Life Changes

Mid October 2025

They say if you want to hear the universe laugh, tell it your plans.

The plan was simple. Spend the whole summer in Thailand. Sun, heat, street food, temples and a little Muay Thai, all of it. Instead, we got Covid, Thai belly, and the slow realization that the parts of Thailand worth seeing are being rapidly replaced by the parts that want to sell you a bucket of Red Bull and a tank top.

Still The People, the land the elephants were all great. However we weren’t feeling it. And after some self reflection on Americanism- blending in to Thailand-ism… We did the healthcare things and Captain babe had a horrific experience the Dentist and leaning pain management was something diffident in Thailand. I did like Thailand and wanted to stay for a bit longer. However after the dentist things. We went else where.

Where to. Funny you should ask. Bali. Because of course, Kind people. Good waves. The eternal promise of transformation at a modest daily rate. And yoga.

The waves were real. The kindness was real. What we didn't plan on were Lisa's souvenirs — the kind you don't pack, you just sort of acquire. The doctor confirmed them. Worms. Parasites. A full deworming situation, which is exactly as undignified as it sounds and somehow even more so when you're doing it in a foreign country at fifty-something years old. And then there was the surfing.

Here's what nobody tells you: surfing is hard. Not hard like "this is a challenging". I mean hard like your body has been lying to you and the ocean just called you out. We gave it a real effort. We had fun. Yet somewhere between paddle-out number three and hey look paddle out again. I had to make peace with something: we are not 30 anymore.  And that's okay.

Back to France, then. Specifically La Rochelle, which I've written about before and will probably write about again. I love La Rochelle. Standing here, looking out at the shoreline — coffee in hand, actual drinkable tap water in that coffee — it's a rare moments where you feel like you made a correct decision.

Except.

Except we couldn't extend our visas from inside the country. Thank you current administration.

To apply for a long-term stay, you have to go back to the United States. We only needed an extra thirty to forty days. That wasn't on the table. So we did what people who have committed to a flexible life have to do.

We figured it out sideways.

England. Merry Ole England. Hobbits, shire - London — one of the genuinely great cities of the world, where the chaos is organized and the pubs are reliable. Then Brighton, because Brighton has an energy, and we could use some energy. But then we were told Falmouth. Its where it gets interesting. Maybe some fishing. Definitely not surfing, still the Channel has its own kind of cold. Not Wisconsin cold. Still its a wet cold.

The English Channel, Falmouth, Cornwall, England

Twenty days. Back to France before the 90-day clock runs out. That buys us another chunk, and by then — by wind and weather willing — the boat will be ready. We clear Spain. We cross the Atlantic. We pick up the dog. We hug the people we haven't seen in months. We make our way to Central America.

This is the life. It's a strange and disorienting and completely worth while.

One thing I've learned traveling like this: people carry too much stuff. And I don't just mean bags. You can get what you need almost anywhere. Outside of specific prescriptions — and even then you can find them, they're just pricier (hindsight- EXCEPT biological Hormones) — the stuff you thought was essential mostly isn't. Travel light. Stay flexible. Those two things will get you further than any plan.(except your wife’s hormones) go back and get them!

I've also learned something about the person I'm traveling with.

Lisa and I argue. We're two people in close quarters on an adventure that doesn't stop being stressful just because it's also beautiful. We get dis-regulated. We say things with more edge than we mean. Still, here's what I know: we are genuinely good to each other. We are, at the bottom of it, best friends. And that matters more than I understood when I was younger.

You carry what you didn't finish in childhood. You carry it right into adulthood, every bit of it — the fears, the patterns, the ways you learned to soothe yourself. The older I get, the more I see people go inward and calcify. The walls go up. The invitations stop coming. I understand it. I've felt that pull.

But here's what actually extends your life, and I'm not guessing — there's real research behind this: the quality of your relationships. Not how many. Quality. The people you can call. The people who call you. The people who are happy to see you. Point being: if you have good people, keep them. If you don't have them yet, make some. That's it. That's the whole longevity strategy.

In April, I buried one of my best friends.

His name was Scott Eric. A mountain of a man. Somewhere north of 400+ pounds, lived alone, cared about the people around him more than he let on. I don't want to romanticize him — he wouldn't want that, He wasn’t nice. Still he was kind. and he's gone now so I owe him honesty. He could have taken better care of himself. He knew that. Even editing this now. I miss him.

Artist cartoon renditition of Scott Eric

From diagnosis to the end: 45 days. Stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

We had a group — nothing formal, just boys who wanted brotherhood and camaraderie . We had plans. Places we were going to go. Things we were going to do together. Two of them I don't talk to anymore. One went somewhere ugly. One disappeared into himself. I wasn't exactly easy to be around back then either. Yet, Scott Eric., I miss him the way you miss someone who actually knew you. The good, the bad, the most virtuous and vile parts of you. And love you all the same.

When I first returned to France. I saw two old men the other day. One was venting about something, riding his bike slowly, just talking. The other was circling him on his own bike, round and round, just listening. Not saying much. Just there.

It looked exactly like what we used to do. Exactly like him. The conversations are gone. — it's absent, and I feel it more the further I travel.

I'm looking at the Bay of Biscay right now. It's shimmering in that way water shimmers when the light hits it right. Its a quiet beauty.

I miss my grandkids. Their faces, their noise, the girls talking and the boys wrestling. I miss my sisters and my brother. All my nieces and nephews. I belong out here right now. The horizon calls like it has something to tell me, and I'm not ready to stop listening.

Much love. All the warmth I can muster.

Make good choices. Be a good person.

Until the next chapter.