Frivolous Universe

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Kim

This morning I’ve been thinking about Bangkok, Mitt Romney, and how objects contain the mystery of their own reality.

Which is to say to a school of resurrected fish, we must apply our imaginations.

Sometimes it’s frightening. The Collected Stories, we say, as if a story could be plucked up like a Matchbox car or a coin purse carved from coconut.

It takes a great deal of time to engage a mystery on its own terms. We mainly spend our time on other things. We are surrounded by beings, wise in their own materials, but it’s hard to listen.

To tell a story straight is to apprehend the one thread pulled through the many. I feel like my whole life is one big amateur hour; how can anyone say they know who 47 percent of us are?

Follow this thread, we say.

Living requires insistence. Often we feel weakened from the start.

What is brightly lit can be apocryphal. We should try looking in the dim places, in the teakwood and in the lamplight.

We must enter the room at dusk. When we pad across the grain, we should not forget that we are part of it.

Photos by Vanessa Boots, Kim Philley, and Matthieu Brion

 

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Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, American Apparel, Paige cargo pants, Korean hat, Idaho, plastic shoes, Bethany Walter

I’m back in ‘Merica for a spell and what a strange place. I took my time getting here. When I arrived in Pasadena to stay the night at a friend’s house, wild green parrots were flying overhead–the raucous descendants of a pair that had been released in the city decades ago. As the tropical birds flew across the silhouettes of transplanted palm trees, I thought about how few of us stay in our place these days–not even the filial-minded Chinese.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, American Apparel, Paige cargo pants, Korean hat, Idaho, plastic shoes, Bethany Walter, Changdeokgung Palace, Seoul

During a 13-hour layover in Seoul, I dropped by Changdeokgung Palace and became obsessed with these morphic, almost abstract figures above the palace eaves. It was a clear September day, and after Bangkok the city felt like a wilderness retreat. I was no longer living between two open jackhammer-happy construction pits. The Koreans spoke to one another in subdued, melodious tones. Seoul, Thank God, was already constructed.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, American Apparel, Paige cargo pants, Korean hat, Idaho, plastic shoes, Bethany Walter, Changdeokgung Palace, Seoul

The one thing I bought in Seoul is this soft straw hat. I love the way the sun filters through its floppy eaves. The hat is both a concrete and amorphous roof for the head.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, American Apparel, Paige cargo pants, Korean hat, Idaho, plastic shoes, Bethany Walter, Changdeokgung Palace, Seoul

An Italian bike, Bangkok-minimart plastic shoes, a Chinese tattoo inked in New Orleans. We’re all mixed up these days and filled with the nonsensical squawks of parrots, political chatter. I’m beginning to agree with Hemingway in that there are many words I cannot stand to hear, and finally only the names of places have dignity.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, American Apparel, Paige cargo pants, Korean hat, Idaho, plastic shoes, Bethany Walter, Changdeokgung Palace, Seoul

Bangkok, Seoul, Pasadena, Idaho, Bianchi, Dodge Dart, Bethany.

Kim Philley, Frivolous Universe, American Apparel, Paige cargo pants, Korean hat, Idaho, plastic shoes, Bethany Walter, Changdeokgung Palace, Seoul

Photographs by Bethany Walter

bike: Bianchi; car: Dodge Dart; cargo pants: Paige; cotton shirt: American Apparel; straw hat: somewhere in Seoul at the base of the mountains; plastic shoes: Jelly Bunny; wood-bead bracelets: a gift from a child at Angkor Wat

 

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To clean house you gotta raise dust. Today I’m packing up my Bangkok apartment. I’m cleaning, mopping, schlepping heavy books for resale, trying to wrangle an XXL suitcase, writing a radio script on an esoteric Burmese spirit festival, and bracing myself for a 54+-hour flight with five layovers–all in the next 48 hours.

Thank goodness for bubble-monkey pauses.

I have Baltic-blue wedges, a mop,

string-cheese biceps,

more laundry to do than is humanly possible, soda water,

books on high shelves,

in-flight reading material,

and, best of all, a meditation MP3 from a guy named Dr. Wise intoning:

Acceptance is relaxation

Acceptance is relaxation

Acceptance is relaxation

Bisou! My next post will be stateside.

shirt: Hey Pilgrim (Chatuchak Weekend Market, Bangkok); jeans: ZARA; belt: vintage (4th floor Union Mall, Bangkok); gold-and-lapis necklace: 1970s Bangkok; earrings: Charlottesville boutique; gold ring: Mondulkiri, Cambodia gemstone–a gift from my friend Heang; wedge sandals: custom-made at Mosstories (Terminal 21, Bangkok)

 

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