To Facebook or Not to Facebook?

Is that the question?

Or is it something else, like maybe

"If someone takes video of a tree falling in the forest and doesn't post it to Facebook, does it make a sound?"

I don't know the answer to either of those. For the past two months I've been over 99% Facebook free. I won't go into all the why's and how for's for my absence other than to state my belief that some are better fit for social media stuff than others. Blame it on being of the "all or nothing" or "everything in excess" variety of human. All in all the break has been good for me. That said I have missed seeing more'n a few who I liked to follow on there. I've wondered who I didn't wish happy birthday or what other event(s) in friend or relative or met on Facebook fellow earthly traveler's life I missed. And of course after years and years of sharing all about my favorite subject--MY LIFE!--I've been tempted to sign on and share life stuff around here.  Putting it away for a couple month's has been self-revealing though--it's helped me to get a clearer look at myself and after a few weeks away a lot of the social media user mental noise quieted down. That's been nice I must say.

So nice that I don't see myself going back on to the degree that I've used it for the past... Good gosh what's it been? Around eight years now I think. Like the title of this blog I opened up ten years ago and never did much with (even forgot I even had it for a few years) "Inochi Mujo" いのち無常
Life is Transience
Change is inevitable
Nothing's set in stone. For all I know I'll be back to doing FB and this in a month or year or ten years from now. For all I know Russian trolls will have convinced Trump supporter Facebook users to wear their MAGA underpants on their head by tomorrow. You just never can tell. (If by chance they've already started doing that my bad. I've been spending less time on the Internet as well) Basically life just got even busier and I've been leaning this direction for a while so that's that.

Besides, I've found writing blogs without the slightest inkling on how to blog to be quite interesting.  I'd written all of three or four in ten years time so with this recent decision to change up how to spend online time I transferred a couple favorite tales I'd posted to FB on here (still searching for others), wrote a few new ones and learned that with a single blog entry thingamajig post whatever ya call it page on here I can keep a running account of OMG is this for real! American politics.  That's a dandy I've about laughed or cried myself silly putting it together.  Warning: Read at your own risk.

But nuff said

I'll end this'n with a few of the happenings in these parts over the past couple of months.

The kids all started a new school year in the beginning of April. (no first day of nursery school for the little one so here's a shot of her sitting on my head instead ;)

"Daddy sampo?" (let's go for a walk) The self-imposed rule's remained never say no.

oldest boy testing newly rebuilt backyard homemade
jungle gym

New friends arrived with spring

Mother's Day was in there somewhere.
Nothing but the finest riverbank flowers for the mom in this house! 

We got in a Golden Week trip to USMC and Japan SDF "Friendship Day" at  Camp Fuji

Younger boy remote controlling a bomb
squad robot

Fuji san at sunset in Gotemba

Then there was a little weekend excursion to catch newts in Tanna

Which we did after visiting MOA Museum of Art in Atami per the excellent suggestion of friends who stopped by on their way to Tokyo 

There were a couple track meets in there too, a Golden Week hike with the boys and of course other common shenanigans such as bird riding rodent tricks and what not.

So that's some happenings from these parts. 

If things stay on an even keel I'll allow myself back in there to click a like or three. Till then if you found this from there please know I'm still trudging this life path with ya'll in spirit--happy, joyous and free in the Here and Now. Or doing my best to be at least ;) 

Jya ne, Cheers!

They are Alive and Well Somewhere

"I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and women,
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken soon out of their laps.

What do you think has become of the young and old men? 
And what do you think has become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere;
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it,
And ceased the moment life appeared.

All goes onward and outward .  . . . and nothing collapses,
And to die is different from waht any one supposed, and luckier.

Has any one supposed it lucky to be born?
I hasten to inform him or her it is just as lucky to die, and I know it."

Whitman's prose was going through my mind even before I pulled Leaves of Grass down off the shelf and took it to bed last night. My heart was heavy. I'd just sent an email to one of my closest friends--an email that felt so inadequate given the circumstances but I had to let him know I was thinking about him and his family. News came earlier that his dad had passed away. Stuff like this tops the list of things that make me wish the journey between Kannami and Clovis was a easier. I've lost count of how many times I've gotten sad news from home sweet California home and wished as much since first arriving in Japan nearly two decades ago. I wished it the year before last when a dear friend and old roommate left this life, then again last year when my karate sensei became terminally ill and passed, and yet again after receiving the sad news yesterday.

I've wished it were easier and less time consuming to live 5,500 miles away from the place where I first emerged on this earth, but all the wishing in the world won't make it so. My life is here and the lives of so many I love and hold dear--family and friends, is far, far away. And so after sending the email, hugging my wife for the longest time and explaining to my curious younger son why I was so sad--after seeing him go quiet and listen intently as I told how I was about his age when I first met this genuinely good man who passed away last night, I did what's become a little personal ritual of sorts in times like these.  I took Leaves of Grass down off the shelf and sought solace in Whitman's words.

Words like those above.

And these below:

"And I call to mankind, Be not curious about God,
For I who am curious about each am not curious about God,
No array of terms can say how much I am at peace about God 
and about death.

I hear and behold God in every object, yet I understand God not in the least,
Nor do I understand who there can be more wonderful than myself.

Why should I wish to see God better than this day?
I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and each moment then,
In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass;
I find letters from God dropped in the street, and every one is signed by God's name,
And I leave them where they are, for I know that others will punctually come forever and ever.

And as to you death, and you bitter hug of mortality . . . . it is idle to try to alarm me. 

I read that Walt Whitman nursed wounded soldiers during the Civil War. He was surrounded by unimaginable death and carnage and sat with an untold number of injured men as they breathed their last.  News speaks of the division and polarity of current day USA. I would argue a nation polarized enough for brothers to be murdering brothers; cousins cousins, friends friends and neighbors neighbors, as quite a bit more polarized, negative and godless than many say America is nowadays. Yet try to find complaint or negativity in Whitman's work. Contrast the death and disgust he met on a daily basis with his affirmation of life without end, with his exalting in all races, all religions, all of nature, with all of life right down to his armpits or the grass he tread  underfoot. William James wrote of him in Varieties of Religious Experience. He placed Whitman as the example par excellence in the chapter titled THE RELIGION OF HEALTHY-MINDEDNESS. And aptly so I'd say.

Mr. James wrote:

"The supreme contempary example of such an inability to feel evil is of course Walt Whitman"

Then went on to quote a Dr. Bucke, who said of Whitman:

"He never spoke deprecatingly of any nationality or class of men, or time in the world's history, or against any trades or occupations--not even against any animals, insects, or inanimate things, nor any of the laws of nature, nor any of the results of those laws, such as illness, deformity, and death. He never complained or grumbled either at the weather, pain, illness, or anything else. He never swore. He could not very well, since he never spoke in anger and apparently never was angry. He never exhibited fear, and I do not believe he ever felt it" 

The last words about fear there may ring a bell for anyone who had a church upbringing, or indeed many who didn't even. They may remind some of the sole force substantial enough to cast out all fear.  I refer to "Perfect Love" of course. (i.e. 1 John 4:18)

Henry David Thorough held much the same opinion of him after meeting Whitman on a few occasions in 1856. In a letter to a friend Thorough wrote:
"I do not believe that all of the sermons so called that have been preached in this land put together are equal to [Whitman's poetry] for preaching"

Alas Walt Whitman was not a proponent of any one particular faith. Indeed, he was not a faithful member of any church, not even a churchgoer, nor did he preach any specific faith or doctrine as being closer to the truth, and thus salvation, than the rest. Yet there it is for all to see. The record of his faith and its fruits speaks for itself. Whence did he find it?

We must turn to Ralph Waldo Emerson for the answer methinks.
Emerson wrote:

"The foregoing generations beheld God and nature face to face; we, through their eyes. Why should not we also enjoy an original relation to the universe? Why should not we have a poetry and philosophy of insight and not of tradition, and a religion by revelation to us, and not the history of theirs?"

"By revelation to us"
So true.
I can't recall if it was also Emerson, or perhaps Thoreau or maybe even Thomas Paine, who wrote that revelation can only be experienced firsthand. Anything other than that, be it hearing about it from a friend an hour later or reading about what some prophet wrote 2000 years ago, is mere secondhand information. Revelation must be experienced. If we're to know any truth we must live it and feel it and experience it ourselves. Of this, I am certain.

There's a sureness that comes from where I don't know yet is far too strong to deny all the same. It's something I just feel to the core of my being--something almost palpable as it flows through and gives rise to the feeling that we're all in this life thing together; that we all came from the same place and to the same place we'll all return regardless of ethnicity, gender, sexual preference, religious belief or lack thereof or other perceived differences people often tend to dwell on.  In looking back I see I sensed it all along but was too scared to let it in. Years of turmoil over trying to force myself to believe certain things after I began to doubt them was the result. Things only got worse as time went on right up until having a moment. The moment washed in on a wave of personal defeat, humility and surrender. It broke me enough to let something in. From that moment on the old belief has given way to one in something more in tune with my soul. I couldn't tell you what the something is but I can give 4,250 reasons why it best to keep going with it.

Those reasons are days. Some 13 years, six months and however many of them now, of not reaching for a drink in an attempt to numb the inner conflict and turmoil that once plagued me. Not even craving one, which absolutely blows me away. What's more is that number increases daily and is directly related to 3 other reasons to stay on this path--the three awesome little souls who I've helped bring into this life and have been put in charge of rearing. My kids have never seen me drunk. Have never seen me hung over. They have no idea of anything but a sober, caring father. Such irony that I fought it for as long as I did though. I fought it till finally arriving at the point where the only choices left were to continue on trying to force myself to believe something that my heart rejected, such as certain things about God or death, heaven and hell and other spiritual matters, and thus go on to the bitter end the way I was, or to do as Joseph Campbell tells the knights did in their individual searches for the Holy Grail--to enter the forest where it was darkest and there was no path. i.e. To make my own path. I'd arrived at that point more than a few times before only to choose the former. This time I was beaten. I chose the latter.

Exclusive certainty has been replaced with awe, mystery, inclusion and uncertainty. I no longer pretend to know all the answers and that's okay. It's okay but seems a bit harder when someone close moves on from this life. It's harder when feeling pain because the world lost a genuinely good dude, a guy I knew well and really liked yet I can no longer allow myself to pretend to know where he is or what happened to him. I know his fate is my own. That I know. Something in me tells me the end of this life we're in is not the end. That I feel. Beyond that it's total mystery.  So I feel the sadness and wonder about the mystery and just try to be awake and aware in the moment.

As for those who are certain of where they and others who affirm the same belief will spend eternity? Heaven knows I tried long enough and hard enough to be among their ranks and have had to fend off guilt time and again over the years for not believing as I was told. If there's one thing I learned through all of it it's this: We can no more force religious belief on ourselves than we can on our neighbor. It's gotta come from within. That and, at just past the half century mark, I've experienced enough life to know not everyone is capable of accepting the same religious doctrine, and even those who do accept a certain text's or teaching's merit may read it entirely differently than others.

Words are ill equipped at conveying the relief I felt upon realizing I need not throw out the baby bible with with the bathwater.  That old saying "When the student is ready the teacher will appear" rings true for me here since, after years of living sober (something I was never able to do while trying to cling to the old belief), of living to good purpose, of trying to be of service to my family and community, be a loving son and father and husband, productive teacher and employee, etc. and so on,  I came across the work of Joseph Campbell and Whoa!

At three to four years later I'm once again able to accept much of the religious doctrine that'd filled me with conflict thanks to coming to read it metaphorically rather than concretely. Looking back I'm amazed at my inability to understand what was right before my eyes all along. I could fill a few dozen blog entries with my fascination for myth alone. The Hero with a Thousand Faces was riveting and beyond enlightening/ Another one in particular, the thin text THOU ART THAT, has encouraged me on this life path again and again since first spying it on the top shelf at Kinokuniya Books in Tokyo years ago.

Campbell taught me that my problem all along was not confined to me alone.

"The problem, as we have noted many times, is that these metaphors, which concern that which cannot in any other way be told, are misread prosaically as referring to tangible facts and historical occurrences. The denotation--that is, the reference in time and space: a particular Virgin Birth, the End of the World--is taken as the message, and the connotation, the rich aura of the metaphor in which its spiritual significance may be detected, is ignored altogether."

That was my problem. That remains humans' problem. At the time of this writing there's been a huge flareup of bloodshed in Israel. The ongoing repression, terrorism, hatred and murder over a piece of dirt.  Faceless and nameless innocent kids--kids who lost the birth lottery--entering the mystery of death long before they're due. Heartbreaking news. Why? Again, to quote Campbell:

"It has puzzled me greatly that the emphasis in the professional exegesis of the entire Judeo-Christian-Islamic mythology has been on the denotative rather than on the connotative meaning of the metaphoric imagery that is its active language. The Virgin Birth, as I have mentioned, has been presented as an historical fact, fashioned into a concrete article of faith over which theologians have argued for hundreds of years, often with grave and disruptive consequences. Practically every mythology in the world has used this "elementary" or co-natural idea of a virgin birth to refer to a spiritual rather than an historical reality. The same, as I have suggested, is true of the metaphor of the Promised Land, which in its denotation plots nothing but a piece of earthly geography to be taken by force. It's connotation--that is, its real meaning--however, is of a spiritual place in the heart that can only be entered by contemplation.
There can be no real progress in understanding how myths function until we understand and allow metaphoric symbols to address, in their own unmodified way, the inner levels of our consciousness. The continuing confusion about the nature and function of metaphor is one of the major obstacles--often placed in our path by organized religion that focus shortsightedly on concrete times and places--to our capacity to experience mystery."

How liberating to find that by embracing the mystery, by admitting defeat, by accepting the fact that I couldn't accept the old ideas and must find my own way, that in doing so I'd unknowingly (at the time) joined scores of great men and women from every religion or none at all, from all over the earth throughout the history of our race. That I'd joined the ranks of everyone from Tolstoy to Einstein to Gandhi to many of my nation's Founding Fathers--Deists to nominal Christians heavily influenced by Deism such as Paine, Adams, Washington, Monroe or Franklin, to Transcendentalists such as Thoreau, Emerson, Muir or of course Whitman, to a multitude of early Christians of whom I heard neither hide nor hair of during all my years of attending church and Sunday school. Like those whose texts were found in Nag Hammadi. The Gospel of Thomas alone has been illuminating and then some. And so began this endless quest that's led to an intensive lay study of early Christianity, myth and comparative religion.

It's been a wild ride thus far to say the least. That moment of feeling so lost was necessary to lead me on this ongoing spiritual quest--to find the likes of Whitman and so many others who couldn't believe, indeed even rejoiced in not believing in, ideas such as spending all of eternity in an afterlife where others aren't allowed. So I wasn't alone in my inability to accept the idea that good people in this life would be sentenced to perpetual suffering for not believing as others. As an imperfect fault-filled father I just couldn't, indeed still can't, imagine anything my kids could do that'd make me condemn then to eternal damnation. Thus believing that the Father--that the source of Perfect Love--would do that was and remains anathema to me. And what of those who are, like I, a little less certain about such things? About God or what comes next after this thing we call death? About where this all leads to if anywhere? Some say this is the end. I surmise the atheist who lives a moral, productive life of service to others while believing as much to be noble soul.

Those questions for I and all of those above are answered so well, again, by Campbell:
"In all traditional systems, whether of the Orient or of the Occident, the authorized mythological forms are presented in rites to which the individual is expected to respond with an experience of commitment and belief. But suppose he fails to do so? Suppose the entire inheritance of mythological, theological, and philosophical forms fails to wake in him any authentic response of this kind? How then is he to behave? The normal way is to fake it, to feel oneself to be inadequate, to pretend to believe, to strive to believe, and to live, in the imitatino of others, an inauthentic life. The authentic creative way, on the other hand,which I would term the way of art as opposed to religion, is, rather, to reverse this authoritive order.
As in the novels of Joyce, so in those of Mann, the key to the progression lies in the stress on what is inward . .. . In the words of Joyce's hero: 'When the soul of a man is born in this country there are nets flung at it to hold it back from flight. You talk to me of nationality, language, religion. I shall try to fly by those nets.'
For what to the soul are nets, 'flung at it to hold it back from flight' can become for the one who has found his own center the garment, freely chosen, of his further adventure."

And for those who are certain of their belief? Who never questioned, who've remained comfortable in their own skin and had no qualms whatsoever about anything received from the Sunday pulpit? Those who remain sure they'll be moving on to eternal bliss after this life, while I and others have to dodge fire and brimstone for all of eternity? Well as long as they do no harm I'm fine with them too. I know and love scores of them--many do a lot of good and carry the Carpenters call to help the needy.  No matter their ways though, I pray they all find much peace and joy.

Alas no matter the belief or lack thereof, the most important thing for all of us no matter the belief or lack thereof--the absolutely vital thing for myself if I'm to live a sober, creative, selfless or do unto others as I'd have them do unto me kind of life in the present as a matter of fact--is to do as Shakespeare spelled out perfectly:

 TO THINE OWN SELF BE TRUE.

Henry David Thoreau said essentially the same:
"Trust thyself: ...  Accept the place the divine providence has found for you." 

Upon deciding to enter the forest where there was no path I felt alone in doing so. I laugh at myself for thinking as much now that I've learned that scores had done the same before I ever even arrived at forest's edge.  I'm not so unique after all. Who knew! I learned the circumstances that led me to do so not unique either, as, again Thoreau, states so well:

"Not till we are lost, in other words not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations."

"realize the infinite extent of our relations" So there you have it. No beginning and no ending, a perpetual cycle that we're all a part of. For me a part now with a sense of being as much. This is an idea my soul accepts and my inner constitution rejoices in as I trudge this Life's Happy Destiny Road.

Trudge or perhaps "tramp", right here alongside "I tramp the perpetual journey" Whitman himself.

Hi-HO!

THERE is NO BETTER TiME THAN NOW!

いま

ここ

THE HERE AND NOW

It's there and then now, what I'm writing about. Here and Now I'm at the computer telling about it. There and then is in my mind however, which is the only place it can be, so there and then is in the Here and Now still.

Today is Thursday.
On Thursdays I'm out the door no later than 7:40 just like any other weekday morning. Out the door and into the little white like a car only smaller Japanese driving device and on my way to the big power systems company to teach the first class of the day. From there I go to teach at a kindergarten or nursery school just like most other weekday mornings as well. Then from there, on Thursdays, there's all of 30 minutes to make it to the hood over behind Quixote to teach an adult student private lesson. My time comes next, usually between 40 minutes to an hour at the gym. Every set to burnout little rest in between it's enough. Next is the final class of the day--a class of kindergarteners that I teach for Casey's English in a rented room at ZoYama Kindergarten then home just in time to open the door for the boys before they arrive back from school.

Company class, nursery school, private adult lesson, kids class and gym the little white transportation device is loaded down with teaching bags and gym bag, white board and this and that and the other it takes a while to unload and put everything away once home. Usually I'm just finishing up that chore about the time the ever so lovely wife arrives home with the youngest girl child.

By then I usually want nothing more than to sit on the sofa or upstairs for a few minutes of vegging out on news at the computer here, but  there's usually none of it, especially not on nice warm late spring afternoons like today. Potato bugs (pill bugs) are often to blame. They're all over in our little yard you see, and if there's one thing that gets a "Kawaiiiiiiiii" (It's so cuuuuute) comment from the little girl child it's a bunch of little potato bugs. So we mull around in the yard checking on those lil fellers and inspecting the ants--did they move since we piled a bunch of seeds on their hole yesterday? Or if not in the yard then we're off for a walk down the riverbank or to play in front of neighbor kids' houses that have moms and kids gathered out front.

The rule's the same as when the boys say "Daddy let's play catch ball". The rule is, unless my life depends on doing something else or something else close to as urgent, the rule is to say "YES". It's a very easy to understand straight forward rule but when dog ass tired it's not always observed with the most gung ho attitude. At least not at first. The trick is making myself move in that direction. Thus the self-imposed rule.

Someday the now of being asked to go for a walk with a cute giggly little girl or fun loving boy will not occur so often. Someday the asking will end. No more walks. No more searching for potato bugs. No more playing catch in out in front of  the house.  But today is not, was not, that someday. Today I was asked and I gratefully obliged. I fully embraced the message on the back of the little girl's T-shirt. There is NO BETTER TiME THAN NOW! Indeed.

Soon after everyone is home on Thursdays the ever so lovely wife must get back in the car and go to Casey's English Numazu HQ to teach a "juku" (cram school) style junior high class. This would often be time alone to get things done time for me but lately the older now junior  high school boy has been staying here to do homework. To some extent the someday of not being asked to play catch ball in front of the house has already come with him. He's a junior high school kid now. He's a lot busier than before. But today he was out there with his tennis racket practicing (He's joined the soft tennis club at junior high school) so I didn't even wait to be asked. I grabbed the ever so lovely wife's old tennis racket out of the shed and we played and played and played...

He hits the ball I hit the ball the ball hits the neighbors car he hits the ball the ball hits the neighbors roof I hit the ball he hits the ball I hit the ball the ball hits the house window and on and on and on.

Neither one of us are all that great at tennis but that had no effect on the THERE is NO BETTER TiME THAN NOW-ness of the moment at all.

The moral of this Thursday recap? The lesson in this tale of my day?
Say yes to the now.
It's always NOW!

Martial Arts: More Than Physical. 武道 part I (Budo part I)

I found it!

The research paper on the Martial Arts that I wrote in 1997. I can't believe that 3 1/2" floppy disc still works! I can't believe the 10 year old external floppy disc drive plugged into a 2016 iMac could read it. 

At the time of the writing I had no idea whatsoever that I'd be training in a karate dojo in Japan a mere 18 months later. The idea that I'd come here as an English Teacher was even further removed! Alas both happened, and this paper does much to shed light on the driving force of my desire to embark on this path that I'm still trekking. 

I love the physical aspects of training in the martial arts, but from the time of writing the research paper over two decades ago right up to the present moment the physical training's been intermeshed with a spiritual quest of sorts. Funny in looking back on it--seeing what's remained unchanged and what I now view differently over those two decades--the most important lesson, or perhaps epiphany even, has been this realization: 

What I'm searching for is what I'm searching with.

It was a desire to write about my experiences with martial arts in California and Japan that got me to digging through boxes hoping to find this and I'll be danged if I didn't find it! (for all I knew it was in one of the few remaining boxes in my parents' attic 5,500 miles away) Still tickled pink over finding it I am. I thought it'd be a good reread to get me started only to decide to copy and paste here once rereading it after so many years. So for anyone interested in a city college research paper on the spiritual benefits of training in martial arts, that's what follows this little intro. It was a fitting find since it mentions my first karate senseis as well as the English teacher who gave me the skills and confidence to train in the martial arts and accept an English teaching job in Japan.

In time get to part II of this--to my original idea of writing about the various martial arts I've trained in, what the training's like in different styles and dojos here in Japan compared with how it was for me at The Rising Sun in Fresno, CA. 

Final note: I cringed when reading this and seeing that I mistakenly wrote that Bruce Lee did karate. He didn't. He created his own style of Kung Fu which, if I remember correctly he didn't even want to name but eventually did: Jeet Kun Do (his style of Kung Fu). I mentioned that name in the paper but the untrained eye will think it's karate that he or Jackie Chan did/do instead of Kung Fu. Karate and Kung Fu are of course two separate arts from two different countries. So big mistake there, but they are both martial arts with benefits that go beyond the physical and can be traced back to the same origins.

So that's that.  Here's a writing sample of mine from 20+ years ago. 
Stay tuned for Martial Arts part II

LIFE IS MUJO and a boy tying shoes

いのち無常
LIFE IS MUJO

Toda Bookstore is on Nekkan Road in Kannami. There's an elevated highway and a second Nekkan frontage road that runs parallel to it now. Construction on that just wrapped up a few years ago. The area looked a bit different back in 1998 but the big Toda Books sign is the same as I found it one weekend around my fourth or fifth week in Kannami, Japan.  I peddled my mamacheri (girly frame bike) down there hoping like heck they had books in English. I'd done read the few I brought with me a few times over and was tired of Japanese TV.  As luck would have it there was one small spinning rack with all of a couple dozen English books on it near the register. There I found a copy of James Clavell's SHOGUN and man what a great read that was.  I blew through it and was back in Toda Bookstore the next weekend. Nothing else on the little spinner rack looked all that great so I searched the aisles of Japanese books, stopping to inspect each and every one with English on the cover. Nothing! English is decoration, the text is all Japanese. Another aisle. Nothing. Another. Still nothing. Back wall. More nothing. In the last aisle there was a square book with orange border that I could actually read and understand the Japanese on the cover of. I'd self taught myself hiragana syllabary by then. (48 phonetic symbols that accompany kanji). The book was this

To my great amazement I saw English translation when I opened it.
I opened to a page near the front of the book and saw

LIFE IS MUJO

Then read

Here and now is all that truly exists
The future cannot be touched
And the past is already gone
Here and now
The life inside you
The life inside me

Long ago, Wise men told us that strictly speaking,
Using a word for the concept of "now" is an anomaly.
You see, by the time you have pronounced the "ow",
The "n" sound has already become part of the past.

At any point in time,
There is no situation which remains exactly the same,
Time and space never rest.
This is the concept known as Mujo.
It is true for all things.
There is nothing that does not constantly change,
If only in the slightest way.

Mujo, therefore the infant grows and matures.
Mujo, therefore the bud becomes a blooming flower.

And Mujo, therefore one can never guarantee, but only imagine 
What tomorrow will bring.

Wow!
I read it again. And again. And again.
I read the next poem and the next. I loved them all

But that first. Life is Mujo. Biggest Wow.

I bought it. I studied the Japanese. I memorized the English. I still have it on my shelf here. It was one of the first lessons in a concept, or way of thinking perhaps, that's long since become engraved on my soul. This is it. The trick is finding it here. I still suck at it, but have caught glimpses

Friday morning.  It came unexpectedly while standing in the entryway with the younger boy as he got ready to head off to school. Him sitting on the step tying his shoe, I standing at the door taking it all in. First thought was "This is a good moment, watching the boy fumble with his shoe laces. This is fleeting. Be present!" Thinking as much got me to watch a little more keenly as his nimble young fingers worked the laces. We spoke as he tied. He failed and tied again. Dad and son, son and dad. Perfect moment. The loop was too big. He backed up and worked the laces again.
"Make a smaller ghost and lasso it from the top".
I gave pointers.
He tried to pull on the second shoe without untying.  Too tight. Untie and work more laces.  Velcro strapped shoes were all he knew till last year; tying's still a task he must put some thought into.  I stood and watched with mind still fresh in first waking hour of the day. It hit me. What is "It" I still don't know. Call it what you will, I go with God but no matter the term it's metaphor pointing past something, or capital "S" Something, unspeakable. It's that indescribable feeling. It's awareness. It's always been fleetingly for me, yet present long enough to catch glimpses. I'm fully present. Out of soul or out of mind, or maybe just out of thin air or even straight from his soul to mine. Whence it came I do not know, but it was. It is. What it is I know even less. There's just one thing of which I have some certainty about it.

 It only knows the Now. 

Still I never know when or where it's gonna hit.
A boy tying his shoe.
Me watching and sending him off to school with a high five and "Have a good day"
I stood at the door and watched him walk down the road till he turned the corner and faded out of view. Awake in the moment.
It's surreal. Maybe it's heaven?
Who's to say heaven's not in the Here and Now?
 So what if there are no fluffy clouds. No halos. No St. Peter at pearly gates. Heck I wouldn't know what to do with that stuff anyhow.  I'll leave that heaven to those better fit for it.
I'm good with a boy fumbling with his shoe laces before heading off to school.

Welcome to Japan. Please shit here

The sound of the jet hitting the runway is still fresh my mind all these years later.

ShyuueeerrrrrrruuuURT!

With that sound came the thought "What the hell have I done?"

I was in Japan for a year. The farthest I'd been away from Central California before that day was Tiajuana, Mexico for an afternoon once on family vacation as a kid and blackout night of drinking that damn near killed me one night in college; toVancouver Island, Canada on family vacation another time, flying to the Virginia for a college wrestling tournament once and a vacation flight  to Hawaii.  That's it. I don't come from a long line of world travelers. But here I was. Japan for a year.

There was supposed to be someone there to meet me at the gate. I walked out this way then back the other way but no signs with my name on them. No one approached me. Nothing.  Ten minutes passed, then a half hour, another how many minutes I don't know till finally a lady walks up to me and asks if I'm Casey.

YES!  Oh thank you Arigato Yes I am Casey.

A lady from town office had been sent to meet me. Apparently she didn't recognize me because I'd had my hair cut, it was a lot shorter than the picture she had of me.  That and, well, you know. All of us not quite giant American sized Americans look the same.  It'd taken so long for her to recognize me that we were late for the train. Thus started my first run like hell to catch a train experience. Run like hell with a 70lb suitcase. And another big suitcase. A box of almonds from Kerman, CA. (the sister city of the city I was going to work for) and a backpack.  I think she may have carried my backpack, rushing for the train remains mostly a blur save for recalling the kind man who carried one of my suitcases to the top of the stairs for me just about the time I was wondering if I'd have a heart attack while attempting to carry two large suitcases and a big ass box of almonds up the long flight of stairs to the platform.

No heart attack. I did not die. We rode a train then another mad dash to catch the Shinkansen then to the Yamadas via her car once we got down to Izu Peninsula. They were the family I would stay with for the first few days before moving into my apartment. Mr. Yamada, perhaps late 60s or so then, was a retired school principal and his wife was about the sweetest little old Japanese lady I'd yet to meet.  I was exhausted when we entered their we went to the living room for Minako the town office lady to introduce me and first words out of Mr. Yamada's mouth were something like;

"Hello Mr. Henry. Please shit here" (pointing to the sofa)

Do what! No, I knew what he meant but was surprised at first for sure.

And so my fascination with language began right then and there.

The phoneme si (like saying letter C or see) does not appear in Japanese. The closest sound is shi, thus sit sounds like shit. I learned that on day one in Japan and have learned more both English to Japanese and Japanese to English language traps in the years since.

A couple years later the science teacher at the middle school I was teaching English at asked me out of the blue one afternoon.

"Henry san, how is American erection?"

Who dude, uhm... It's fine but... uhh...  Oh oh oh oh oh the eLection!

We'd become friends I liked talking with this guy a lot, super neat dude so I explained the reason for the shocked look on my face and we laughed about that forever then about a million times since.

American erection is strong!  Woohooo!

Needless to say there's no l in Japanese so the Japanese alternative r gets punched in wherever an english L appears, which can change the topic of discussion in a big way in some instances.

English speaking foreigners aren't safe either.  We can make equally entertaining, or embarrassing, blunders.  Or so I learned during my second or third month in this land.

I'd been trying to build a vocabulary like a madman, learning new words every day totally botching it but trying like hell to communicate in this new, strange tongue.  Heck chances are I was studying at my desk while on break at another middle school I taught at when a group of girls came into the room handing out sweets they'd made in home economics class.  They brought it to my desk and one asked if I knew what it was.  As luck wouldn't have it I did know. I'd eating it and learned the word just a couple days prior so I said "Yes. I like unko!"

To which they started laughing hysterically and a nearby teacher look aghast and started telling me "no no no" but I, confident in my new language skills, repeated it again and again.

"No really, unko is good! I like unko! I Love unko! Unko is delicious!

The  girls are about on the floor by now they can't contain themselves the perplexed and angered looking teacher has now approached me is right at my side firmly saying
"Henry, this Anko!" (sweet bean paste)

Oh yeah, I like anko.  うんこUnko ＊　あんこAnko? What's the big deal?

Teacher has dictionary open by now is pointing to middle page I read "feces"

Oh. I see. Unko is shit.  Okay thanks I got it. Sorry. Don't worry though I won't be forgetting that one anytime soon. And so I haven't.

Anther time the music teacher at the first middle school gave me a ticket to watch her play in the Mishima Orchestra. I went and sat with another couple of teachers she'd given tickets to. She played percussion and wow, she was good! Morishima sensei sitting at my side said how serious she looked and I agreed. He spoke Japanese so he said "majime" (serious)

Next day in the teacher's room I went to her desk to say thanks again for the ticket. I wanted to say something nice so I repeated what Morishima sensei had said during the concert.  Or I thought I did.

Anata wa mijime desu. I said. Morishima sensei and another cool teacher dude Kiuchi sensei burst out laughing and Nanbara sensei turned red.
I'd been here long enough by then and made more than a few mistakes so knew I blew it and went straight to "What'd I say?"

まじめ　Majime - serious
みじめ　Mijime - miserable

I'd told her she was miserable. (this was before I'd leared to add "sou" to the end to say she "looked" this or that, so I just told her straight "you're miserable". Anther embarrassing lesson learned. Good thing I'm expert at laughing at myself!

Or then there was the time I asked the panicked looking 7th grade girl if she was an enema.
I can't believe I did that I knew that one dang it!

Every foreign teacher of young children here learns "kancho" soon after working in Japanese elementary schools or kindergartens or anywhere else around young children.
かんちょう Kancho is...
Well here. Kancho.
Click and see for yourself if you don't know.

きんちょうKincho is nervous.

Kincho! Not kancho!

Alas blame being tired that day or just not having the second language hardwired into the brain like the language one acquires from infancy, whatever the reason there I was helping this nervous young 7th grader with her reading she was having a tough time of it so in my attempt at asking if she was nervous I inadvertently asked if she's an enema.

It turned out that no, she is not an enema.

You never can be too sure!

Final thought. If you've never tried to learn and or don't speak a second language you are not allowed to make fun of anyone who has or does. Period. I highly suggest everyone try to learn and speak a second language though.  Science proves it's good for the brain all around and I can assure you, it's good for the humility too!

Kimodameshi 肝試し Test of Courage

I learned a new Japanese phrase today. I learned 肝試し. The boys were saying it shortly before they headed off in the dark. It’s pronounced “kimodameshi”; it translates to English as “Test of courage”.

The boys’ first day of “Golden Week” holidays plan was barbecuing at their friend’s house up the street, but the dad went awol so my wife Shiz asked me to go down to help the mom keep an eye on things. I really didn’t need to since some other neighbors ended up joining in on it and Shiz and H-san (daughter) came down as well. There were only four boys—two sixth graders and two fourth graders—our two included. They played with fire and threw water balloons at each other, scarfed down a few kg of bbq each and roasted some marshmallows then had to be gone before eight p.m. Not gone home, gone off to test courage! 

They walked off in the dark with a sole headlamp between the four of them. They walked along the river up to the road, turned south then followed the road a couple hundred meters to the foot of ShiroYama—a small nearby mountain between our Kakisawadai neighborhood and Hatake area of Kannami. Once at the bottom of the stairs leading up from the side of the road to the mountain trail they went one by one to do the “test of courage”, which was a solo walk up to the shrine on top of the mountain. 

The narrow trail’s lined with brush and bamboo grass on each side under a canopy of trees. It runs up the side of the mountain (more like a large hill-sized mountain) fairly steep stretches with a few turns then levels off at the football field and a half sized top covered with scattered trees, small vegetable fields to the north, a thick bamboo grove over on the southern slope and a small shrine on the far side directly east. Once up there they had to continue up through the tori gate then between two old stone lanterns, past the huge old weathered tree and small lichen covered statues (that appear about as old as Japan itself) till arriving at the dark, dark shrine.  Then, if lucky enough to still be alive, run like hell back to the safety of friends waiting below.

I’d actually been on the trail many times at night. I ran it for conditioning when training for a full contact kyokushin karate tournament a couple years earlier. I didn’t run all the way to the shrine—just the steep part to the top of the trail yet enough to know it's a great place for kids to carry out a test of courage.

Alas the other fourth grade kid’s mom just had to stop by to voice her concern about her son being eating by wild animals or stumbling into a wild boar trap or tengu attacking him or something worse. The other fourth grader kid’s mom is a worry wort and asks way too damned many questions. I tell my wife the lady drives me crazy, to which my wife laughs and says yeah she drives everyone crazy. I mean sure there are some wild animals around—raccoon dogs, weasels, wild boar, venomous snakes and civets and we even had an old lost badger wander into our yard a year or so back, but they’re sparse and the only time I ever heard of anyone having any kind of trouble with one anywhere near here was some long ago tale of a wild boar wandering down out of the Numazu Alps and chasing an old lady or something to that effect. I did see a sail-tanuki (tanuki is raccoon dog; sail tanuki is a raccoon dog that’s been run over so many times you can pick it up and sail it through the air) saw one of those last year on the road next to ShiroYama. Still they attack kids about as often as they steal kids’ bicycles so no worries there or with anything else. My fear of any of them being harmed by wild animals was slightly below zero.

 It’s the bugs that are most threatening in these parts anyhow, especially them danged suzumebachi giant Asian hornets. Those things are scary! Those things kill more people nationwide than all wild animals combined. They're freak'n huge too. I wouldn't be surprise to hear of one downing a small airplane. Still they’re not at their worst till summer so not much worry with them either. Shiz and I and the other kids mom weren’t concerned at least, so the level headed moms just had reassure the drive ya up the wall mom and answer her 57,000 questions (I find it best to pretend like I don’t understand what she’s saying. It’s good to be foreign sometimes!) and then we saw them off. Go on boys. Have fun! 

Of course the boys were likely more concerned with the threat far scarier than wild animals or giant killer bugs though. Dangerous strangers? Gun wielding maniacs? Big corporation lobbyists? Nah, not too many of any of those in the Izu countryside. No, of all the scary things in the dark none are so scary as the ghost that a young boy may spy on a dark path leading to a shrine while all by himself you see. Everyone knows how ghosts like to walk along dark mountain paths and visit shrines at night. So I imagine that was the real test of courage.

They didn’t get back till nearly ten p.m. I really wanted to go along too but surpassed the age limit dang it! So I had to settle for eagerly asking all about it once they got in. I don’t think they all made it all the way up the long dark path to the shrine, at least not the younger ones, but it sounded like they went far enough to “test the courage”. A boy ritual success achieved. Good on them!

I know deep down that this is the place where I’m supposed to be—that this is the path I’m supposed to be walking at this point in life—but still at times I get to wondering “would it be better to be living back in California?” Living back in the place where I’m from. I think of all I loved about elementary school there like school sports and such. I wish my kids could have some of the experiences that I did that they likely won’t get here. On the other hand I don’t hear much if anything about parents letting young kids walk along dark rural roads to dark mountains alone at night to “test the courage” there nowadays. I remember walking down Armstrong Ave after dark or cutting through fields to inspect some old barn at night when I was a kid, but apparently things have changed a bit in the 40 years since then. I know they have in the place where those memories of mine were made. Those three properties—nearly 30 acres total with a mere three houses, lots of pastures, barns and a pond and such—that alone is all roads and about a gazillion and a half track homes now. 

So if there chances are they wouldn’t be having the “test of courage” experience like they do here. And the test of courage is a good healthy kid thing to do methinks. I can wonder and wish for something that’s not or be grateful for the positive things in the here and now. The latter seems more productive, so I’m quite happy to learn this new phrase and hear all about how it’s done from boys who just did it. Three cheers for kimodameshi! Learning to test the courage will serve them well in life.

View from the shrine on Shiro Yama

(the top of the trail is about 25 meters beyond the tori gate) 

初日の出 * First Sunrises

I never knew about Hatsuhinode 初日の出 until a few years after moving to Japan. I never even considered such a thing either. It wouldn't have mattered if I had since most New Year's Day's mornings of my late teen and adult years were spent with a hangover thus the last thing I wanted to see was painful sunlight anyhow. But then a year or three after I retired as an alcohol drinking someone mentioned it to me here. I think the mentioning came via a post New Year's Day question actually.
"Did you watch first sunrise?"
Watch what? Why? I asked.
Only to be taught that it's a tradition of sorts for many folks in these parts. And so the the next year I tried it and Wow!
What a great way to bring in the New Year.
So the next year I went again.
The next again, and next again, and on and on till this year and no plans to stop anytime soon.

When I first heard about it we were living traditional Japanese style upstairs of my wife's family home, which is just about a mile from an optimal first sunrise viewing location. So year after year I'd see it rise from the same location and other little traditions would be added in. Like after my sons were born the first, and then the second, started joining me so I'd buy them a can of hot coco out of the vending machine on our way and take the little camping stove so we could roast marshmallows because what better way to view the first sunrise than while drinking coco and eating roasted marshmallows!

The place we watched it from was on the beach near the Emperor's old summer palace, or one of them, the one in Numazu now a tourist attraction. We'd watch from the place where a small river dumped into the Suruga bay just south of Mt. Ushibuse. Then one year while out for first sunrise viewing I saw a group of people out in the water watching it in kayaks.  Whoa! I thought. That must be awesome!

I added an inflatable kayak to my Amazon wishlist soon thereafter but big luxary items like that aren't the kinda thing I can just buy on a whim so there it stayed for years till finally one summer after rebuilding my in-laws' kitchen floor my cooler'n ever father-in-law handed me a few 10,000 yen (about $100) notes and said "Don't give this to your wife. Spend it on you) So there ya go, it's time to buy that inflatable kayak!
That was last year. This year we brought in the new year way, way out in Suruga bay in a kayak.  Just me and my two boys it was surreal.

So my location has changed, and no marshmallow roasting in an inflatable kayak so that New Year morning  tradition's gone but the new one's better and we still break out the camp stove to heat up water for instant ramen and/or yakisoba on our last day of the year hike up Mt. Washizu anyhow. I'll write another post about that one--that end of the year tradition of climbing Mt. Washizu.

It's symbolic in the sense that we watch the sun rise up over Mt. Washizu on New Year's morning. So the afternoon before we go up Mt. Washizu, the year before last the whole family joined in so it was me and the boys, my wife and our then 2 year old little girl. Last year was just the boys and I the weather wasn't so great and my wife's more of a fair weather climber. In the beginning years it was just me I'm way happy the family joins in. I don't know how much longer it'll be till it's back to just me. Kids grow and want to do their own thing, inochi mujo life is always changing no two New Year hatsuhinode are the same.  Like everything else though that's all the more reason I revel in each and every one of them. Each moment of them even.

There's something about it...
Cold crisp morning waiting and watching till the first beam of sun breaks over the mountain then putting the hands together in gassho (praying position) and saying a prayer of gratitude for life in the here and now.

I spent some time gathering as many old Hatsuhinode photos from past years that I could find, Inochi Mujo and Sunrise Mujo, some look similar perhaps but no two are the same and each experience was definitely unique--each has it's own little story and happy memories to go along with it. By all means take a look but I highly recommend seeking out your own optimal first sunrise of the year location and trying it yourself.  It beats the hell out of spending New Year's with a hangover, lying in bed (or on the floor, or in a gutter somewhere) dreading that first beam of sun hitting your face.
Based on personal experience of doing both I can say that much for sure!

First Sunrise of 2007 初日の出 

First Sunrise of 2008 初日の出

(No 2009--Was back visiting family and friends in foggy central California that year)

 First sunrise of 2010  初日の出

Catching the first sunrise of 2011 初日の出

First Sunrise of 2012 初日の出 -- The Year of the Dragon. 

 From this year onward I started digging through my kids' toybox the night before to find a character that corresponds with the zodiac animal for the New Year.  

Oh yeah and to the best of my recollecting and photo finding I'm nearly certain 2012 was also the year that "Hatsu-suie" first jump in the sea of the New Year tradition was born

.  

Year of the Snake -- First sunrise of 2013 初日の出

The boys joined me for the sunrise that year and three adventurous friends joined for the first swim.

 

 First sunrise of 2014 初日の出 - Year of the Horse 

 My younger boy child praying in the New Year, two of the adventurous friends from the previous year along with a couple more and my boys joined me for a cooooold windy first swim that year.

 Year of the Ram (or Shaun the Sheep ;) 

First Sunrise of 2015 初日の出

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Another one with the boys and another cold first swim.

First sunrise of 2016 初日の出 Year of the Monkey

The boys joined in on the first swim again, which made the little girl cry so she got to go out in the sea too! 

First sunrise of 2017 初日の出 Year of the Rooster

and another first swim.  High praise to Canadian couple friends for joining me every year! 

 First sunrise of 2018 初日の出 Year of the Dog

 First year of new tradition watching first sunrise from the inflatable kayak toy.  I highly recommend it!
































Nice peaceful sea this year
Me, faithful as can be Canadian cold water swimm'n pals and my sister-in-law