ping flies home

When you have become used to living alone, as many of the women my age have (perforce), it can be hard to breathe in with another person's rhythms. Sleep schedules, meal schedules, bathroom schedules—all require adjustment, especially when you are sharing a room or the front seat of a moving vehicle.
   We all have our oddities, we just don't come face-to-face with them living solo. For instance, I am not security conscious. I don't need a gun or a dog to hold off intruders: the door is open. I leave the keys in the truck in Missouri and Block Island. I don't lock my doors anywhere, except sometimes at night, and generally leave my houses open even when I'm not home. Ping, however, didn't even like to be on one floor of the Goose if I was on the other. She locked doors always, including when she was inside the truck, and I was filling the gas tank. I did not tell her that Memphis has one of the highest murder rates in the country.
    

    "If I am live with you, my English will be better," said Ping. She is embarrassed by her English when speaking to anyone but me, but it's way ahead of my almost nonfunctional Chinese. Ping used to be more fluent in English, but she has been speaking nothing but Chinese in recent years—to her sons, to her babysitting charges, who typically have one Chinese parent, to her multitude of friends. Our interactions, therefore, were in fractured Chinglish and not particularly deep. "Okay, hao," was our most-used phrase.
    She took surreptitious pictures of fat people—she found U.S. obesity incredible. The only really American pursuit she is obsessed with is basketball—and she missed the final because of our trip. Though barbecue may have a place in her heart as well. And, of course, Elvis.

    How can you chart a life from one moment in time, say 50 years ago? As 20-year-olds, we had no idea what the future held. Obviously. I mean, Milli Vanilli was once at  the top of the charts. But the years have unfolded, and more shall be revealed.
   Misty eyes at the airport, and away she flew.

Postscript.

   We talked on the phone when she was home.  "We both live together very happy, right?" she said. "I am so enjoy this trip."
   She is already planning her next junket to China for a wedding. Then she would like to see Iceland. And maybe we will go to Taiwan together before too long. The house we lived in there has long since turned into an apartment tower, and the sewers are now underground.
  But Ping has vowed never to visit the American countryside again. She wouyld prefer to visit me in New York.