I know that you believe you understand what you think I said, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant. - Robert McCloskey
I couldn’t sleep last night, no matter how hard I tried nothing worked…and in trying I’m sure I made it worse. So I went out walking. In a way, it’s refreshing to walk down the middle of the main street of town without fear of getting hit by a car, but at the same time, it’s desperately boring. I must have walked for thirty minutes before seeing another human, running at that. I ask you, who runs after midnight? I thought 5am was ludicrous, but maybe that’s just me. It’s slightly tormenting to not be able to decipher whether I’m unhappy or simply bored out of my mind lonely. Most likely a combo, but no less disastrous.
Dre calls to update me on her whirlwind adventures in the big city, a collaboration of Starbucks, Halloween parties at foreigner hot spots, bar hopping and avoiding her Japanese stalker. The difference between our two experiences in the same country, doing the same job on a daily basis is just insane. Sometimes I wish I could experience everything there is to experience. I’ll go walking into the mountains on photography excursions and think how distressing it is that I’ll only see a certain roadside shrine in the sunlight on a Saturday, but never in the rain on a Wednesday, during a typhoon with the wind howling and tossing about scattered leaves, or in the snow, lightly dusting the heads of statues. We live terribly short lives. Isolated from the elaborate world around us. Or maybe that’s just me. I used to think, and possibly still hope, that upon dying we’d have the ability to live the life of someone else. Not reincarnation necessarily, more along the lines of sitting in a room watching a home movie of every moment of someone else’s life. Omnisciently viewing their every move and thought, right there with them in spirit, experiencing their life in full, just as they did. That could be traumatizing, but there is so much we’ll never understand about human nature simply because we can’t comprehend other’s experiences. You only know what I choose to tell you. If you knew more you might not continue to read. Or you’d pity me, or hate me, love me, sympathize, empathize, agree, disagree. My existence and your comprehension of my existence are on two completely different playing fields. I wonder how you view me. Half the time I don’t quite understand myself, do you not understand me? Would you even want to understand? Intimacy is a bitch, I’m sure we can all agree on that much.
In certain social situations….okay, most social situations, I feel out of place, isolated by my own actions, cast aside as a wallflower. I think, “If only they really knew me, we’d get along.” But it’s too tedious and overwhelming to introduce myself in entirety in one social setting to one person. They’ll never know the real me and even if they wanted to, I’m not sure I could explain it to them, and if by some chance I attempted such a feat, they’d probably analyze my existence in a manner completely different from what I was hoping to express. Does that make sense? I invited Jeremie over for dinner last week. I did so as a gesture of goodwill considering his mother just died and I wasn’t sure how else to go about showing my sympathy. He talked and talked…and talked, as he’s known to do, but it meant nothing to me. I can’t begin to understand him, he talks of superficial affairs. I think I’ve lost my ability to b.s. in conversation without feeling I’m denying myself some social truth. Compromising my nature of more personal matters simply to appease his want of dialogue. Needless to say, we’re still not friends. I try, I do, but I’m not sure I’ve ever known how to begin. In second grade my teacher, Mrs. Schrader, consistently wrote on my progress reports, “does not work well with others.” But it’s too much work to work with others. I’ve met my catch 22 - I’m lonely as all get out. I think I should stop here, I can tell you don’t understand by the perplexed look in your eyes, or maybe the font is simply too small.
Maybe I should add that I wrote this at four in the morning last night, after hours of wandering the streets alone with nothing but the rush of the Chikugo river in the distance to keep me company, slightly buzzed from repeated cigarette drags (I’m not a smoker) and bored, quite possibly, out of my mind…your call.
Dre calls to update me on her whirlwind adventures in the big city, a collaboration of Starbucks, Halloween parties at foreigner hot spots, bar hopping and avoiding her Japanese stalker. The difference between our two experiences in the same country, doing the same job on a daily basis is just insane. Sometimes I wish I could experience everything there is to experience. I’ll go walking into the mountains on photography excursions and think how distressing it is that I’ll only see a certain roadside shrine in the sunlight on a Saturday, but never in the rain on a Wednesday, during a typhoon with the wind howling and tossing about scattered leaves, or in the snow, lightly dusting the heads of statues. We live terribly short lives. Isolated from the elaborate world around us. Or maybe that’s just me. I used to think, and possibly still hope, that upon dying we’d have the ability to live the life of someone else. Not reincarnation necessarily, more along the lines of sitting in a room watching a home movie of every moment of someone else’s life. Omnisciently viewing their every move and thought, right there with them in spirit, experiencing their life in full, just as they did. That could be traumatizing, but there is so much we’ll never understand about human nature simply because we can’t comprehend other’s experiences. You only know what I choose to tell you. If you knew more you might not continue to read. Or you’d pity me, or hate me, love me, sympathize, empathize, agree, disagree. My existence and your comprehension of my existence are on two completely different playing fields. I wonder how you view me. Half the time I don’t quite understand myself, do you not understand me? Would you even want to understand? Intimacy is a bitch, I’m sure we can all agree on that much.
In certain social situations….okay, most social situations, I feel out of place, isolated by my own actions, cast aside as a wallflower. I think, “If only they really knew me, we’d get along.” But it’s too tedious and overwhelming to introduce myself in entirety in one social setting to one person. They’ll never know the real me and even if they wanted to, I’m not sure I could explain it to them, and if by some chance I attempted such a feat, they’d probably analyze my existence in a manner completely different from what I was hoping to express. Does that make sense? I invited Jeremie over for dinner last week. I did so as a gesture of goodwill considering his mother just died and I wasn’t sure how else to go about showing my sympathy. He talked and talked…and talked, as he’s known to do, but it meant nothing to me. I can’t begin to understand him, he talks of superficial affairs. I think I’ve lost my ability to b.s. in conversation without feeling I’m denying myself some social truth. Compromising my nature of more personal matters simply to appease his want of dialogue. Needless to say, we’re still not friends. I try, I do, but I’m not sure I’ve ever known how to begin. In second grade my teacher, Mrs. Schrader, consistently wrote on my progress reports, “does not work well with others.” But it’s too much work to work with others. I’ve met my catch 22 - I’m lonely as all get out. I think I should stop here, I can tell you don’t understand by the perplexed look in your eyes, or maybe the font is simply too small.
Maybe I should add that I wrote this at four in the morning last night, after hours of wandering the streets alone with nothing but the rush of the Chikugo river in the distance to keep me company, slightly buzzed from repeated cigarette drags (I’m not a smoker) and bored, quite possibly, out of my mind…your call.
posted by Chishiki Lauren at 6:32 PM
3 Comments:
If people are running at midnight in my town, it's usually because they've just looted a local store. Take care, sweetie.
Evidently crime doesn't exist in Japan, so I imagine the lunatics running after midnight are simply that. However, I keep getting messages on my desk about the consequences of drug usage while serving as a JET participant. What do they think I'm doing?
Case in point of my naivety - I actually said crime doesn't exit in Japan. Big mistake. That had seriously fast repurcussions. I'm cursed.
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