What I Learned While Driving 25 Geckos to Oklahoma

 

 

 

1) Transgender people can still be kicked out of the US military

Yep, I learned this while listening to NPR as we drove through rural Kansas. While my scaly travel companions clung to their artificial tree branches, I learned that don't ask don't tells repeal only made it ok for openly gay men and women to serve in the US military. Apparently, it's still fine to boot out openly transgender men and women.

 

2) There are people in Kansas who actually listen to NPR (well, three anyway) 

 

Yes, NPR exists in a conservative state like Kansas and people do listen to it...well at least three do. I listened to the station for about four hours during my trip and they played separate recordings of the same two people for their customer testimonials. Still, it's quality programing and I'm sure the Geckos appreciated getting a well rounded look at today's current events.

 

3) People in rural Kansas shoot off fireworks in corn fields

 

This probably isn't too surprising given how isolating life in some of the six home, one gas station mini-mart towns must be. While driving back from Oklahoma I passed through four separate towns where young people were shooting off fireworks in cornfields. Granted, it might be practicing for fourth of July celebrations next weekend.

 

 

4) Taco Bueno is better than Taco Bell but isn't Mexican food

 

For the uninitiated, Taco Bueno is a fast food Tex-Mex chain. It's best described as a better version of Taco Bell. The portions are larger the quality is slightly better and you don't feel like your digestive system has been ravaged once you've had your last bite. None of that makes it great Mexican food but after three hours in a car with no one to listen to your renditions of Pink but 25 confused lizards, it manages to hit the spot.

 

5) Bluegrass is perfect music for driving through an endless sea of corn and wheat

 

I'm not a country fan. However, I have a soft-spot for old school folk and bluegrass. Both types of music are awesome to turn on when driving through an area that has nothing but farm fields. The downside is it also contributes to graphic fantasies of hillbillies emerging with shotguns from the cornrows.

 

 

6) Kansas City's main mix station can't be lost easily

 

I don't have an MP3 player and I'm do lazy to burn CDs (You know, cause that's so time consuming). This means I usually listen to a local mix station 102.1 when driving around Kansas City. What I didn't know was that you can drive almost two hours south of the city and still pick up the station pretty clearly. This means I can listen to my favorite station play the exact same songs from about ten singers over, and over, and over, and over again...ah, American Pop Culture.

 

7) A ton of cars in Oklahoma have Cherokee Nation License Plates 

 

The Cherokee people were forcibly relocated to Oklahoma by the US government during a tragic event known as the Trail of Tears. Several thousand Cherokee died in the forced march from the Appalachian Mountains. Today, a large number of Cherokee live in the State and as such you see a number of cars with Cherokee nation license plates.

 

 

8) Oklahoma State troopers' cars need a new design 

 

Don't worry I wasn't pulled over. However, I did get a look at the cars of the Oklahoma Highway Patrol Cars. Let me tell you, they have the absolute worst paint scheme of any highway patrol cars I've ever seen and I've been in a number of States. The cars are all white (as are the troopers) and have a black outline of the state of Oklahoma on the side...that's it. I think these officers need to do some consulting with the fashion police.

American Shame- Race and Our Realities

Today, I am ashamed to be an American. I am ashamed of my pale skin and the privilege and legacy it contains. We are a nation plagued by a sickness- that sickness is racism and we have to treat it. 

Dylann Roof may have been a maniac, but his mania was nurtured and cultivated. It was encouraged and ratified by voices from our past and present. And now, nine innocent people in Charleston have paid the price.

For all the strides America has made since 1964 there is still so much work to do. This attack has been only the most recent example of how African Americans in this country are still second class citizens. 

 

I am sick of reading stories about black men and women being abused by police. I'm tired of seeing the difference in how whites and people of color are treated differently by the authorities in so many matters. 

My soul is cut every time I hear of yet another young black person being gunned down and the indifference or hostility that comes from White Americans who refuse to see that Jim Crow is not yet dead.

We need to address race in this country. Something has to change in our society so that we can continue to build off the legacy of the Civil Rights movement of the 60s. We need an America that is truly for all Americans, free of random acts of mass gun violence, with justice for all regardless of skin. We need this and we need to talk about how to do it.

Even getting to that stage, however, is difficult in our current environment.

All too often we lack the ability to have good, honest respectful debate and discussion. We spend too much time in our own political, and social realities often defined by what we find online. And the more we listen exclusively to others like us, who repeat again and again that our world is the greatest and our problems are the worst, the more likely we are to ignore the pain of the others outside our reality and perhaps even hate them as Dylan Roof did.

Too many of us in White America are not capable of living with difference or with ambiguity. We are fearful. 

And I don't just mean on matters of race. We fear political difference, religious difference, philosophical difference.

Above all else we fear being challenged, we fear having our beliefs, our worldview altered by the reality of another. Rather than entertain the notion that what our views on taxes, social welfare or President Obama are not gospel we fail

No more is this clearer than the realm of social media, where all too often we share stories that reinforce our worldview and interact with others who believe the same things we do for the same reasons.

We come to love our home, our culture, our ideals, our front lawns, our sexuality, our cars, our sport's team. Not only do we fail to see the lives of other around us, we fail to value their reality. We fail to see that their path's struggles, different and at times more severe than our own, are just as real.

It's this failure at trying to understand the other (no matter who that other is) that is reinforced by and reflected in American media outlets like Fox and MSNBC.

Our race problems and so many other issues America is wrestling with stem from this. Our inability to look beyond our favorite news stations, our most trusted websites and Facebook groups and break from whichever parallel universe we inhabit even if just for a little bit.

When we lose the willingness to sit down with someone who's belief and background differs from ours and attempt to understand their perspective we are more likely to find ourselves incapable of respecting anyone who doesn't do as we do and think as we think.

We have to break this. We have to learn respect for whichever other we are not a part of. Until that happens, these types of attacks will continues and they will be our shame to bear as the rest of the world watches.

GOT- Why Season 5's Finale is the Most Depressing Episode Yet

Will he return?

 

Another season of Game of Thrones has come and gone...and damn did it go out with a bloody bang.

I've been a huge fan of the TV and book series for a few years. I've loved the dirty, uncompromising portrayal of Medievalist politics and war in a fantasy setting. I've been through it all: Ned's Stark beheading, Winterfell's burning, Khal Drogo's death, the Purple and Red Weddings.

Yet Season 5's finale, which aired yesterday, may have been the toughest episode I've ever had to sit through. That's saying a lot. Especially when in Season 3 an entire wedding party was massacred and unsavory acts were done involving decapitation and a wolf.  (Here comes the King in the North!)

 

There's a few reasons why this season's finale was as depressing as it was. First, practically all the story-arcs needed to be tied up in one episode. In past seasons, the pattern was to have a final battle or traumatic event in the ninth episode. The last episode of the season was then used as a climax or resolution in the aftermath of the previous week's event. This gave the viewer time to process and come to terms with what had happened. This season, however, broke the mold. Instead, not only did we have several important character deaths, other characters suffered new traumas or were left in precarious positions. Oh yeah, and on top of all this there was a massive battle at Winterfell. 

All of these events happened in rapid succession without any time to absorb the emotional impact of what we were seeing. And we saw a lot of heavy stuff.

Even for a book reader like me, who knew where each story was likely to end this year, it was difficult to watch so much horrible stuff happen in a fifty minute time period. It's one thing to read all of this in a book, it's quite another to see it happening in front of your eyes. Watching Cersei's walk of shame, Sansa's desperate leap from the wall and hardest of all, the possible death of Jon Snow was like getting hit by several different cars one after the other.

 

What made it harder was the fact that there was no silver lining. Usually in past finales at least one of the story lines ended on a positive or slightly uplifting note. In Season 1- Dany rose from the flames with her dragons. Season 2- Robb married Talisa and Dany recovered her dragons, Season 3- Astapor's slaves were liberated, Season 4- Arya sailed into the horizon after escaping the Hound. 

Season 5's finale had no such ray of sunshine in an otherwise overcast world. The closest we came was Tyrion reconnecting with Varys. Everyone else is either dead, likely dead, or in a far tougher spot than they were before the episode. 

Now, all of this is not to say I will stop watching the show. This isn't a 'I'm done' rant like the many I've seen on Twitter. Game of Thrones remains one of the best TV series ever created and I intend to keep watching until the series concludes.

 

This is only meant to say, damn I wish there could have been some ray of hope somewhere to help offset the trauma.

American Amnesia- Thoughts on Memorial Day

Yesterday was Memorial Day in the US. For those who don't know, it's a national holiday in America where US soldiers who have died while in uniform are honored and remembered. While that might sound like a very solemn occasion, and yes there are ceremonies and parades remembering fallen soldiers across the country, the truth is most Americans spend the day picnicking, barbecuing, and drinking.  Not surprisingly there is also a considerable spike in arrests related to drunk driving.

 

Like all US national holidays, Memorial Day is not something that arouses any deep seated feelings of patriotic loyalty in me. I grew up in Thailand and while our family celebrated certain US holidays from time to time, I can't say they were as exciting to me as Christmas or Thai New Year. Getting older, traveling to new corners of the globe, all while delving into the darker chapters of US Foreign Policy and History at college didn't exactly make the Star Spangled Banner a favorite tune of mine either. 

 

That said, I don't hate the US. It's a very great country. It's accomplished quite a lot and provides a great deal of philanthropy across the world...for better or worse. As far as the US military goes, I'm wary and sympathetic. I disapprove of the power of the military industrial complex and the fact that US spends more money on its armed forces than the next twelve countries under us combined at the expense of important social services. 

 

On the other hand, the US military is often at the tip of the spear when it comes to responding to humanitarian disasters and catastrophes around the world. I know people in the US army. Some of my friends were military brats. The soldiers I know on an individual level are great people; ideal driven, highly motivated and often very humble. 

 

Overall, it's good that the US has a holiday to remember its fallen soldiers. All countries around the world commemorate those troops who've died in combat. No one should expect the US to be any different. 

 

However, when I see pictures circulating social media showing the funerals of US soldiers, when I catch commercials on the TV from a local news station ending with 'We'll never forget', and yes the abundance of American flags, I can't help but feel discomforted. Because we do forget...and no I'm talking about forgetting that US soldiers died. Nor am I referring to the supposed sanctity of the day being tainted by Americans deciding to clog their arteries with saturated fats.

 

I'm talking about how Americans' remembrance of their soldiers and the wars they've fought in is often tainted by a selective amnesia. We remember that soldiers have died fighting in wars. Yet we deliberately neglect thinking of the wider context of these conflicts.

 The false narratives that have driven us to unnecessary conflicts, PTSD and physical disability, the deaths of non-American civilians in wars across the globe, often unintentional, the chaotic and bloody mess we have left behind in countries we had spent trillions of dollars to rebuild or develop; these are all aspects of wars past and present that we choose not to include in remembering US soldiers who died. 

 

Why? Well, I suspect a number of people would feel that it makes the deaths of the soldiers, particularly those who died in Iraq and Afghanistan, in vain. Somehow, criticizing the nature of the justness or necessity of the wars they died in is an attack on them as people and lessens their own lives.

 

I don't view it that way. A soldier is a soldier. They follow orders. They obey their superiors. While they may harbor doubts about why they're trying to hold onto a remote outpost in the Afghan mountains (Restrepo), they will continue to hold it. Soldiers, regardless of nationality, do not decide where they are sent. They don't choose which field to fight in or which cause is just.  

 

Leaders do that. In the States it's leaders we elect, leaders we choose to go along with. Ergo, the buck stops with the ordinary American.

 

And this is the true reason we dislike talking about the unjust and tragic nature of some of our wars on days like yesterday. Because we don't want to indict ourselves. We don't like to acknowledge that we are the reason these men and women have gone off and killed others before being killed themselves all for causes we told them were worth their weight in life. 

 

I can think of no clearer example of this than Iraq. In 2014, 50 percent of Americans believed that decision to invade Iraq in 2003 was the wrong choice. This shouldn't come as a surprise. Nor should it be a surprise that in March of 2003, when the invasion was underway, 72 percent of Americans believed that using military force in Iraq was the correct decision.  

 

Sure, George W. Bush sold the American people a yarn about Saddam and his weapons of mass destruction but we bought it. 

 

The talking heads at Fox and CNN prattled on about shadowy ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq's military. We swallowed it up. 

 

US officials told us the American soldiers we were sending would be greeted as liberators and that a new democratic society would blossom in the desert. And we said 'Of course it will! America can do no wrong!' forgetting that we are an imperfect nation made of imperfect people and that we knew next to nothing of this country who's future was now going to intertwined with our own. 

 

I lived through that time. I remember it vividly. American news covered Iraqi Freedom like the Super Bowl. The excitement and electricity among the students at the US public school I went to was palpable. We believed in the war. I believed in the war and ultimately we the people of the United States had no damn clue how much harm we were going to inflict on Iraq's people, ourselves and the American soldiers that we claim to love so much. 

 

Fast forward through 4493 dead American soldiers hundreds of thousands of slain Iraqis, and the country we promised to liberate and make a democracy in our own image is engulfed by political discord, the terror of ISIS and even more sectarian bloodshed between Sunni and Shia.

 

None of this changes the fact that many US servicemen and women served selflessly and to the best of their ability. None of this changes the courage they showed in extreme hardship.Yet how many of their lives, which we insist must be remembered, could we have saved if the American people had been more hesitant to plunge forward into war?

Will we learn our lesson and honor the American soldiers of tomorrow by promising them that the next time our government tells us that a war is worth waging we will be better informed?  Will we make damn sure that we have thought long and considered the loss of life on all sides before sending them into fire and flame? I can only hope so. I can only hope. 

 

US Army Spc. Jerral Hancock- Photo by David Jay via NPR

Dear Millenials Near Thirty- A Love Letter

 

 

Dear Millenials Near Thirty,

I know you've thought about that number.

You can admit it. You may have tried forgetting it... Nevertheless, it's there on the horizon.

 

And I want to tell you wherever you are, it's fine. That's the message I wanted to tell those of you who share my stage of life: in the latter days of their twenties with thirty on the horizon.

Turning twenty six two years ago increased my awareness of my age. Turning twenty seven has made that awareness ever more acute. Like most of you, I've dwelt more on this fact more often than I should have. I've looked over my life since college and made the mistake of comparing it to others. I wonder about different paths, different roads and I try and decipher the pictures on social media to see if friends from high-school or college are more or less content with themselves than I am.

I know you've done this too. We know we shouldn't make these comparisons. But we do. We're human and we have windows into the lives of others as no generation has had before.

In the end though, social media is just that a window. The realm of the internet is a trailer of a person's movie not the biopic of their entire life.

Since coming back to the States in  February I've been able to catch up with a number of my peers. Without the pressures of full time teaching I can finally make space to truly reconnect with all the people I'd lost touch with during my two years in Thailand. Whether over Skype or in the flesh the stories I've been told by friends have been as diverse as they have been insightful.

Some people have moved from one country to another, some have changed cities, some have started new careers or gone back to school, some have made a rapid ascent up the ladder.

Many have gotten married, some have gotten divorced, some have ended long relationships, some have moved back in with their parents, others have moved out.

And for some their world has not changed significantly at all. They remain in the same place they were two years ago, working the same job, living in the same house, together with the same person.

All these changes have been fascinating to learn about. Each life is so different and yet the one thing that holds us all together is that no one really feels like they have figured everything out. There's still, for most people I've talked to, a sense of uncertainty about their journey. For all the empty spaces we've filled in our lives, there remain vacancies. Some old some new.

A successful job but no relationship, a profession which brings money and prestige but no personal satisfaction, a fulfilling profession that doesn't pay quite enough to support a family.

We are fuller people. Yet we are also more aware than ever of the empty places in ourselves.

Yet, it's all alright. I'm here to write you that it's okay. I believe one day many of those holes will be filled and the few that remain will be become treasures to us.

Because the older we get the more comfortable we become with the weaknesses we have and prouder of the strengths we possess. I find myself loving the holes and vacancies in my life with new appreciation. We may never be full but that does not mean we are empty. It doesn't mean we can't live a life of meaning, purpose and contentment.

You are not alone in your uncertainty and ambiguity. That is what this decade is all about. :)

Much Love Fellow Almost Thirtysomethings,

Sean

What it Means to Publish- Thoughts on Releasing Part of Yourself to the World

'Vulnerable Heart' by Angela (pixeldust007)

I remember the first story I ever wrote. I was around nine and like many little boys in the 90s I loved Star Wars. One day, I decided to take a pencil and paper and write a story about how the rebels found their base on Hoth. The plot of this early fan-fic revolved around Luke Skywalker being shot down by a star destroyer. He crash landed on the ice planet and after wandering around trying to avoid snow troopers he found the massive cave complex that would provide the rebels with their haven.

Like so many kids, my initial enthusiasm for this passion waned and I never finished what I started. So many of my projects followed the same path over the next sixteen years. I finished some pieces. Sometimes I would take care of the first-draft, occasionally I would make it through an edit or two and there were a number of short Facebook notes, and blog-posts that I would share for the wider world. Yet there were so many other works that just sat half-baked and completely forgotten in a folder on my computer. And, until I finished the last edit of my Native American Fantasy novel, 'Only the Sky is Forever', I had never reached the stage of publishing a piece of fiction.

It's one thing to share what you've written with those close to you. That in and of itself is courageous in my opinion. Many of those who write never reach that stage and I understand why. Writing always comes from the soul. It's a segment of what goes on inside you. Showing part of the real you is never easy. However, putting your official stamp on something and telling the world 'Hey, this book I wrote, I want you to buy it.', that's even more daunting, at least to me. You're telling others, your voice is worth something. You're proclaiming that your soul, the piece of yourself that is etched in those words, is worth buying for three dollars.

As the author, you're intimidated. You have a much larger expectation to live up to. You're worried. You ask yourself many different questions: Is this story really worth sharing? Will anyone buy this part of me? Will anyone care? Will anyone absolutely despise it?

These thoughts went through my head at different times throughout the past few weeks as I thought about the imminent publication of my book. I have a feeling most authors have similar doubts at different times. Yet, the heart of why writers write, is never fame and fortune( plenty of us dream of it even if we won't admit it). It's because we are addicted to the act of creation. We are consumed by the desire to stir the caldron of potions in our head, add the right ingredients at the best times to make it as fine a brew as we can and finally pour what we've concocted out for the sake of watching it flow out onto the page or screen in front of us. This is the act that keeps us going even if what we write never wins a Pulitzer Prize or reaches anyone beyond a few friends.

It is gratifying to be read. I hope people do read this book I've written and are willing to pay for it. Yet the canvas I paint with my words is meant, first and foremost to be something I can look upon and smile at. And if others wish to smile at it with me, dismiss it or walk by without a glance they are welcome to. I'm just glad to be able to say to the world, 'it's here! it's finished!'

 

 

Only the Sky is Forever- Preview

Below is a short excerpt from my new book, 'Only the Sky is Forever'. It's the opening prolouge which provides the foundational story for the book's universe. 'Only the Sky is Forever' comes out this week exclusively on Amazon.

 The Making of the World

The Maker created our world and the two that came before it.

In the world before ours, the people of the land were powerful and blessed by the hands that made them. They lived well off the land. There was game to hunt in the forests, water to drink in the streams, corn to harvest in the fields.

But the people of the land grew greedy, proud and took much more than they needed. The animals and other creatures began to suffer and starve.

Seeking to rebuke them for their trespasses, the Maker appeared to the people of the land and gave them a warning.

'Take only what you need,” the Maker said. “Do not abuse the other creatures or each other and I shall promise to one day give you all my power and wisdom. Become greedy again, and I shall sweep you away and make a new people in your place.”

The people of the land consented to their Maker's offer, promising not to take as much as they had before.

Yet within a short time the people turned their backs on their promise, slaughtering all the animals, cutting the trees and spoiling the soil.

Enraged and saddened, the Maker took vengeance. From the Maker's shed tears Unktehi the horned water serpent of deconstruction was born. She covered the land in a flood, drowning the people.

When all were gone and the lands submerged, the Maker looked over the waters with the Sun above them. Playing four songs on a medicine lute, the Maker created a new world, the one we know today.

The first song, caused the earth to rise from beneath the waters

The second song, caused the mountains, trees and animals to rise from the earth.

The third song, brought forth the new people, other walking and speaking beings and those great spirits that are both human and animal.

The fourth song, removed the heart of Unktehi from her body which caused the great snake to fall into the lake on the top of Serpent Mountain where her body remains to this day.

The Maker hid Unktehi's heart, that the serpent could not return. To this day, the Maker keeps the new watch over the world and all those who inhabit it.