Higher and higher: Married in China
High. 19th floor. Beijing’s a flux of Toyota's Honda's and reverse engineered Chevrolets that miss each other by hairs and there amid the traffic two men sweeping a sidewalk there a granny with her walking stick and a fierce look in her eye. And barely any smog in January. The hotel's classy enough with a gym and good scotch, we've slept through the night and ate like animals. Especially excited now. We're especially excited, joyful, gleeful and all over the place. My father and stepmother we'll just call her Monique that's friendlier Monique and my dad had a good night themselves and my father's gushing at the 'wee girls they're so tiny look at them like match sticks they go out of their way to make you feel good taken care of I mean so tiny the girlies the service here's excellent' and there he goes putting a hand on some waitress' shoulder and she shies away, images of ageing bald men in Thailand appear in my mind and I try to get them out of my mind I sometimes consider myself one of those colonial types who marries Asian women I've no desire to be a part of that club of ageing bald men who marry Asian women with expectations I don't have expectations beyond being alive with someone in my life who doesn't drive me up the fucking wall and she relaxes me yesterday I told her when I met her I realized myself, as in I became real, as in I'm me now and I've not felt free to be me until I met her have you ever felt this I asked
yes, she said
and we continued dinner her mother was sitting across from us who came down from Chifeng to Beijing to welcome us and welcome us she did with a lunch for royalty and all care and love taken care of it's a miracle this. She told me she felt like the largest lightbulb in the room, which is like saying you're the third or fifth wheel depending on the vehicle. And I told her I was. And she told me she was and we laughed we're good, we're good
miraculous to be here. Beijing is a crowd of excited children dragging their parents across the city for ice cream.
It's my second time here. Winter this time. Summer last time. Winter again next year. Living in cycles of visits. My wife is a Chinese woman, a capoeira playing, mandolin owning, smiling ray of sunlight.
Preparations are underway for our Chinese wedding. Parents are underway from the Netherlands in their business class seats half dozing on benzodiazepam and champagnepam. Uncles are flying in from Guangzhou. Uncles are purchasing fleets of liquor. Aunties are purchasing fruit. Ballroom floors are being buffed to mirrors. We are underway from Beijing up to Chifeng in Inner Mongolia.
Mongolian horde, you can't say Mongolian without saying horde my father says and we discuss Mongolian music at the rehearsal dinner it's very American to do rehearsal dinners Monique says and my father starts into the Catholic concept which is to go through the whole thing at least once and it makes sense to want to get to know the family everyone gets to know everyone before the wedding so you know and Monique and I say yes it is a bit dated and unnecessary I'm trying to make Monique feel more appeased my dad's fine but Monique at customs was detained because they couldn't scan her fingers worked to shreds no more prints to speak of she's completely shaking when she's finally cleared when a superior customs officer says they don't really use the prints these days anymore anyway and she's been smoking more since and I say to her yes it is a bit dated isn't it you're right and she smiles and my father says I wasn't finished talking we look at him and he looks through his tan spectacles his Elton Johnish shades over at us and away miffed he's seventy four and he says it makes sense to do a rehearsal and says the same thing he'd just said and Monique apologizes for cutting him off and I apologize for being complicit in the cutting off and he rambles in better spirits again as he asks what's the plan
the plan is enormous like a guiding light
written in the clouds
up all night making them
we'll be married by Monday and away with the plans.