are dim with grief. I call to you, O LORD, every day.

I spread out my hands to you. Do you show your wonders to the dead? Do those who are dead rise up and praise you? Selah Is your love declared in the grave, your faithfulness in Destruction. Are your wonders known in the place of darkness, or your righteous deeds in the land of oblivion? But I cry to you for help, O LORD; in the morning my prayer comes before you. Why, O LORD, do you reject me and hide your face from me? From my youth I have been afflicted and close to death; I have suffered your terrors and am in despair. Your wrath has swept over me; your terrors have destroyed me. All day long they surround me like a flood; they have completely engulfed me. You have taken my companions and loved ones from me; the darkness is my closest friend.”

Psalm 88 NIV.

One Must Be Lost in Order to Be Found

But those are not this story. This story is about how a man, with barely more than the clothes on his back, emerged from the darkness that had been a long 20 years, and found light in a very unexpected place. I recovered moderately from those dark times. I wouldn’t step into a professional kitchen again. It wasn’t my calling anymore. My calling became much more spiritual and purposeful. I emerged with this uncontrollable urge to experience life on a very different level. To explore, and engage with the world in a different way. To seek true happiness, not just fleeting pleasure. I knew when I stepped back out to freedom, that a sign would be coming. I just somehow knew.

Besides the other difficulties leading up to 40 I can throw in a handful of failed marriages. I paid more attention to my work most of the time than I did anything else. But that’s the American way, right? I would often take my kids with me to work, setting up televisions, computers, and gaming consoles in my office. They had as much authority over my cooks as I did, and were fed anything they asked for. Six scheduled days a week, usually meant seven. From my mid 20’s to late 30’s seems like a distant dream filled with ceviche, grilled lobster, foie gras, and prime rib. I mean, I guess it could have been worse. At least we ate well. But happiness seemed elusive. Contentment seemed to be the only thing I could manage.

Lost in the Wilderness

I didn’t know what to do in the first year out of confinement. Some mercenary work here and there, driving for Uber. Anything to put enough money in the bank to get away for a weekend or more. Exploring as much as I could. Trips around the Southeast, California, anywhere I could find a cheap plane ticket or an easy drive. I would seek out restaurants to visit. Going from the Chef to the guest. I was learning to be happy, feeling everything out. It was at this time that I discovered how much I really enjoyed writing. I had always been a ferocious reader, gobbling up books like tic tacs. A habit I still exercise today.

And so it went. Work, a little travel, some moments of happiness, wash, rinse and repeat. I became more involved in community work. I took over a mission feeding any and everyone that was hungry the third Tuesday of the month at Repairers of the Breach in Covington, Georgia. Giving my skills as a Chef to a cause without compensation was the greatest fulfillment I’ve ever gotten out of cooking. Still is. Cooking for others on a personal level and not a professional level is far more meaningful. It helped me to begin to understand what is really important in this world.

The Sign

I’ve always been intrigued by the concept of arranged marriages. I have met in my travels people from around the world in arranged marriages. It’s still very common outside the western world, and they have often been some of the happiest couples I’ve met. They often occur in places where divorce is not allowed, and they don’t always go well. There are some unfortunately bad stories of abuse and neglect. But most I’ve met learned to love each other, learned to be married, because that’s just the way it was going to be. I just find the success stories fascinating. To become a student of your partner. Do you trust your parents enough to choose your life mate? And this is not leading into saying my marriage was arranged at all.

But it was the first time that my mother found the woman I would later marry. It was funny. I was not in a place in my life where I thought marriage was even on the table, or a thought really. The Lord knows I had done a great job in that department in the past. But I will never forget, and I don’t even know if my mother has ever even looked at it in this light, but I remember standing in my mother’s kitchen, and out of nowhere she said, “Would you be interested in ever getting married again?” I think my initial reaction was laughter. She said she might have someone I might be interested in meeting. I dismissed it as a joke, and brushed it off.

When The Universe Speaks, You Better Listen

As the days passed from that moment, it just wouldn’t leave my thoughts. It had burrowed in like a mole, and would not leave. Curiosity and this nagging thought took control of everything. I began to ask questions. A friend had a niece who was divorced, had two girls, had not had the easiest of times throughout her life, I could relate, but lived on the other side of the world. Diem’s family has been close friends to my family for a very long time. She has some cousins in the states, her family ran some of the nail salons around the Covington, Conyers area in Georgia, and one of her younger cousins was my oldest living daughter’s best friend.

To that effect she wasn’t a stranger, I just didn’t know her that well. We were eventually introduced, and, as Diem has always lived in Vietnam, a slow evolution of pen pal, to friendship, to courtship evolved over quite a period of time. The moment it turned into love I remember very clearly. Suddenly everything just changed. It was sometime before our first trip together. I remember sitting in the back of a taxi in Da Nang. A small caravan of luggage, cousins, Aunts, Grandmothers, I was on a trip to Vietnam for Tet to write some of my first articles for the website I had recently created. I was going to make a trip to experience Tet in Vietnam as one of my first series of articles for this grand dream of becoming the adventurer I always wanted to be.

An Unspoken Understanding

We sat in the back of that taxi, and I just remember our hands clasping each other’s. We looked at each other, and she laid her head on my shoulder. It was a moment still frozen in my mind. I remember the baby blue leather jacket she wore, her smell, the Buddha statue that sat on the dashboard, the Thi Ly bridge that sat in view outside the window. We had known one another for quite some time, but suddenly everything was different. I can only imagine the gossip that ensued when we hopped a flight to Hanoi two days later, and have been on an amazing journey ever since.

We made an agreement that day. That we would take care of each other for the rest of our lives. There’s just so many things to unpack in all of that. We were both unlovable in our own lands. She is a divorcee. Something unheard of in Vietnam at the time. Divorce was legal but rarely allowed before the 2000’s and Diem in that since is a pioneer. Essentially subjugated by her former in-laws, I can only imagine how difficult things must have been for her to take that step. Divorced women in Vietnam are essentially second class citizens. It took a great deal of courage for her to take that risk to lose everything, including potentially her children. And to be shunned upon by society for the rest of her life.

Feeling the same

I also had fallen into a similar situation. The stigma of incarceration, even though I walked away without a conviction, was debilitating. Even though the offices and appropriate departments signed off that my record would be cleared, it still seemed to be found, and I didn’t get jobs, and in one case lost a job because of it. The fact I was several times divorced, I just felt like there was nothing for me anymore other than my children and family. But, I felt a very deep disconnect from the world I was from. Suddenly life was pure, innocent, and real again. Nothing in the past, for either of us, mattered. The only thing that mattered was how we could support each other in a positive, loving, and meaningful way.

I Can’t Say Enough

After Hanoi we never looked back. The depth of understanding in life, the strive to show compassion to everyone I come in contact with. These things have been cultivated not exclusively because of Diem, but indeed greatly impacted by her. And by the two little girls that now call me Ba. Little Xu told me the other day she was going to grow up to be a doctor like her cousins in the US, so she could take care of me when I got old. It was so sweet. They have also helped to rekindle a light that had only remained lit because of my own children. Life has just changed meaning. Even the definition of fulfillment changed within me.

We have been on some incredible wonderful journeys. But, I have seen things that are sometimes difficult to accept. For every handmade tattoo in Thailand, I’ve seen a displaced village with no country. Selling what meager goods they could to keep their children fed. Who were often left isolated from education and any real future. For every natural wonder we’ve seen in the landscapes of Southeast Asia, I’ve seen disabled individuals pull themselves down the road with their curled up hands on a curled up piece of plastic, selling toothpicks for pennies to hopefully get a bowl of rice for dinner.

Our Journey

Our journey has taught me the value of compassion, the insignificance of my own suffering, and a better understanding of the human condition. The beauty the world has to offer, and how deeply precious and delicate it is. And most importantly, I’ve learned to love and be compassionate genuinely, without attachment. A Christian by faith, I have been exposed a great deal to Buddhism in my time here. And don’t worry, I’m not converting. But, there are some great lessons in its teachings.

A Buddhist Excerpt on Compassion

“Now, when people speak of compassion, I
think that there is often a danger of confusing
compassion with attachment. So when we
discuss compassion, we must first make a
distinction between two types of love or
compassion. One kind of compassion is tinged
with attachment—the feeling of controlling
someone, or loving someone so that person will
love you back. This ordinary type of love or
compassion is quite partial and biased. And a
relationship based on that alone is unstable.

That kind of partial relationship, based on perceiving
and identifying the person as a friend, may lead to
a certain emotional attachment and feeling of
closeness. But if there is a slight change in the
situation, a disagreement perhaps, or if your
friend does something to make you angry, then all
of a sudden your mental projection changes;
The concept of “my friend” is no longer there. Then
you’ll find the emotional attachment evaporating,
and instead of that feeling of love and concern,
you may have a feeling of hatred. So, that kind of
love, based on attachment, can be closely linked
with hatred.

The Dalai Lama – continues,

The Second Type of Compassion

“But there is a second type of compassion
that is free from such attachment. That is genuine
compassion. That kind of compassion isn’t so
much based on the fact that this person or that
person is dear to me. Rather, genuine
compassion is based on the rationale that all
human beings have an innate desire to be happy
and overcome suffering, just like myself. And,
just like myself, they have the natural right to fulfill
this fundamental aspiration. On the basis of the
recognition of this equality and commonality, you
develop a sense of affinity and closeness with
others. With this as a foundation, you can feel
compassion regardless of whether you view the
other person as a friend or an enemy. It is based
on the other’s fundamental rights rather than your
own mental projection. Upon this basis, then, you
will generate love and compassion. That’s
genuine compassion.”

“So, one can see how making the distinction
between these two kinds of compassion and
cultivating genuine compassion can be quite
important in our day-to-day life. For instance, in
marriage there is generally a component of
emotional attachment. But I think that if there is a
component of genuine compassion as well, based
on mutual respect as two human beings, the
marriage tends to last a long time. In the case of
emotional attachment without compassion, the
marriage is more unstable and tends to end more
quickly.”

The Dalai Lama – The Art of Happiness – Chapter seven, paragraph 4

A Cloud Never Dies

I think the greatest healing I’ve come to have over the many demons that have haunted me in this life has come from my time with Diem. I’ve sought solace in God, and though I am a believer in Jesus, it was the teachings of a Vietnamese monk living in exile in France that gave me the greatest acceptance and understanding in death. I would have not found this peace had it not been for Diem. But she may not know until now the true tranquility that she brought me through just her being.

“Death is essential to making life possible, death is transformation, death is continuation.”

-Thich Nhat Hanh

“Verily, verily I say unto you, unless a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.”

The Book of John 12:24

The humble monk goes on to talk about a cloud. How one day it is in the sky, it then falls as rain. It may end up in a river, or cistern, then in a bottle of water, and then again in the tea that you drink. We are all connected in a very powerful and real way. The moisture you exhale in your breath today, could be the rain that becomes my tea tomorrow.

Signlessness

Thich Nhat Hanh also teaches of a Buddhist concept known as signlessness. Something that radiates deeply with today’s world. A sign is what characterizes anything in this world, it defines it’s form. If we recognize things based on their sign or form, we may think that an acorn is not the oak, the child is not the parent, or that this cloud is different from that cloud. In everyday life these distinctions are helpful, but they distract us from seeing the true nature of existence.

I highly recommend “The Art of Living” by Thich Nhat Hanh. As a westerner, I am a lover of Philosophy and particularly the works of Plato, and Aristotle. Thich’s discussion on signlessness to me seems to be a modern day refinement of the Aristotelian discussion on substance and form. Everything that exists, does so simultaneously as both substance and form. The acorn is an acorn in it’s form, but an oak tree in it’s substance.

Where there is a sign, there is always deception.

-Buddha

The World Came into View the day I met you

To simplify the value of what Diem has brought to my life would be a disservice. She has shown me a world that is both foreign beyond explanation, yet familiar as the moon is to the night sky. I have come to understand suffering in ways that have made my own more manageable. Her pragmatic nature, the things I have discovered by her side, the profound change that has come over me in the time we have been together, is immeasurable.

I have come to deeply understand the interconnectedness of every moment that has happened in my life. Every tear I’ve shed, laugh I’ve shouted, every shoe I have put on, if changed in any way, may have led me down another path. I would do it all again and more to find myself here today with you, Diem. This is a strange Anniversary gift, as we are on lockdown, and our options are limited. So offer you this. A personal thank you letter. A letter deep into my soul, into my mind, into my very existence.

A New Journey Lays Ahead

Soon we will travel to the US, and begin a new world. What you have meant to me in these past four years is impossible to explain. I can only hope I can give you a fraction of the experience and fulfillment you’ve given me in your native lands. The thought of arriving in the US. experiencing yet another great adventure, seeing a new world through you and the girl’s eyes is so exciting. Particularly my adopted little angels. I can’t wait for us to break bread with my family, and for you to finally meet my family and friends.

The immense profoundness of understanding, love, and peace you have brought to me is amazing. I hope I have done the same for you. So, on this, our second wedding anniversary, stuck in lockdown, I just want to say I love you. And everything that I have ever suffered through has been worth it in finding you. Happiness does not manifest before suffering. One can not exist without the other. Thank you for showing me a world that has made life beautiful, and vibrant again.

Some Photos From our Greatest Journeys.

A Final Note

I have learned in my travels with Diem, that God has manifested himself in different places at different times in history. I believe this wholeheartedly. Many things I have seen, experienced, and felt in my travels with DIem, has proven this to be true. So I will leave you with a final quote from the book” Muhammad” by Deepak Chopra.

“The way in which consciousness rises to the level of the Divine. This phenomenon links, Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammad. Higher consciousness is universal. it is held out as the ultimate goal of life on earth. Without guides who reach higher consciousness, the world would be bereft of it’s greatest visionaries. fatally bereft in fact.”

-Deepak Chopra. An excerpt from “Muhammad”

Happy Anniversary Diem. It’s been an amazing journey. I can’t begin to imagine where life may take us next. I love you.

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