Today my life played out like a country western song.  A very weird, often absurd, cross-cultural and laughable country western song (if there can be such a thing.)  I can’t stomach country music myself (the one exception being  Johnny Cash–I’m listening to him right now for inspiration); even though I was born and spent many formative years in the state of Kentucky.     I don’t know how I could put the details of this strange day into lyrical form and since I don’t really "do" country music I won’t attempt to fabricate the genre.
Instead, I’ll just lay it out in stanza summaries and let you decide how it would sound if it were set to music:

Stanza one: My wife left me.

Isn’t that always how these things always start off?  Don’t panic.  I didn’t (at least not at first.)  Christa had a really great opportunity to go to a village two or three hours drive away from Xining with two other girls from our team.  She debated about whether or not she should go because it was an overnight trip, but in the end it seemed too good to pass up.  The T village they went to is a place where our team has helped build a new type of energy-efficient home.  Using partial solar power and other technical things I can’t comprehend yet, these homes are designed to improve the overall quality of life for the villagers.  The idea is to build one and test it out with the hope of building more.  Anyway, it was a girl trip and they asked Christa to come.  Since I don’t have classes this week it worked out well (or not-so?) since I could watch the kiddos.  Still…my wife left me…and that’s always the first domino to fall.

Stanza two:  I got lost taking the kids to pre-school.

This one is embarassing because we don’t live far from the school AND (even worse) Christa took me with her yesterday to pick up the girls at the exact same school.  The carpooling system Christa helped establish is a well-oiled machine which inevitably is the type of mechanism I throw a destructive wrench into within seconds.  In theory, the process is simple really.  1.) Round up all the ex-pat toddlers who go to Anna’s school, 2.) Hop in a cab and hand the taxi driver instructions that have been carefully written in Chinese characters.  3.) Guide the friendly taxi driver the last few blocks to the school.

The only problem is that the school is located near an open market and can only be accessed by cab down this one street.  Well, we didn’t take a cab yesterday when we went.  We took this motorized rickshaw type vehicle that can maneuver through the market and access the school from a different direction.  I thought it would be no problem to find the school from the other direction.  Men always think this way…to their demise.  Christa even told me how to get to the school from the opposite direction.  Well, it still didn’t work.  The cab driver even pointed me in the wrong direction when he dropped us off near the market.

Yeah, it’s pretty bad when you’re being berated by 3-year-olds.  "Daddy, I don’t think we’re going the right way."  Alas, we made it there…and only a half hour late!

Stanza three:  I lost the keys to our apartment.

After the pre-school incident, I had high hopes that my bad luck had run its course.  (Ha! Fat chance, pal.)  I decided to be adventurous and take Sarah to a local ‘mall’ and get her a tricycle.  We took a bus, made it to the mall (the one we went to is pronounced Ee-woo) and found a decent tricycle for a decent price.  She liked it because it makes a lot of noise and has a kitty’s plastic face on it.  I liked it because it has a pushing/steering device on the back that allows the parent to control the handlebars from behind.  So I can push her along and control the steering even though she can hold onto the handlebars.

We loaded our prize in the back of taxi cab and rode back to our apartment complex.  As I wheeled Sarah back to our apartment building in her new trike I began to go through my pockets to find my keys.  I had a lot of things in my pockets: the paper with directions to Anna’s school, a phrasebook, a bus pass, my wallet, a shower mount w/four screws I also picked up at Ee-woo, and…

Nothing!

I had nothing else in my pockets.  I was supposed to have keys in my pocket.  I had left the house with keys, but now there were no keys!

{{PANIC}}

I was wearing black running pants because of the 400 meter relay I was scheduled to run later in the day.  I started putting the evidence together in my mind.  The type of pants I was wearing are notorious for things sliding out of pockets when one is sitting down.  The keys must have fallen out in the cab….which was now long gone…

{{PANIC}}

After a few minutes of transcendental meditation (just kidding) I calmed down.  I knew our house-helper had been given a set of keys so she would eventually come and open up our apartment.  I wasn’t going to be locked out all night or anything.  Nevertheless, missing keys are missing keys.  I decided to go hang out at the front of our complex (Sarah in the trike) in the desperate hope that the taxi would return with my keys…

Stanza four: The car broke down.

Well, we don’t really have a car, but I suppose Sarah’s new trike would qualify. After buying Sarah a snack at the 7-11 (it’s not really a 7-11 but that’s what we call it) I decided to pace.  That’s always helpful in a panic situation.  Surely the especially honest taxi driver would see my keys that had fallen beneath the seats and under the duress of a heavy conscience he would return to every stop he had had in the last two hours in an effort to return the lost keys to their owner.  Surely this would happen, right?  That’s what I thought.  I was losing it.  Sarah seemed pleased to just be eating a snack in her new trike as I was pushing it along the avenue…

Back and forth, back and forth.  Just one more pass.  Did I mention there are only about 20-30 identical red taxi cabs that blur by our complex in a 5 minute span.  Like a needle in a haystack, I tell you.  I was searching, waiting, praying…and a few cabs almost stopped.  Almost.

And then (POP)…I heard something snapped.

I looked down at the clasp that held the steering bar that I was using to steer/push Sarah’s and I was flabbergasted.  No, completely flummoxed.   The plastic clasp that held the bar in place had split in two. 

Here’s some internal dialogue:

This is a brand new bike…busted. 

No, this is a brand new Chinese bike…busted.
 
Well, give me the Chinese products they’re making for America then…where are all those factories and stores?

Don’t give me these brand new bikes they make for themselves.  Why do they treat themselves this way?  If that’s the way it’s going to be, give me Wal-Mart trikes then!

I could no longer steer the vehicle.  The toddler now had the power to steer, but unfortunately no ability to pedal.  We were dead in the water.

Realizing that I had to go back to Ee-woo was almost the last straw for me, but I think at that point the day had moved from tragic to insanely laughable.  I decide to push Sarah’s trike to my track meet.  Why not?!  What else could the country/western song-writing gods hurl at me?  What else, indeed.

Stanza 5:  To Be Continued Tomorrow

The Track Meet and subsequent events deserve their own post…