Writing in the Kingdom

Preface:

"But it is difficult to write here. Dana writes in Boston. Steve Rossie does not live here. Even Marc Holt left.

I am trying to write today because I have an unexpected day off. What happens? The new GF brings some Japanese bondage porn home and starts watching it with her morning coffee.

Then the maid from the apartment comes by to sweep the hall and since the door is open notices my GF watching Japanese bondage porn. This is heavy duty stuff about an old Japanese guy who moves his young trophy bride to Paris. Maybe youโ€™ve seen the movie.

Now I have two women in the living room watching Japanese porn and drinking my coffee and they are eyeing the Belgian chocolate I bought yesterday (after Christmas sale). It is really good chocolate, white and dark molded into seashells with a truffle filling.

How much longer do you think I am going to be able to write?" -- from the Comments section on Thailandstories.com

__________________________________________________

Attn: Thailandstoryites and Comments readers . . .

Mr. Chiang Mai Kelly (I call him Mr.) has made, or ricochetted off of, an interesting point. Currently much (most?) of the interesting insightful writing about Thailand is being done by people not living in Thailand. Examples abound and I have rolled these marbles around in my mind for some time. Many of the hi-profile writers we are used to seeing on current Thai-farang genre websites no longer live in the Kingdom. They left. They are writing from memory. I am still surprised now and again when I find that a writer I thought was an expat is now back in his own country and making submissions from there. Someone should do a survey just for the fun of it.

Would I be as productive a chronicler if I lived in Thailand? No I would not be as productive a writer on Thai and personal affairs if I lived in the Kingdom. Why? Women. Thai women. Thai women are incredibly attractive to me. Like kryptonite to Superman, Thai women cause me to lose all my powers and I offer no resistance. My days are peppered with the head slap (Holy Fxxx, look at that) and the expostulation (oops, here comes another one). When I am leaving at the end of another one of my way-too-short vacations I feel like I am an astronaut being sent back to a barren world of no interest and no future. Boston.

And in Boston? What does this astronaut return to? Women in Boston are stunningly (my God she looks terrible), reliably, and depressingly unattractive. They can't walk, dress, or smile. Seduction is of no interest because all men are pigs and the courts and the government will protect them and provide for them. I do not know of (and have never known of) a single man in Boston happily having a sex life with women like he could be having in Thailand. Maybe in Fort Lauderdale, Florida where the sun shines men are having fun with women like in Thailand, or maybe in rural Texas roadhouse bars men are dancing and drinking and laughing with women like in Thailand; but that ain't Boston.

Here in Boston we don't have fun and we don't have sex. When is the last time you heard the word Boston and the word sex in the same sentence? Oh wait, you just did hear that sentence: Here in Boston we don't have fun and we don't have sex. Today it is 23 degrees. Maybe that is the difference. I have plenty of time to write about Thailand issues while I am in Boston. Instead of a Thai lady on my lap I have an electric blanket on my lap. I'm wearing a fleece sweat suit indoors and huge moosehead slippers with antlers that I bought in Salt Lake City thirty years ago.

Sexually, Boston is a pit (and I mean pit) stop between trips to Thailand. Think I am exaggerating? I spent twenty years riding around with guys in pick-up trucks on low end jobs. Landscaping, furniture delivery, trash hauling, painting crews, picking up old tires and batteries from gas (petrol) stations, picking up grease and fat drums from restaurants, emptying highway trash barrels, construction--all the jobs of the bottom of society. The talk in the trucks was about sports, politics, things, and current events. There was no talk about women in general or women in particular (girlfriends, etc.) Nobody had a sex life. Nobody even had the dream. I have no problem being a productive writer in Boston. What else is there to do?

I live in a building in Boston with 220 units in a neighborhood full of young people (lots of colleges in Boston). I'll bet almost every single man is sleeping alone tonight. And if I open the window I can not hear a single bar or a single happy sound. If I tell these lonely single men personal stories regarding times with women in Thailand they do not believe me and they do not listen. They can not process the information. I might as well be talking about Mars or Mercury or Saturn. A place on Earth populated by fashionable fit fun beautiful women who like to get naked with men and have sex? I must be deranged. A little elderly guy telling stories out of his ass. Hey, they're not that stupid. Who would believe that nonsense? Think of the reality of these mens' lives. The mind boggles.

I have plenty of time to write about Thailand in Boston. I can make two original submissions on two different websites per week and not even feel it. Painless. Like falling off a log. Hardly a challenge. What else is there to do? And there is almost no chance that I will ever meet a woman here. Too extremely dangerous. In the Park Street subway station, as an example; they have uniformed police, undercover police, and jackass employees who can not mind their own business. Presumably they are acting in concert to spot criminals, petty thieves, pickpockets, customers who need help, etc. They will also spot you if you seem to be talking to a woman you are not married to:

Police Officer: Sir?
Me: Yes?
Officer: Do you know this woman?
Me: No, but I was hoping to.
Officer: Step over here please, we want to talk to you. Stand with your back against the wall and show us your I.D.

Initiating a conversation with a woman in public is now an assumed crime in the making. Men in Boston have effectively been barred from fifty per cent of the human race unless you are giving them money (girlfriend, wife). I was once asked to leave a public park at lunchtime. I was eating a sandwich and reading a newspaper. A mother complained. The policeman rolled his eyes and told me (kinda begged me) it was just easier to leave.

Policeman: Sir, please do not tell me your rights. And please do not ask me to present your accuser to you. And please do not tell me you are innocent of inappropriate behavior--I can plainly see that. And please do not ask me my name or ask me the name of my supervisor. Honestly sir--it is really just easier to vacate the park.
Me: Ok, I'm going.

If you are a single man eating lunch and reading the newspaper in a public park with mothers and children around it is now a potential crime. I did not know that. Well, I know it now and I will not forget it. Someday a woman may ask me for help. She may not get help. And children? Forget about it. I don't even smile and wave at babies in baby carriages anymore. Too dangerous--for me.

Mother: Officer?
Police Officer: Yes?
Mother: This man waved in a friendly manner and smiled in a friendly manner at my baby.
Officer: Sir?
Me: Yes?
Officer: Step over here--do you have any I.D.?

Someday a baby-child may ask for my help. They may not get any help. Too dangerous for me.

I was once asked to leave a children's section in a bookstore. I guess I could not have been a father. Or I guess . . . ah, forget it. Sound familiar? It should sound familiar. In some countries women in public unaccompanied by men are considered whores. In America men unaccompanied by women are considered criminals. In Boston, if I walk up to a woman and say: "Hello. My name is Dana. What is your name?" I am one step closer to jail. Company Human Resources paperwork, policies, and 'behavior seminars' have so terrorized men that in the hallways and offices and confines of businesses this generation of men do not even speak to women. Too dangerous. And me? Stopped holding doors for women twenty years ago. Holding a door for a woman as a courtesy or as a marker of culture is a kind of contact. Contact with women carries too much risk. Open your own fxxxing door. I once had a woman criticize me because I did not hold the door properly. I have not forgotten that. I took it as a warning from someone qualified to issue warnings. I am scared all the time in Boston when I am outside my building. Women are everywhere and like wild dogs every one can hurt me.

Are there low class, mean spirited, predatory women in Thailand that would think nothing of the baseless accusation or the imperilment of my freedom? Yes there are; but at least they smile at me. My whole life teeters on a smile. It's amazing how cheaply men can be bought.

I have plenty of time to write about Thailand when I am in Boston. Hell, there is no reason to leave my apartment.

© Dana. All rights reserved by the author.