Nightly Journeys

I get a call last night, or more accurately early this morning, at 12:10. It was Semi-Naked Guy and he's standing at the back door with no keys. He did wake me but I didn't really mind.

"Where do we go when we sleep?" he asked after I had walked the length of the house and let him in, I assume inspired by the groggy nature in which I had answered the phone. He's full of big questions like that, big questions that cannot be contained by his lack of shirt.

I left the conversation for bed, without an answer. Shortly after I could hear soft snoring from the lounge, indicating that where ever we go, he's beaten me there.

I lay awake for a while pondering my destination. The Land of Nod as it were, and the journey we take there each night. We show an innate knowledge of it in the words we choose, all suggesting some form of movement, sometimes "drifting off" like a leaf tumbling in a summer breeze. At other times, the violence of "falling" asleep, of dropping sharply between worlds, as our bodies plummet from our control and our consciousness goes... where?

Before I had tottered off back to bed he said "Thank you for being part of my journey", "You're welcome, I guess" I answered uncertainly.

All I did was open the door.

The Tale of the Random Rickshaw

So at the moment I'm living with this dude, not "living with" just living with, and he likes to walk around sometimes in different levels of semi-undress, so I call him Semi-Naked Guy (not to his face, just, you know, in my head).

Anyway, the other day, Semi-Naked Guy walks into the house and says "Hey, wanna come look at my rickshaw?". I'm thinking euphemism, but no, as I walk outside, there it is, a bright red rickshaw.

He'd hired it for his friends' wedding they were using it as the bridal vehicle and it was parked outside the house for a week.

The day of the wedding arrives, and he has the bright spark idea of getting the rickshaw to the wedding on the train, he gets to the station all right. He's set with his 2 tickets, one for him, one for the rickshaw, and gets all the way up the 40 odd stairs to the platform only to find that when the train arrives, his bright red rickshaw doesn't fit through the doors.

So S-NG and his mates end up hiring a trailer or something and manage to get the Bride to the alter on time, or at least only the usual amount of late for a Bride.

After the ceremony he's driving the bridal pair around for their photos and he turns the rickshaw, as he turns, he moves, the rickshaw moves, and the couple moves with it but one of those massive cartwheels on the side doesn't. The guests are all watching the situation in slow-motion, yelling out with one voice that real slow drawn out "NO!" that only ever happens in movies and bad sit-coms. Semi-Naked Guy realises just in time to not ruin the Brides day completely.

He spends the remainder of the day, riding around offering all the cute girls a ride on his rickshaw. Now how's that for a line?

"Ladies, want a ride on my rickshaw?"

Happy Wandering Woman-niversary!

Exactly one year to the day, after I set foot in Japan, I set foot in my new office into my new role. I'm still wandering, just in a more centralised location for now. Centralised specifically around the Central Business District in Sydney. It's my city and I love being back here, I have rediscovered the strong sense of home that I have here. I have come full circle, ready to start saving for the next adventure.

Now, two weeks in, I'm really loving my new job too, successfully being incognito as the mild-mannered insurance something something.

Thanks for following.