Trules Reviews... the Decades, the End

2010 to the Present... Finally!

Well, I’m finally on the backstretch. Coming to the end of my decade review.

No, wait, I’m on the homestretch.

No, wait. Which stretch is it? Backstretch or homestretch?

Well, you can’t exactly say I’m a racehorse. Not really. Because I DO take my time, now don’t I? A lot of words. “Too-many-words-Trules” - that’s what some of you call me - behind my back. I’ve heard you!

Ok so, I admit, I do like my words.

But which is it here? Backstretch or homestretch? There must be a difference….

Well, it turns out that “backstretch” is the opposite of “homestretch”. You see, the “backstretch” is parallel to the “homestretch” on the racetrack - across from the grandstand - where the horses pace themselves, while the “homestretch” is the part between the last turn and the finish line, the climax and most exciting part of a horse race, and where, at the end, the winner is crowned.

Got it? Natch!

Well then, I’m in “the homestretch”, the last part of my tale, from 2010 to… the present. The Obama-Trump-Biden years. The “Trules becomes a father” years. The “who knows what the hell is gonna happen next?” years - as of November, 2024!

After which, I can finally get back to my charming little tales about… Santa Fe.

2010 -2024 (63 - 76 years old)

The decade of the 2010s began in the chaotic wake of the 2008 global financial crisis and ended with the impeachment of a U.S. president. The continued explosion of social media fueled mass protest movements like “Occupy Wall Street”, “Black Lives Matter”, and “Me Too”, bringing millions of people together around the globe in pursuit of common objectives. Britain saw a new generation of royals emerge, countries around the world passed new laws legalizing same-sex marriage, President Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives, and a beloved baseball team, the Chicago Cubs, ended a 108-year-long dry spell by winning a World Series.

Me? I started the decade with all things in order, the 3 pillars of my life still sturdily in place: the oldest of the three, my USC theater professor job heading into its 24th pedagogical year, the second oldest pillar, my home of 17 years (even though I never owned it) was still holding my hillside palace in place, overlooking the Pacific Ocean and the Hollywood Sign from the hills of Echo Park, and the third pillar, my unlikely marriage to Surya, an Indonesian woman 31 years my junior, was as secure as ever, going on its 7th year, 9th if you counted the year she actually joined me in 2001.

Of course, if I looked more closely, perhaps I could have seen some cracks in the pillars, some fissures in the masonry: things like another battle or two with my bullying Dean at USC, or an unannounced and hostile rent raise at “Lucretia Gardens”, or maybe even an angry and solo trip back to Sumatra by my wife to visit her family while she was depressed about her unemployment during “the recession”. But hey, who wants to look at cracks and fissures?

Anyway, it’s 2010, and all’s right in “the world according to Trules”, so why not accept another Fulbright Grant to go to Bucharest, Romania for a month to do what I do - teach improvisation and solo performance, on my country’s dime, and to represent American values that I actually practice and believe in: freedom, self-expression, creativity, individuality, art, and following the beat of you own drummer.

I’ve never been to Eastern Europe before, except briefly to Berlin and East Germany, and although I’ve been to Communist Vietnam, China, and Cuba, I figure Eastern Europe will be an education all unto itself.

It is…. In fact, Bucharest reminds me of the late 1960s on the West Coast of California in America. Or at least, it’s trying to be. Ever since the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 and the execution of brutal Romanian dictator and Communist Party General Secretary, Nicolae Ceaușescu, also in 1989, the youth of Bucharest have been going through the “alternative culture” changes that their Western European brethren went through in 1968. Sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll. It’s surprising to me. And refreshing. It brings me back to my 20s, the same age as my UNATC students, the national theater university in Bucharest, who have never had a “professor” like me - so open-minded, so free-thinking, expressive, and iconoclastic.

At first, they’re a bit cautious and shocked.

Who is this Trules dude who’s yelling at us to sign up for his class? Telling us we’re going “discover ourselves”? He’s going to “set us free”? “Find our own voices”? What the fxxk?

Well, slowly, they start showing up in Studio D, up three flights of stairs, almost in the attic of this stodgy old government building, from where… over the next several weeks… strange “cries and whispers” are heard from strenuous, physically-demanding improv classes, and from personal and emotionally-demanding storytelling and monologue writing classes, that these Romanian students have never tried before. Because, from their stodgy old Romanian, formerly-Communist professors, they’ve never been told progressive ideas like “students may actually have something of value to bring to the stage”, only that “the only form of theater to be done are the classics!”

Wells, yours Trulesly turns things on their head for a few beautiful weeks, at the end of which…. about fifteen brave Romanian students rent a downtown Bucharest coffeeshop, pack it to its gills, and present a show called

“Wanna Know a Secret?", A Night of Solo Performance

…after which… they receive a standing ovation for their courage and artistry, after which… we’re all so thrilled and excited that… we go spilling out of the coffee house onto the cobblestone streets of Bucharest to the famous mid-city protest fountain where they all serenade me on guitar and with their voices - with Romanian folk and protest songs… until 3 a.m., when I finally beg off to make my flight to Istanbul, Turkey the next morning - to meet Surya, for a two-week tour of the onion-domed Orthodox Anatolian Peninsula.

The world? Beginning in December 2010 in Tunisia and continuing into spring, 2011, the “Arab Spring” is a wave of populist uprisings against authoritarian governments in the Middle East (Tunisia, Morocco, Syria, Libya, Egypt and Bahrain) that, although not entirely successful, results in regime changes in many of these countries. That same year, around 1,000 people march through the streets of New York City’s Financial District in September 2011 under an “Occupy Wall Street” banner. The protesters condemn income inequality and the influence of money in politics and call for an overhaul of what they see as a failing financial system. In 2013, three black female activists start using the social media hashtag #BlackLivesMatter in response to the acquittal of George Zimmerman, who has shot and killed an unarmed black teen, Trayvon Martin, the previous year. Drawing inspiration from the civil rights and Black Power movements of the 1960s and Occupy Wall Street, the Black Lives Matter movement gains more attention in 2014 and 2015, when rioting follows the deaths of several more black men who are, once again, killed by police.

In 2011, Surya generously agrees to take her LA “homegirl”, Denise, who has never been out of America, to Bali, the island where she and I met. Of course, Surya goes early to visit her family in Sumatra, and I end up flying to Bali with Denise.

But when we arrive, Surya’s youngest sister (of four), Anna, meets us at the Bali airport - only to tell us that,

Surya is in hospital - with dengue fever!

Horrible news! An Asian mosquito-borne disease, also known as “bone-crusher’s disease” because of the tremendous pain it inflicts upon its victims, for which there is no prevention, and which frequently results in death to children and elders, dengue keeps Surya on her back on IVs in the hospital for a week, but - she’s tough - and thankfully, with excellent treatment, she pulls through.

We continue, traveling up the East Coast of Bali, ending up in the small rural fishing village of Padangbai, full of tall green tropical coconut and banana trees, where… huzzah… I come down with a serious attack of gout… which if you don’t know, is a very painful disease that attacks the joints of the fingers and toes from an inherited excess of uric acid in the blood. (Thanks for that, Dad.)

I’m laid up in the corner room of a beachfront bed and breakfast in Padangbai. I can’t walk. Surya has already spent a week on her back and feels obligated to take Denise around the beautiful Balinese island. She does, leaving me… cornered… not only in the room, but by the brother-in-law of the hotel owner’s wife… who is a typical local Balinese… piranha.

The truth is, I’ve made this trip to Bali, in my own mind at least, to buy a retirement home. I haven’t really discussed the details with Surya, which of course I should have, but to me, come on,

I can afford to buy a house here on an island Paradise for cash, maybe $50,000, and retire here, without a mortgage, leave America, a land I’ve criticized for decades, become an “expatriate”, a thing I’ve romanticized for decades, build an adjacent little bungalow for my friends to come visit me from all over the world, maybe build a little swimming pool… Hey, I may be lame with gout, but Padangbai is looking pretty damn good to me!

The piranha, “Made” (MaDAY), puts me on the back of his motorbike and drives me all around town. He shows me every piece of property for sale. All the “big hotels that are going to be built.”

Riiiiight!

One thing leads to another, and there are two, side-by-side bungalows… off the main road… right in the middle of a verdant coconut and banana tree field.

Welll… there are two foundations of bungalows, both of which are framed and almost roofed, but which obviously, have not been completed.

Wellll… it “so happens” that,

The family’s son’s has cancer and they need the money for him. So they are desperate to sell - at a very good price, Pak Trules.

Riiiiighhhhht! I’m supposed to believe this Balinese line of “boulay (Indonesian gringo) bullshit!

But wait a minute! It also turns out that the B&B owner, where I’m “cornered” is also the “chief” of the whole village of Padangbai. He’s about 60, my age, but naturally, he’s Asian, Indonesian, with a wisp of a long white chin beard. He looks like a big “Mr. Miyagi”, from “Karate Kid”. His name is “Pak Putu”.

And for some reason, Pak Putu is unduly impressed with me. He thinks I’m a “good businessman”. That I will “bring him luck”.

He wants to become my 50% partner to buy the 2-bungalow unfinished villa!

And so… to make a long story short…. we do! Buy the villa. Me and the village chief, Pak Putu! 50-50!

And in six months, Made, Pak Putu, and his wife, Dani, finish building the 2-bungalow “villa”. They thatch the roof with bamboo, pave a driveway, put in glass windows, gorgeously furnish the interior, hang mosquito nets, build a tropical garden paradise, even build…a swimming pool.

I’m a first-time homeowner, in Padangbai, Indonesia, age 64!

As you can see from the photo, we rent it out when we’re not there, which is 99% of the time, because I’m still teaching. I bought it to retire, and… that’s still a few years off in the unknown future. In the meantime, there’s Airbnb and Trip Advisor and Booking.com and this and that, all being a royal pain in the ass… long distance international rental… with a piranha as manager.

But then… THINGS CHANGE AGAIN.

In 2014, my former Indonesian USC student, Roland, invites me to Jakarta, the Indonesian capital, to teach a theater workshop. He’s an aspiring filmmaker who has gone to USC film school and is pretty well-established in his home country, so he can set everything up pretty well at a major hotel, with accommodations, with even the flight and stay for Surya included. Great! We’re able to combine a visit to our villa in Padangbai, with Surya’s visit to her family in Sumatra, with my teaching gig in Jakarta.

But one day shortly before we leave LA, Surya comes into the bedroom where I’m reading Gabriel García Márquez and she says,

Can you come into the living room? I’d like to talk to you about something.

A little formal. Makes me nervous. Nevertheless, I get up, follow her, and sit down on “The Purple Couch.”

I don’t want you to get upset.

How can I get upset when I haven’t even heard the idea?

From past conversations, this sounds like it’s going to cost me A LOT of money.

Do you remember meeting my nephew, Exsel, in Bali?

I do. He came to visit with Anna over New Years in 2012? And he jumped into the pool about a thousand times with those plastic floaties on his arms?”

Right… Well, Anna thinks he’s really smart and curious, but sometimes he gets bullied by his brothers.

He has one older brother and one younger brother, right?

I’m proud of myself for remembering.

Well, Anna thinks it would be really great if we invite him to visit us in LA.

Ok…. for how long?

Well, that’s up to you.

What do you mean?

Well, Anna spoke to our brother, Nanda, and Exsel’s mother, and everybody thinks it would be a good idea for us to adopt Exsel.

Adopt him? For good?

Only if you agree.

Wow! This is about more than money! This is about….

What do you think?

That’s what Surya asks me. What do I think? About becoming an adoptive father. At age 67!

Out of the blue. On The Purple Couch.

What do you think?, I ask her incredulously.

____________

ASIDE: Without giving it a whole long story of its own, let me just say, that Surya and I tried an unsuccessful IVF procedure earlier in 2014. But because I underwent chemo-therapy for my cancer (Hodgkin’s Disease) in 1989, I, unfortunately, was unable to fertilize Surya’s eggs - to form the necessary “zygote” - to be re-implanted into her uterus – to magically… “make a baby”.

_____________

Surya now says,

I think that it’d be an incredible opportunity for Exsel to have a different life in America. And for you to become a father.

I look at her expectant face. I don’t know what to say.

But only if you want to.

I’m stunned. I’m thinking about the “opportunity” Surya is offering us. Both me and Exsel.

First, Exsel. An eight-year-old boy from third-world Indonesia. Giving him an education here in LA. A chance at getting a good-paying job. Infinitely more options than he’d ever have in Medan. Where he’s from the fierce, matriarchal Batak tribe. Where just five generations before him, his family were animate-worshipping cannibals. Where Surya’s Mom raised six children by herself, ever since her husband died in a motorbike accident when Surya was fourteen. Where the typical teenage Batak boy goes to school, hangs out on the streets, smokes cigarettes, stares at his smartphone, and looks forward to - nothing. Where Surya’s youngest brother sold drugs and died of a drug overdose in his mid-twenties.

Where in America… Exsel could look forward to - giving back - to his birth family… in the future. It’s what Surya has already done since first coming to LA. It was part of her original reason, part of her immigrant dream, for moving to America. Now, without Exsel even knowing it, it’s why Surya, Anna, and his own birth parents… have all agreed… to allow him to also come to LA. Allowed the idea… for him to be adopted. Even before having me on board.

And for me? It’s sort of obvious, isn’t it? I’ve never been a father. The opportunity would have seemed to have passed me by. A self-confessed artist-hippie. A guy who never believed in marriage or family. In settling down. In parenthood? A guy who lived only for himself. Well, here’s “the train of opportunity” again…. stopping at my station. Just like the blind chance I got to dance in 1970. To become a clown. To teach theater at USC. To make a documentary film about my Uncle Harvey. To go to Bali in in 2000 where I met my wife by accident by asking two random strangers for directions on the streets of Kuta Beach. It just seems like my life has never been about the choices or decisions that I’ve made or decided for myself. Quite the opposite. It seems that my life has been about the random or fateful or synchronous opportunities that have simply appeared or come my way. Ones… that I’ve said yes to.

And NOW here’s another one.

You don’t have to decide right away, Surya says. We could just bring Exsel here and see how you like him.

And how he likes me. (beat) Ok…. let me do a little research about how to get him a visa.

You mean you’ll do it?

I’m not saying I’ll adopt him. But I’ll try bringing him here. And we’ll see how we like each other. We may never get another chance like this again.

And there it is. Anna’s idea.

Surya? And me?

We just say “Yes”… to “The Train of Opportunity”………………………..

Now… it’s May 5, 2015. Cinco de Mayo. I’m waiting at LAX, Los Angeles’ bustling Tom Bradley International Terminal. I’m alone. Nervous as hell. My knees are knocking and I’m sweating. A lot.

I’ve spent the last year, hassling with immigration lawyers (useless), international adoption agencies (the same), and the USCIS (seemingly the bane of my existence), trying to get Exsel a “tourist visa”. There is absolutely no other way to get him to LA - legally!

Surya and I had to go directly to the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, representing ourselves as Exsel’s aunt and uncle (instead of being the required birth parents), and we begged the agent, Natan Berger (no kidding, a member of “my Tribe”), to look at my gigantic file of support papers that I gathered, “proving” that we had every possible person’s, and agency’s, “permission” for Exsel to “come visit his aunt and uncle in LA” for one month…. at which point…. Mr. Berger asked me directly,

And you have no plans to adopt the boy, do you, Mr. Trules?

At which point I laughed heartily and said,

No way, Mr. Berger, you can clearly see that I’m far too old for that.

Stamp. Stamp. Stamp. Visa approved.

One of the happiest days of Surya’s life!

Now, half a year later, I have a sign with me at the International Arrivals Terminal. It says:

“WELCOME EXSEL!”

And there it is, up on the overhead directory: China Air Flight 3807 from Taiwan. It’s just arrived, from halfway around the world. From Medan, Sumatra - two hours to Jakarta. Next - change planes… six hours to Taipei on the island of Taiwan. Then - wait five hours as the plane re-fuels before…. another twelve hours… across the Pacific, landing in…. LA. Altogether, about twenty-seven hours. Quite an ordeal for any international passenger. I can only imagine what it’s like for 8-year-old Exsel, on the first airplane flight in his life!

I’m looking down the long international deboarding runway. It’s steeply graded uphill to downhill, like the passengers come out of a long dark, third-world tunnel.

I don’t see them. It seems like every passenger and their brother… and their mother… and their father… and their son and daughter… and their infant child… has de-planed… and come out of the tunnel.

Where’re Surya and Exsel? Have they missed the plane altogether?

But hey… look… finally!

There they are!

My wife. And this little boy… holding her hand. Dragging two rolling suitcases. The one Exsel has looks bigger than he is. He has on a thin, sky-blue t-shirt and too-big khaki shorts. His legs are sooo skinny. He looks like he hasn’t eaten his whole life. He’s sooo tiny. Forty-three inches tall, when we measure him. Four feet, seven inches. He won’t be tall enough to go on the rides at Magic Mountain for years to come. He looks cold and hungry… like one of “your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”. And he looks….overwhelmed.

They walk down the ascending arrival ramp. Towards America….

I wave my sign wildly,

WELCOME EXSEL!

Surya sees me. She points to me so Exsel sees me too.

I know he’s thinking:

Who is this “bule”?” (Indonesian for gringo) I can read his little face.

I hope maybe he remembers me.

He is soooooo cute.

But finally…

Exsel has arrived in America…..

….and my life is about to change forever.

I think I’ll stop here.

You already know that Donald Trump won the 2016 US election over Hillary Clinton although he didn’t win the popular vote. And you know that he lost the 2020 US election to Joe Biden, although he claims that he didn’t and instead, he provoked a violent “insurrection” on January 6, 2021 at the U.S Capitol Building because of those beliefs (or claims). And you can’t help but know that he’s now ruling and running the so-called “Republican” Party, or at least the MAGA part of it, and in all likelihood, he will be running again for President of the United States in just a few months, and that the results of this upcoming election will in all likelihood determine the direction of our once-great country. And that it will likely be a historical election and quite likely… every vote will count, so…

Get out there and vote!

And you already know that there are brutal, costly, and history-making wars in Ukraine and Gaza whose outcomes may affect the fate of the whole damn planet, and that… it’s a bleak world to live in, but.. we have to keep our heads and spirits up, and do… what we can.

And as for Trules, that would be me, you already know that I’ve spent the rest of the 2010s decade and the next 3+ years of the 2020s — raising my boy, Exsel, and moving my family to Santa Fe, and escaping the LA desert after 40 years… all of which you have, or can… read about on my 2 Substacks.

So…

finally….

I have hereby completed…

My Review of the Decades!!!!!

I hope you made it through!!!

Or will go back and check on any of the posts you missed.

Until next time…

See you back in…

Santa Fe!

Yours decadely,

Trules

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