I was out doing my coffee this morning. Had a nice walk and then noticed a new coffee shop along my walk I must try. Got to Red Soil which I frequent about weekly. It’s a nice quiet stop. There’s a small area for sitting. Fans and AC are nice. Wifi is good.
The place normally is frequented by young Khmer men that stop and socialize and work there. Everyone shares the few tables. Most of the young guys speak English so I often get asked about living in Siem Reap. Or how America is to live in. There’s an incipient belief it’s like a dream. Where everything is nice. Food plentiful. Houses and cars and jobs just come to people. Of course like a dream the reality is sobering. Anyways, I don’t ruin the dream or dreamer. I just tell people don’t believe all you see there. It is not like what your fantasies tell you. The reality is grimmer. Dirtier. Less lovely tuan those wonderful dreams. Realities often are.
It led me to think on getting old in America. How it felt when jobs stopped coming so readily. When I felt despised or at least put up with when I searched jobs. I was lucky. I ended at a company that wanted me age or not. I knew I had to leave. So the entire years of doing these critical and difficult cloud programs with less runway than what was needed was part of this plan.
The plan was to not get any older in America. To get some things done financially and personally and prepare to just go. I wanted no ties. No burdens. No strings. And I had none. I also wanted to just go. I wanted no one telling me where and when. Asia gave me that for years. The main thing though was this.
I did not want to be old in America
Yeah. That was it. I did not want to be that guy playing cribbage in Carl’s Junior with retirement coffee. I wanted less. Hell. I wanted far less. Yet within that I wanted more. I wanted freedom. And since I left I’ve had it. I’ve lived where I pleased. Came and gone as I wanted. Stayed in places I liked. Left places I did not. In other words I lived this life I wanted and dreamt of.
So this morning talking to this younger Khmer tour guide I explained to him. I think he got most of it. I would not wish anyone to grow old in a place where they are a fixture. Unable to afford basic life or more. We deserve more. Deserve joy and happiness. Wherever we want it to be.
For me it’s been Asia. There’s this thing about how people are looked at, dealt with, treated. We are not cribbage pieces on some board moving to some beat we don’t control. Instead we all deserve this measure of life. Some dignity. Respect. Ability to live however we wish.
Moving to Asia years ago meant for me I found people, things and places that reaffirmed my choice before. Then I met my wife. I had never expected to meet another woman. Definitely not a Cambodian woman who dedicates herself to our life. Who has told me her purpose is my happiness.
That’s a far piece from a dusty Carl’s Junior restaurant in Newark California. And it should be. My message us get old. Do what works. But also find your place. Perhaps it’s not in the country you started in. That’s okay too. Don’t be the player or the card in the deck.
I told the tour guide getting old in America is no joy. No happiness. We are not members of that society. We’re just old and we wander coffee shop to cheap fast food place. I never wanted that.
Do you?
