In a previous post, I quoted a line from one of the Lord of the Rings movies.  At the risk of sounding shallow or hopelessly geeky, another line (a scene really) from one of those movies struck me this morning as I sit sipping coffee in a tented camp in the middle of the Cambodian jungle.  Samwise Gamgee trailing behind Frodo on a small track through a field suddenly stops.  “This is it, Mr. Frodo,” he says.  “If I take one more step, it will be the farthest I’ve ever been from the Shire.” Geographically, I have probably been farther from Seattle than Cambodia, but mentally, this is it.  We’ve been gone since January 12.  I don’t think I have ever travelled for this long.  I feel the need to stop and observe the moment.

Melissa and I left Phnom Penh two days ago and drove four hours towards the Thai border and the ocean.  The weight of what we saw at the Killing Fields still pressed upon us.  We stopped at the base of a river near where it empties into the gulf.  Though it is called a river, it is more of an inlet.  The water is brackish in the dry season and fresh in the rainy season. 

As we sat with Sing, our guide, waiting on a boat to take us to the tented camp, once again, I found new shoots of hope and love and healing springing from that barren place laid waste by the previous day’s activities.  Sing drove us to a small, quiet spot along the river.  We walked out on a wooden dock over the emerald green waters with nothing but jungle on either bank and sat on the bare floor letting the breeze cool us in the ninety-degree heat.  Something was different about this particular rest stop.  It was not on the itinerary.  We thought it was simply a place to hang out until our boat arrived to take us up river.  Then Sing let us know that this was his place.  He had recently purchased it.  His face filled with a mixture of pride, love and joy at being able to share it with us. I would like to tell you that in that moment the heaviness of the Killing Fields lifted.  It did not.  But I felt lighter.  I sensed the beginning of recovery.

If I learn nothing else from our ramblings, I am content to know with greater conviction than ever that if there is something that created this universe, that something is most tangible and real in the connection between two people.  And if, as atheists maintain, there is no creator, then I am content to know that this connection between people, a connection that only blooms into existence if we reach for it, does not defy scientific explanation so much as resist it.  I am a believer in education, in science, in objective, empirical data and analysis. I reject the irrationality that warps and bends our public discourse today.  At the same time, I believe there are ways of knowing that exist beyond the domain of science.  One is not better than the other.  They are different ways of learning and must be harmonized.  

After a forty-five minute ride on a large wooden canoe-like boat fitted with a very loud outboard motor, we glided to a stop at a floating dock, the first human-made structure along the banks of the river we had seen since setting out.  During the ride, we chatted (yelled, actually, to be heard over the engine) with a British couple slightly older than us.  By the time they left the next day, we had exchanged emails and made promises to get together if they ever found themselves in Seattle or if we ever travelled to London.  In the span of less than twenty-four hours, we mutually discerned in each other a kindred spirit, a willingness to laugh and share and enjoy each other’s presence. Perhaps more than any other experience on this trip saturated with new experiences, this recurring ease at making connections reveals (in all its naked ugliness) the toxic, vapid, relentlessness of Donald Trump’s rhetoric and the media’s incurable addiction to reporting it.

We noted in a previous post how nice it felt to catch a breather in Hoi An after starting our sabbatical with a full, nonstop schedule.  If Hoi An was a breather with its lights, energy and restaurants, the tented camp is a silent retreat.  The facility consists of 12 canvas tents, each fully plumbed and approximately 12 feet by 15 feet.  Think glamping.  The main building is an open-air pavilion with a wooden floor and a thatch roof.  Down a series of sand and wooden steps you reach the silent, virtually still river and a floating wooden dock. Our only planned activity for the three days was an early morning kayak/hike, which, true to form, we completed with our guide a good ninety minutes faster than he had ever done it.  Side note: we may experience many transformations on this trip.  Being able to amble leisurely through the jungle will not be one of them.  We are both starved for exercise and use every opportunity to pump our hearts.  Melissa did, however, learn how to identify the diarrhea tree, the bark of which makes a tea to calm the stomach.  Good to know.

A swim in the river is simply delightful, the only way to cool off during the day.  The first day, I kayaked up stream and then reclined fully on the kayak and let it drift slowly back to the dock.  The British couple we met saw my supine body sprawled on the brightly colored kayak floating aimlessly downstream and debated whether to call for help or laugh hysterically.  Between the heat of the day and the quiet of the jungle, this place lends itself to blessed inactivity.  The second day, after our record-setting kayak/hike, we read, dozed, laughed and eventually rallied to get some exercise.  Melissa kayaked while I swam upriver for 15 minutes.  Then we switched.  I kayaked while Melissa swam downstream back to the dock.  What took me 15 minutes took Melissa 8.  I tell myself she had the advantage of swimming with the current, and I would appreciate it if all of you would go with that theory as well.

Last night after dinner, we played two hands of gin, both of which Melissa won.  We returned to our tent around 7:15 with Melissa joking about what mini-series we should watch on Netflix.  I started a new novel on my kindle, but found my eyes drooping.  I think I fell asleep around 8 pm and did not wake up until 6:15 am.  I can’t remember the last time I slept that long or that soundly other than when I was down with the flu.  

This morning at breakfast I looked at Melissa whose face I could describe in detail and said, not at all trying to be romantic, just factual, “you get prettier everyday on this trip.”  I hope throughout this blog I can capture a sense of how restorative this trip has been.  That observation, however, probably comes as close to what I sense is happening as anything I could write.  Her face has not changed.  I see in it today all the beauty, laughter, worry, tenderness, and love I have seen over the course of our relationship.  What I saw this morning reflected back at me was that essential goodness, the part of both of us that came into this world trailing clouds of glory.  It sounds sentimental when I write it, but I refuse not to.  If we cannot find beauty in ourselves, we will never find it in the world.