[WITI No. 47] Book as alternative life path, Starting a religion, never enough mom.
Writing about a lifelong habit of reading from a father's perspective
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I have made a small dent in listening to Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami, the audio book is 28 hours long. Even at 1.5x, it will take about 19 hours to get through it. I still have about 12 hours left. The story has taken its magical turn. As I listen, I try to think about the map of the story he created. I feel like I’m right on the edge of understanding how he does it. I’m not sure where that awareness comes from but I’m certain consuming a bunch of his titles in a short period of time, both reading and listening, gives you the rhythm of his writing.
Sorry, I’m geeking out on Murakami and his writing. His writing certainly isn’t for everyone - no writing is but I find his depiction of modern Japanese life fascinating. I lived in Japan for a short period. Murakami reminds me of what my life might have looked like had I stayed in Japan without the magical realist elements.
How does all this relate to parenting?
Well, my time abroad had a huge effect on me and one of my goals for my own children is for them to experience life abroad as well. You get a different perspective living within a culture that’s different than your own. For example, I really learned to appreciate public transportation because in Japan, it’s prohibitively expensive to drive and park. As a result, I travelled via foot and train and enjoyed every moment of it. I wasn’t counting steps at the time but wouldn’t be surprised if I logged 12-15k steps per day.
Being a foreign student is an interesting experiment as well. Sometimes, you barely know how to ask where the toilet is:トイレはどこです?Thankfully, I prepared for my eventual stay in Japan. Asking about the bathroom was the least of my worries. I wish I would have been more prepared to handle money. 500¥ drinks of Old Crow bourbon at the local watering hole burned a hole in a hole in my budget. The old saying is truth: Youth is wasted on the young.
Working in a foreign country is a portal too. I had a weekend and summer job at a print shop as a teen but I wasn’t aware enough to realize that my coworkers were there, in order to provide for their families. I was paired with a professional who had to complete his own work along with babysitting me, the gaijin. It wasn’t easy for my sempai but we made it work. I got a taste of the company cafeteria where I could eat udon for 100¥ (about a $1 US) - that’s a bargain! I also experienced the seemingly mandatory dinner, drinking and karaoke that was part of salaryman life.
This is just how they do it, Japan, it works for them. It may not work for you. That experience is invaluable because if it works for you, you might find a portal through which you would radically change your life.
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I made a note from Light the Dark from poet, Sherman Alexie, an indigenous person about a quote that electrified him.
“I’m in the reservation of. my mind” - Adrian Louis’ Elegy for the forgotten Oldsmobile
Here’s Alexie…
When I was younger, my reaction was much more personal. It became a personal statement for me. And now I think it's a philosophy. I feel like I could start a church with that line. The number one tenet of that church? No cedar flutes. Also, no references to talking animals. And a concerted effort to get everyone off the res. What would be the symbol of my church? It'd be a broken circle. And that would be a positive sign That break in the circle would really be an explosion of possibility. Indians always praise circles. But they actually are chain-links.
There’s a serendipity in this discovery. A week or two ago, I was into Carlos Ruiz-Zafon Angel’s Game where the character Andreas Correlli was trying to start a new religion. Then this came back to me from so many years ago - you’ll have to listen to the entire 2:47 seconds to recognize the connection.
Find of the week
Who among us has experienced something similar as the piper below?
I wrote about Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library where the protagonist tries on the possibilities of what her life might have been from the list of regrets she’s compiled. Is there a title that is like a map of alternative life? Share above! What’s required in your own personal church or religion, leave a comment.
That’s all I got.
Till next week,
-George