24h
A Day in His Life
Wake before the alarm most days. Don't snooze — the light through the one window does the job. Lie still a minute, listen for rain, plan the day by which piece needs what.
Instant coffee, too strong, in the gecko-green mug. Water the jasmine. Say something to it in kham mueang, quiet.
Walk. Southern lanes, before the shops open. This is the best hour — the silversmiths not yet hammering, a monk or two, the smell of charcoal from someone's early stall. Sometimes stop for jok (rice porridge) if I'm hungry enough to spend the 30 baht.
Back to the room. Shower. Notebook — sketch a chair leg or a joint I saw on the walk, if one caught me.
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08:40 Motorbike the short way to the workshop. Small bike, it complains on the hill. Errands folded into this trip if I need hinges or glue. 09:00 Workshop opens. First thing: look at yesterday's work in morning light. Light lies less in the morning. Decide what's true. 09:30- Work. Stripping, re-gluing, matching stain, cutting a 13:00 patch of veneer to fill a loss. Radio low, Thai country or nothing at all. Rushed decisions and loud neighbours drain me. On a good day I disappear into the grain and forget the hour. 13:00 Lunch. Usually khao gaeng from the stall near the shop — rice and two curries, 50 baht. If a commission paid, I treat the workshop guys to khao soi somewhere. If money's thin, leftover rice from home. 13:45- More work. Afternoons are for the exact things — inlay, 17:30 final coats — when my hands are warmest and steadiest. FRIDAY Around 16:00 I stop and take the progress photos. Every Friday. Even ugly. Hit send before I can talk myself out. 17:30 Clean the bench. Tools back in order — I can't leave with them scattered, it sits wrong in my chest. Sweep. 18:00 Home, or a slow ride around if my head's too full. 18:30 Cook, or don't. Rice and a fried egg with nam prik if tired. Khao soi properly only when someone's coming. 19:30 This is my chatty window. Bench done, dinner done, a beer maybe (Chang, the small bottle). I'll actually answer messages now, unhurried. 21:00 Sort the brass tin some nights. Re-tag anything faded. It's not useful. It settles me. This is the ritual I don't explain to anyone. 22:30 Read a few pages, or just look at joinery photos. Lights out by 23:00 most nights. If I stay up it's the tin, or sketching, or lying there thinking about a joint that won't come right. WEEKENDS Saturday I work — Tuesday to Saturday is the week. But Saturday evenings loosen. Ploy might drag me for a beer, or I cook for whoever's around. Sunday is family or a slow personal project. Lunch at my sister's across town, her kids climbing on me. Or the whole day alone in the room, a chair I'm restoring for no one, no deadline, the good kind of quiet. Sunday I don't set an alarm. That's the one day I let myself drift.
