The Year That Was… (Context & Milestones)
It’s been a year… and what a year it was.
I left behind a 25-year teaching career in government education, retired with full benefits. Goal accomplished, just like I planned since I was a little kid. The rat-race finished.
I let go of my real estate business, liquidated nearly everything I owned. Nothing in storage. No safety net. No plan B. Just what fit into a couple of suitcases… my heart and soul … and the life I hoped to carry forward.
A year since my father died. The kind of loss that wasn’t only filled with family drama but also rearranged my inner world into unexpected corners of my daily life. Carrying a quiet and persistent voice that shows itself at unexpected times.
A year since I landed in Thailand— trading the treadmill of American striving for the narrow and winding sois of Thailand. Not as a tourist this time, but as someone beginning again. A whole new life, stitched together in a country I only passed through a few times before.
A year since I stepped off the fast track and asked myself. Now what?
Why Thailand? / The Sabai Sabai Ethos
I chose Thailand for a reason.
I come from ‘merikkkah, where your worth is measured by how busy you are and how high you climb and how much stuff you gathered. Success is loud… Fast…Branded. The culture rewards the busyness of the grind. I played that game well. But somewhere deep down—even while I was winning—I always knew something wasn’t right about this ethos. I only knew I would eventually want out.
Thailand offering is something else. Here, there’s a phrase—sabai sabai. It’s hard to translate, carrys many interpretations. So click on the link. Basically, it carries the feeling of “it’s all good,” “no worries,” “take it easy.” A softening of the grip on life.
People let each other be. They don’t interfere, don’t shame, don’t push. There’s space to live how you want, without the constant pressure to explain or defend it.
That doesn’t mean it’s utopia. There are things I still struggle to make sense of—like the older foreign men with very young Thai wives. I try not to judge, but I notice. I wonder. I’ve heard whispers of customs and laws, especially in other countries, that make me uneasy. But I try to stay grounded in what I see, what I know.
The truth is, every culture has its shadows. There is darkness and corruption everywhere in this capitalist world. In Thailand, corruption is local and visible—you can slip a few baht to a police officer and avoid a ticket. In ‘merikkkah, it’s hidden in boardrooms, corporatism and political donations. Same game, different players.
Daily Life & Choices / A New Home
The rhythms of daily life here are slower, and are not free from their own complications.
Last October, Chiang Mai saw its worst flood in recorded history. The river spilled into places that were flood free forever, and I was displaced from my home. My landlord—dealing with worse damage at their own place—offered no help, despite what the lease spelled out.
That shook something in me. Not just the water damage, or the memory of wading through septic waters to get out of the floodwaters. But the reminder that even in a perceived peaceful place, things can fall apart. And do fall apart. I realized I needed to move—not just to avoid future flooding, but to find a setting that felt more stable, more aligned with the kind of life I came here to live.
I found a new home. It’s farther out from the city than I originally planned, and I’m still not sure how far is too far. Time will tell. But it offers the views of the mountains and the rice fields that I dreamed of. Quieter, more space, more tranquility, more possibility. More peace for my daily life… walking, cycling, swimming, writing, cooking and the occasional around the world travel.
I’m looking for peace. For simplicity in the slowness of life. For days that don’t feel like I need to accomplish the to-do lists, or a life I feel I need to survive or outrun.
And yet—simplicity isn’t always so simple. I still want my Bose speakers and Nike orthotic walking shoes. I want my Revo polarized sunglasses. I want rice fields, mango trees and fiber internet. I want clean water and the freshest produce. These aren’t luxuries to me—they’re the things that helps me live a good life.
I’m not trying to go off-grid. I’m just trying to get closer to what feels real to me.
Visa, Belonging, and the Bureaucracy of Aging Abroad
Thailand makes it surprisingly easy to stay—at least on paper. For those of us over 50, there’s a retirement visa option: keep a minimum balance in a Thai bank account, fill out the right forms, and you’re in.
But that’s just the surface.
Every ninety days, I must check in with immigration to confirm I haven’t disappeared. I do have a multiple entry visa that allows me to come and go as I please. Every time I return to Thailand, it resets the 90-day ritual. It’s a small bureaucratic inconvenience, but one that quietly reminds me: I’m still a guest here. My life is my own, but it’s also subject to stamps, signatures, and systems I didn’t grow up with.
So, I hired an agent. For around $300 a year, he handles it all—the visa renewals, the paperwork, the multiple-entry stamps, the 90-day checkins. I don’t have to wait in line or navigate the immigration office or a language I’m still learning. That peace of mind is worth every baht.
Still, I’m thinking about shifting the dates. If I can time it right, maybe I won’t have to be back in Thailand during monsoon season just to renew my visa. I’d rather be traveling when the skies open up and flood the streets again. Will see what happens as I investigate this.
There’s a strange kind of privilege in being able to play the game the system, ever so diligently and gently—move dates around, pay someone to help. But I don’t take it for granted. I’m not here to pretend I belong or entitled to certain rights in the same way as someone who was born here. But I’m not just passing through, either.
Somewhere in between guest and immigrant, I’m carving out a structure, a daily routine, a rhythm of life. A way of being here without pretending to be from here. Adapting to this culture and way of life is critical.
Food, Land, and What Nourishes Me
I’ve been a chef most of my life. Not just professionally, but in how I see the world—through ingredients, through seasonality, through the quiet alchemy of blending flavor and taste. With appreciation for the abundance that comes from the land and for those who work the land in loving ways.
Northern Thailand feeds me in more ways than one. The land here is generous. Rich river valleys and mountain air create microclimates where tropical fruits and temperate crops grow side by side.
At the local markets, I can find strawberries and peaches, fresh-picked from the highlands. Mangoes so ripe the juice drip down your chin. Greens I’ve never seen anywhere else and am still learning about—bitter, tangy, medicinal, and wild.
And the food. Yes, of course, there’s spice from those “birds eye” Thai chilis. There’s amazing salt flavor diversity coming from fermenting fish and soy beans. But there’s also variety, subtlety, and balance when you want it. You don’t have to burn another hole in your a__, I mean, tongue to eat well here.
More than the ingredients, it’s the approach to food that I find nourishing. It’s not dressed up. It’s not precious. It’s just…available. Honest. Made for the people who live here, delivered in plastic bags. It’s the people who dress it up for Instagram.
I’ve wandered markets all over the world—from Cairo to Cusco, from Istanbul to Kerala — and still, the fresh markets in Thailand feel like home. They remind me of what food is supposed to be: a relationship with land, with the people, with the historic traditions, with what’s in season, abundant and close to hand.
In this stage of life I find myself in, nourishment means more than taste. It’s being in sync, in rhythm, with the flow of life. Simplicity. Connection. With the earth. With the people. With myself.
Flowing… with the agriculture seasonality, a ripe mango from my mango tree, fresh strawberries just came down from the mountain, eaten standing barefoot in my (soon to be) garden.
Simplicity… drinking my locally grown and roasted coffee, with no urgency to get anything done.
Knowing… that I won’t break the bank and I don’t have to hustle to eat well.
This is what is feeding my soul now.
What It Means to Live a Good Life Now
This, I think, is the real question. What does it mean—now—to live a good life? To feel like a complete human. Unbroken. A life I don’t need a vacation from. I wrote about this before.
I used to say I wanted simplicity… and I still do. I imagined it as a kind of stillness, minimalism, a clearing where there is nothing that pulls at me. But I’ve come to see that simplicity isn’t passive at all. It’s an active choice and discipline.
Because I come from ‘merikkkah. Where everything says you should consume and want more. Where more is better. To increase the country’s gross national product… when it should be to help increase the gross national happiness. Slowing down feels like going against gravitational pull.
I don’t have to work anymore. That’s a gift many people never get. But the absence of a job doesn’t mean the presence of peace. What I choose to do with my time now—how I care for my body, how I tend to my mind, the thoughts I cultivate, who I allow into my inner world—that is my current personal work.
So I ask myself:
What does a flourishing life look like when I’m not chasing anything?
How do I stay awake to my life, not just fill it with busyness or pass the time unconsciously?
What do I still have to give back to the betterment of humanity and the planet — authentically, meaningfully—without slipping back into performance or feeling I have to prove something?
And perhaps most importantly:
Who do I want to walk with in this next chapter? Who sees me not for what I produce, but for who I am—when I’m not striving to produce anything?
That’s what’s in front of me.
It’s not a plan. Because I have no blueprint.
Just a path that unfolds with each honest and genuine step I take every day.
And my hope… that walking with open eyes, open hands, and an open heart… will always be enough.
Leave a Reply