Week 10: Happy Birthday, Kat!!!

Was Kat's 26th birthday today. I took her out for a birthday facial, and then had dinner with her and Javier. Kat and I are less than a year apart--every year, there is a period of about two weeks when we're the same age. I can't believe that we're in our late 20s. I mean, I still remember when Kat and I used to play funeral (yeah, we had a pretty macabre imagination back in the day) and make castles out of sofa cushions and blankets.

Thinking back, Kat and I had a great childhood. We never wanted for anything, we were well-loved by our parents. I love my parents' quirks--they never hesitated to drag us all over Europe and the Middle East, and they never begrudged us McDonalds' (hey who cares what kids eat, as long as they eat, right?). We lived in small-town Texas on 3 acres of land, and one of my fondest memories was sitting on the riding lawnmower with dad. I remember once when my dad came home from work with a trailer attached to his pickup truck--on the trailer was a used golf cart! Kat and I spent years afterwards devising obstacle courses and coming up with various names for unique spots on our land. (If I remember correctly, "The Gorge of Death" and Mount Olympus were a couple stops on our Pilgrim's Progress-esque golf-cart allegory...)

Our idyllic childhood was not without tragedy, however. A couple of days before I turned 9, our puppy died. Grizzly (named because he had the roly-poly demeanor of a bear) was the most affectionate, energetic, adorable puppy, always so happy to see us. Sometimes I thought that Grizzly's energetic tailwagging would knock him clean over. When he ate, the caked food on his face would remind me of a mischievous child with chocolate. When my dad would come home from work, Grizzly was so happy to see him that he would carelessly run out to meet him. One day, Grizzly's recklessness got him killed when my dad accidentally hit him. In retrospect, it seems like such a small event, but at that point in our lives, it was a huge tragedy. Weeks after, my sister and I would spontaneously burst into tears--my dad felt so bad.

I don't even know why I'm thinking about this--perhaps its because its close to my own birthday, a general sense of loss over growing up, or just a run-of-the-mill existential moment. Things affected me more viscerally back then--definitely not the case now. Its not that I necessarily feel my self getting more and more cynical by the day, but when I compare across years, I see the gulf between the childish wonder and freshness of my childhood, and the person(a) I am today.

Song currently playing on iPod: Running Up That Hill (Kate Bush)

Kat told me this week that she's going back to the states for Christmas. I honestly don't blame her--she's been incountry for well over year now, and needs to get out badly. Frankly, I'm a bit jealous. She gets to hang out with mom and dad, eat good food, and take a breather from the stuffiness of Hanoi. Anyways, its been years since our family last spent Christmas all together, and I am starting to miss the familiar trappings of home. I still don't have Christmas plans yet, but somehow I have a feeling it will be pretty solitary. Its true that I don't go home but twice a year, but still, its good to know that home is a mere 4 hours away on a plane, as opposed to 20.

Crazy thing about the cat. After weeks of thinking that One Dollar was a girl, I caught her licking herself and found that "she" was definitely a "he!!" But the puzzling thing is, she has boobies. Is there a possibility that One Dollar is a hermaphrodite cat? How does that work?

Must run--bed time. More next week.