Even though I’ve lived in Arizona for 12 years, I never saw the Grand Canyon until this past weekend. What an awesome experience. It puts things in perspective, our smallness in a vast universe. Then I went somewhere I’ve been before, a town called Sedona, and I appreciated its magnificence for the first time. Built on and surrounded by red rock, Sedona may be one of America’s (the world’s?) most beautiful cities. Watching the spectacular sunset against a backdrop of gorgeous red rock mountains and mesas made me long even more for a return to America.

I had forgotten just how many friends I have here, and I’ll see quite a few before I go back to Singapore. I forgot because in Singapore I am all by myself. I live such an isolated life there, I actually lost touch with the idea of friendship and a social life. Coming home was a reminder of just how rich my life used to be, and can be again.

I like Singapore, but it’s not my home. Hong Kong felt like my home because I was more involved with the people there, and even in Beijing I had a social life. But in Singapore, the mid-life crisis that started when I was in my late teens grabbed me by the throat and never let go. What am I doing here? What do I want to get out of my life? What’s important? How many more years can I continue to coast, without setting my own course? These conversations are always blaring at top-volume in Singapore. They went silent the instant I stepped off the plane five nights ago.

I am not happy about my blog since leaving China. I know it’s been meandering, but it’s just following my own thought patterns. No direction. Sometimes I feel I am force-feeding it with posts that aren’t totally from the heart. In Beijing my blog was (at least to me) so vital, a real part of me. I never gave much thought to what I’d put down; the words just showed up on the screen. It has never been that way since I left, and that’s symbolic of all my current angst, my sense of directionlessness.

I know I should leave Asia. I hate to say that, but I know it. I’ll miss being “someone special,” one of the perks of living and working in a foreign country, but that’s not enough. Hating to get nostalgic and sentimental, there’s simply no love for me in Asia anymore. And there is a lot of love here, and somehow I forgot about that. This trip drove it home with a sledgehammer.

So, another turning point in a life that has consisted mainly of turning points and so few actual goals. That’s okay; I know I’ve had an incredibly exciting life and known some of the most amazing people on earth (all to be brought out in my book, someday). I can’t say there are no regrets, but looking back at the road not taken is a futile and frustrating exercise. I have to concentrate on the diverging roads in front of me now, and I think I know which one I’ll turn on to.

Enough metaphors! And enough emotional sludge. I’ll be back Monday night, and it will be interesting to see where I go from there. In my heart, I already know.