It’s 3 am.

36 hours awake, with the exception of a 30 minute catnap does not make for high functioning cognitive skills. There are about 250 people queueing for 3 available customs agents in order to officially enter Thailand. Apparently, the Saudi Royal Family, their handlers and a lot of Louis Vuitton luggage has chosen to arrive simultaneously and have at least 5 dedicated agents to help process them. Long story short, I am exhausted, weary, and feeling overwhelmingly alone, despite the swarming masses of people surrounding me. The shuttle that I had arranged to pick us up at 1 am has presumably left by now since I have been waiting in this line for nearly 2 hours. My mind races, remembering the description of the location of the “small, family-run hotel” that I had chosen, which stated that they encourage patrons to use the hotel’s shuttle service due to the difficulty that a taxi driver might encounter when trying to find their “quaint, off the beaten path” location. In other words, if that shuttle driver grows impatient and decides to leave, I’m screwed. I had the hotel’s phone number, but no functioning cell phone to use, since Brad had our old iPhone that we intended to buy a SIM card for upon our arrival. Envisioning climbing into a taxi with little knowledge of the Thai language and no local currency made me break out in a sweat. Trying to talk myself off of the proverbial ledge, I told myself to stop worrying. Things could not continue to go badly for me. I was playing the law of averages. The odds were in my favor, right?!

As I focused on breathing deeply, it finally became my turn to present my passport to the Thai Customs Agent. With the resounding thump of an ink stamp, I was ushered onward to retrieve my luggage, which seemed unnecessarily heavy now that I didn’t have Brad to hoist it from the carousel. Those 13 pairs of shoes that I had foolishly packed seemed to laugh at me as I unsuccessfully attempted to drag my suitcase during its first trip around the turnstile. Just as I lunged towards it a second time, a kind man traveling with his family effortlessly grabbed its handle and placed it down next to me. Such a simple gesture meant so much to me at that moment. We exchanged nods, smiles and thank-yous and I rolled my luggage up the arrivals ramp to a horde of people holding signs and screaming names of those that they were supposed to collect and transport to hotels. I didn’t even think there was a snowball’s chance in hell that my driver would wait nearly 2 1/2 hours for me.

But he did.

I’m not gonna sugarcoat it and say he greeted me with a wink and a smile, since he slammed down his sign with my name on it and said with great dismay, “You very late!!” I was so happy to see him that he could have screamed at me the whole way to the hotel and it wouldn’t have mattered.

I had made it.

After 6 hours of sleeping like the dead, I awoke to this view from the balcony of my hotel room. 

And I knew that everything would be alright.