I Didn't Say That #10

Today

I'm at a hotel in Chiang Mai with my wife. We took a bus here last night to get nice and close to the US Consulate for her tourist visa interview this morning. Denied again. Just like the last time, the guy asked her two questions before telling her no, refusing to even look at the supporting documents we’d spent months preparing. But we were both born with uncomfortable levels of rebelliousness and resilience. So our day will come. It’s only a question of when.

Next, we'll start work on a marriage visa. But not today. Today we're just going to move about and live. I just booked us a room at a nicer hotel in a better part of the city, where we'll eventually end up and crash for the night. If I’m lucky, there might even be a cannabis brownie in my possession when we arrive.

Tomorrow, we'll take a bus home and get back to our lives there. As part of our day of living today, I'm going to shut this laptop the fuck down. Before I do, there's only one link I came across this week that I felt was too good not to share. It’s an episode of the Lex Fridman podcast. I’ll let him introduce it:

Lex Fridman @lexfridman

Here's my conversation with Ye aka Kanye West (@kanyewest). Given my family history in the 20th century, this was difficult but important. I believe in the power of tough, honest, empathetic conversation to increase the amount of love in the world. youtube.com/watch?v=4AWLcx…

After I shared the episode with my boss, she called it a "master class on how to maintain moral limits but reach out with understanding," and I think that was pretty well said. On a personal note, I’ll just add that I was super impressed and inspired by how well Lex handled the conversation. This is how to speak with someone you disagree with. More than that, it's how to speak with a friend you disagree with. If you can’t handle being on either side of such a conversation, then at least one of you is probably a bad friend.