Passport Please

My wife was pulling into the parking lot as I walked out the lobby of the company where I teach an ESL class every morning. Dang what did I forget this time? She always texts before coming so I looked to see but no, no text. 

“Doshita?” What’s up?” I asked as I got up to the driver’s side window. 

She had a strange look on her face. Oh shit one of the kids? Parent fear. First thought is always the kids. 

She held up something in her hand. My passport? Still it didn’t click. She pointed it out to me.  No way! 

She told me. What the hell! No way! 

My heart sunk. How could I…? Immediate self-disgust. How could anyone miss something like that! How could I not know my passport’s expired two days before the flight! God what a dumb ass! I was just getting started. Nobody can beat the hell out of me like I can. 

The self-condemnation continued all the way home―embarrassment with the thought of telling everyone why we didn’t go; disgust for such dumbshit oversight; heartsickness with the thought of telling my younger son.  He had a days left to the trip countdown paper taped to the kitchen counter. He’d been peeling off  a page with each passing day.

I ran through excuses in my head. Every day is so damned busy! Upwards to eight classes to prep for and teach, raising three kids and all that goes with that, buying the house this year and busy with reinforcing it for earthquakes. On and on I built the list but knew deep down it’s the kind of mistake only absent minded pros like myself make.

The shock and self-admonishment grew into depression as I went online to cancel the flight and file a claim to refund airfare. I was feeling lower’n snail turds by the time the boy returned from school.  The sound of the door was followed by his happy call. “Tadaima” (I’m home!) then “Daddy?” My heart sunk even deeper as I walked downstairs to tell him.

I told him.

“Nan-de? Nan-de!” (Why? Why!!)

His eyes filled with tears.

Buddy I’m so sorry. It’s all my fault.

“Yada! Yada! Daddy dai kirai! Yada”

(NOOO! I hate daddy!)

He stormed out the door with tears rolling down his cheeks. I couldn’t blame him.  Dad’s aren’t supposed to blow it that bad. I went to the door and half-called out in a defeated voice. “Dude I’m sorry” He kept walking. The depression grew even deeper. 

I know it’s life. I know it’s “shoganai” as they say in Japanese. I know this too shall pass. Everything always does. Inochi Mujo. Life is transience. I even know the reason for the depression this time around.  That’s not always the case. At times it’s come out of nowhere and knocked me on my ass. Those who’ve had to battle the depression demons will understand. 

I learned that alcohol fixes depression way back in high school. It seemed to fix it at least. Whichever the case it stopped working years before I stopped trying it. I’m grateful that alcohol isn’t my solution any more. Not that I’ve anything against drinking. Booze is great stuff. If not an alcoholic I’d still be treating the slightest bit of blues by drinking like a champ. Alas that’s a luxury I can no longer afford. It got way too damned painful, damn near fatal even. So now? I disconnect. Put away the phone, avoid or deactivate Facebook, talk about it when ready and till then just sit and feel it, go for a long bike ride or walk in the nearby hills and feel it. It’s the feeling it that I’m grateful to be able to do most. Go through it sober. Feel it for all its worth. That's something I couldn't do for the longest time.

I heard others tell of going through far worse experiences than forgetting to renew a passport and not drinking over it. It took some years of try and fail before getting to the point where I can do it myself. I can now say with certainty that it is in fact possible to be embarrassed, to make huge dumbass mistakes, to feel like shit, and yet stay sober.  Experience has taught me as much. I’m grateful for that too.

The boy’s fine now. He’d been hounding me for a Nintendo Switch for months on end. “All of my friends have one”  Good for your friends. You don’t. He does now. Good parenting or not I could care less. He got screwed out of a trip to California because of my dumbass mistake. Not checking the expiration date. I swear there are times I’m amazed I haven’t won a Darwin award! But all’s well now. Early Christmas present in hand he’s happy as ever with how things turned out.

The little girl child was far easier to break the bad news to and console. When I told her it’ll be a few months instead of days till we go to America she was distressed for all of thirty seconds till getting distracted. Four year olds are easy to distract. “Squirrel!”

And me? Well I actually laughed about it this morning. My wife’s seen me go through it 100 times. For reasons I’ll never know she stuck it out with me after I returned to life from the relapse to end all relapses some 5,169 days ago. She has her own way of dealing with me that seems to work. After 15 years of marriage she seems to know when I’m coming out of a funk before I do even. She must’ve sensed it this morning. She made some wise crack about me not being able to go to the store because my passport’s expired. I told her I was gonna kick her ass. We’re good. 

The appointment is made I’m off to the US Embassy in Tokyo to renew the passport next week. I’m still not much looking forward to telling all my students about the trip that wasn’t but know deep down it’ll be good for keeping my overactive ego down to its right size. And California? Well it’s been four and a half years since I was last there so guess a few more months won’t kill me.  I’ll show up sober and probably even happy with a valid passport in hand. I wonder if my brother will still be waiting to pick me up at the airport? 

Brother finger NOooooooo!

Do you know the finger family?  

They've got a hit song it's all over the YouTubes.  Go give it a listen but beware! You'll have it stuck in your head for days to come. 

I've been teaching the finger family song to Japanese kindergarten kids the past couple of weeks. I use homemade vocabulary picture cards to go over the words first.

Daddy
Mommy
Brother
Sister
Baby

The kids all know "baby" already, so it's just four new vocabulary words.  Most have them memorized lickity-split.  Then we get to the song.  It's really good for English intonation and rhythm, as well for learning the phrases:
 "Where are you" 
and 
"Here I am"

I drew pictures on my fingers before going to the kindergarten.  Once we start singing I hold up my hand palm facing the kids and wiggle my thumb as the song begins;
"Daddy finger daddy finger where are you"
The kids laugh. I love hearing the kids laugh. It's golden. 

The kids mimic me too. They hold up their hands and wiggle their thumbs, then forefinger, and on down the line just as I'm doing. 

For whatever reason last week I did something different in one class though.  It was a smaller group of kids at a private nursery school that we provide English instruction for.  All of the bigger schools have class sizes ranging from a dozen to over two dozen kids per class, so I'm constantly standing and on the move. There are only four to eight or ten kids per class at this one nursery school though, so I usually sit at the little kid sized table as I teach. 

I must've been reaching in my bag for something when the song began to play or what I don't know, but for some reason instead of holding my hand palm facing the kids I started singing with my hand up palm facing my own face.  I didn't even realize it at first as we all sat there singing;  

"Daddy finger daddy finger where are you?
Here I am, Here I am,How do you do

Mommy finger mommy finger where are you?
Here I am, Here I am, How do you do.

Brother finger brother finger where are you?
Here I am, Here I ...

Holy Sh%@!!!

There I sat with eight three and four year old  kids around the table.
All in song and a'smiling. 
All flipping me off!

I about busted something trying to hold in the laughter.  

Note to self. Keep all fingers extended and palm facing outward. 
Especially when you get to brother finger! 

Ah the joy of teaching little kids. 
 It never, ever, ever gets old. 

This is it.

End of a workday at the end of a workweek, Friday night sitting at the computer not really feeling much like getting up and moving when a pink pajama-clad kid bounces up the stairs “Daddy train!”. She’d been asking since before dinnertime. Not feeling much like pulling the big plastic box full of her brothers' old train set out of the closet I was hoping she’d forget. 
She didn’t forget.
The self-imposed rule is say “Yes” unless absolutely impossible to do so. Times like tonight it’s not always the most enthusiastic “yes” but I say it and act accordingly just the same; I stand to follow her to the boys’ room. Leading the way she stops to get down in sprinter start pose:
"Yoi Don!" (Ready go!) 
She takes off down the hall in big bouncing steps. She beats me there, breaks into dance and starts sing song’n away. I move the stuff off the big plastic train box and pull it out of the closet. I stop and watch.
All I could do then is stand there and smile.
Breath in. Breath out.
Be present.
Bliss.
Some time later imaginary people are driving cars and trains jabbering away at each other in a little girl’s voice behind me. A boy steps into the room: “Daddy tuck tuck”. Every night that I'm home he asks without fail. Every night without fail I stop what I’m doing and heed the tuck tuck call. It may be in its final year if not months. I refuse to miss a tuck tuck. His big brother never asks anymore, but sometimes I give him one anyway. It’s a big win for me when he allows it ever since he passed the big 13.
Watching the sing song dancing girl. Tucking the giggly overly ticklish boy.
This is it.
The longer I do this Life thing, the more of it I experience, the more I realize this is it.
Everything points to Here. It all points to Now. 
This moment.
This is it.

School Cleaning Japan Style

There were still a few open parking places when I pulled into my little girl’s public kindergarten at nine to 8 a.m. this morning.  I’d dropped off my oldest boy and two of his friends at their jr. high for tennis practice on the way.  The drive there with three 7th graders in the car left me in a great mood. The two kids in the back kept giggling and saying “wakaranai” (I don’t understand) every time I said something. The oldest boy riding shotgun understood everything of course, but he said “wakaranai” too. Gotta fit in. I get that. I peppered my English with Japanese so I knew they did in fact understand some. I overcorrected a few turns on the curvy country road making the two in the back seat lean into each other. They laughed themselves silly. Three year old or thirteen makes no difference to me, kid laughter is the best.  Thus the good mood when I arrived at the kindergarten.

Car parked towel in hand I walked with the other arriving parents to the kindergarten grounds behind the school. Once gathered you had to find your kid’s name on the back door. The names were written on pieces of tape and separated by classroom names. I found はな and stuck it on my shirt. 

At exactly, and I mean exactly, 8:00 a.m., the schoolmaster greeted us all―a half circle of parents facing her―about 20 or so dads standing on one side and 30 or so moms on the other. I instinctively took my place on the dad side. I’m the only American, indeed the only non-Japanese, so do my best to do as the Romans do.

“Ohayo gozaimasu” We were greeted with a good morning and a bow. “Thank you for coming. You’re all busy. Thank you. Thank you. A few more words mixed in with a few more thank yous then the mic is passed off to one of the dads. 

I understand 100% of what’s being said in contexts like these. That’s not always the case in Japan. There’s still so much I miss and never will understand. So goes being a stranger in a strange land. But I get it all at kindergarten clean up day. That pleases me. 

Another good morning, another bow, another thanks and few more words then another mic pass to one of the teachers. 

Another good morning, more bowing, more thanks we know you’re all busy along with a promise we’ll try to finish up in a couple hours. 

It's parents clean the public kindergarten day!

I get a kick out of people watching as we all stand around for morning greetings. All Japanese sans me but a wide mix of kinds of people really―men and women of all shades and stripes, blue collar and white collar, country looking folk and city looking folk, one younger dad showing up late in a baggy, shiny sweatsuit with baseball hat on crooked and three sparkly silver earrings in one ear. The rough looking dad who’s always covered in clothing mid neck to the ends of wrists and ankles even at hot summer events is there. I’m 99% sure he’s tatted up from head to toe yakuza style.  I smile and give him my gruffest “ohayo gozaimasu “good morning”. He doesn’t say much but I bet we could share some similar tales of drinking or fighting or the like since I don’t quite have a choir boy background either.  

Then there’s the high fashion moms, the matching sweats clad dad with his rubber boots and cleaning rag in a fancy shopping bag, a dad wearing high dollar rubber boots and coveralls with brand new pruning sheers in hand, a few other dads in older clothes with pruning sheers or saws they brought from home, fat dads and skinny dads, chatty moms and quiet moms, most all but me have gloves in hand. Gloves and helmets are big for any kind of work in Japan. I have neither. I’m American dang it! Badges? We don’t need no stinking badges! I mean gloves. 

Starting speeches and greetings finished we all go to our respective groups. There are two other dads and me along with a lot of moms in Megumi sensei’s group. She’s my little girl’s teacher. She’s a black belt in karate. I like that. I actually trained in the same dojo with her when I first arrived in Japan. She’s freak’n tough! Her “Kiai!” alone is enough to make most wet themselves before turning tail and running. Attackers entering schools are almost nonexistent in Japan. Gun wielding attackers are non existent. I like that too. Still there’s no shortage of nutcases and psychopaths here either so I’m glad my little girl’s teacher is a bad ass karate lady.  

She gives us our jobs. Other groups are out pruning trees, cleaning the big covered rain gutters around the perimeter of the school and grounds, pulling weeds and the like. Our group was on window duty.

Everyone had a zoukin cleaning rag in hand. Everyone brought their own as I guess was written somewhere. Everyone but me that is. Doh! I borrowed one from the school and worked extra hard to make up for the zoukin fail. 

Two low pressure hoses and four buckets, two brushes and two small step ladders we all get to cleaning cobwebs off the screens, scrubbing and washing windows. We’re told just to leave the screens on.  I start to become critical. You’re doing it all wrong! You need to take the screens off dang it! You need to use dry rags after washing otherwise the windows will look like hell. I caught myself midway through my mental criticizing.  It’s cleaning the school, yeah, but it’s so much more than that. 

I’ve joined in on kindergarten and elementary school cleaning for all three of our kids and will go clean the middle school in time I’m sure. I’ve gone to the elementary school a number of times and once so far to the junior high before work to stand out front and greet kids as they arrive for school in the morning. Cleaning the schools, greetings kids at the schools, most if not all parents take part in things like this. We see each other. We say a few words. We get to know who is whose mom or dad. We sometimes realize “Oh our kids are friends”. It’s not about cleaning and greeting so much as it is about community. I know this so I don’t jump in and try to improve their purely substandard cleaning method (by my expert cleaner American standards).  

We’re not even close to being finished by my expert cleaner standards. Look at those cobwebs up there! Look at that screen there’s still all kinds of dust in the corner. No. We’re done. We’ve all cleaned together. We’ve talked. We’ve all glanced around at name tags and all have a bit better idea of who is whose dad or mom. We gather around in a half circle again.  

In her closing speech the schoolmaster said “Okage sama”.  It’s one of my favorite phrases in Japanese. My favorite poet Mitsuo Aida, or Tim Jenson the translator of many of his poems rather, translates it to “Our debt to others.”. I love that. Nobody does it alone. No I did not build this. I did not clean this. I did not make this. I did not achieve this. Not alone. Absolutely nothing is possible in this life without the help of others. Like it or not we’re all indebted to one another. The game is rigged. It’s best that way. The sooner we come to accept it the sooner we find real peace and joy. Or so has been my experience at least. 

Stepping stones

Daisen-san 大仙山 is the name of a mountain nearby.

Fumi ishi 踏み石 is Japanese for "Stepping stone"

This is about the joy of making myself move

I've lost count of how many times I've climbed it since my wife and I moved back to Kannami with our two boys some going on seven years ago now.  I first climed Daisen-san--Mt. Daisen--with the boys shortly after we moved to the Hirai area of Kannami. I'm guessing it's been a good seventy years or better since someone put in the road going partway up it, built the stone pagoda and shrine, huge roofed structure with the freak'n huge brass bell, made the hiking course with benches along the way and such on the mountain.  There's still an old weathered sign on the side of the narrow residential road points to the trailhead. The trailhead is a small paved road, if you can still call it "paved".  No upkeep's been done for years if not decades--not on the hiking course, the huge buddha and 12 Chinese zodiac animals carved and cemented into the giant stone side of the mountain facing the valley, none of it. 

 I remember that first climb well because my older boy yelled "Dad snake!" just in time for me to grab his little brother to keep him from stepping on a mamushi--a Japanese pit viper! A rattlesnake's rattle-less asian cousin. All the hiking paths have long been reclaimed by the mountain so I keep a keen eye out for those things ever since that first pit viper run in.  It's the suzumebachi giant "yak killer" hornets that I look out for the most though. They're the biggest hornets on earth.  Good gosh I hate coming across those things.  

In fall and winter the chances of getting swarmed with giant black and white striped mosquitos that'll leave you with a welt the size of a quarter or crossing paths with suzumebachi giant hornets or mamushi pit vipers are slim to none. Thus I tend to climb it a lot more when the weather turns colder; days like yesterday and today for example.

Home from teaching the sole morning business class of the day yesterday with no kindergarten classes or private adult lessons scheduled I was free till afternoon classes save for printing out lesson plans. What a great chance to read a bit more of Sapiens that I'd picked up in Tokyo I thought.  Alas reading soon became napping. I woke to a dream of swimming way out at sea in Suruga Bay.  I was swimming towards the Western Izu shore. Who was that guy on the raft that I swam by? I felt lazy as I lie there contemplating the dream... 

Dang I've gotta do something! A line from a Mitsuo Aida poem came to mind.  

"It's simply a matter of making yourself move"

I've gotta move! 

Get up and get out the door. On the bike and peddling the next thing I know I'm huffing and puffing up the billy goat steep used to be a road on Mt. Daisen.  I get to the place that once was a small parking lot, slosh through the mud careful not to peddle over any little frogs, peddle around the chain across the even worse path that once was covered in concrete and huff and puff some more till I can't peddle any further.  Lean the bike against a tree then slow jog the last few hundred meters up the twisty turny mossy decomposing leaves and sticks covered path.  Whoa a whole tree! That wasn't here last time. Finally at the flat area near the top where the dilapidated old shrine and bell still stand.

 Kata! "A pure heart is a dojo". Mt. Daisen is my dojo. Not a soul around, still huffing and puffing from the ride and hike/run I go through the five Heian kata then do the Bassai kata a few times.  Ringing the bell and taking a few moments to stop and breath is mandatory before heading back down.  

Two or three years ago a mudslide relocated a tree to the middle of the last turn of the used to be a road.  The stone retaining wall near there has more recently given way to the forces of nature. Some rocks have tumbled down onto the used to be a road and more will be coming soon. Two huge stones are giving way to gravity--to the pressure of steep earth and huge stone behind them.  It was while passing by that that the thought hit...

Fumi ishi!

Yes, the perfect stepping stone. I'd only taken my iPhone and wallet but threw them in my backpack by habit.  It's my smaller daypack but I bet it's big enough to carry that one stone in, and as luck would have it it was!

Home with the stone I felt way better for having made myself move.  

I had far less time between classes today but after putting that stone down I got to thinking "I bet that other big piece broke off of this one".  Back on the bike two km later of huffing and puffing then the final few hundred meter run climb again and there they are.  Not just one piece but three! And two smaller ones I bet they all fit together.  They're all still covered with spots of lichens what an awesome giant stone to sink into place where the lawn never grows next to the deck in our yard!  I'd taken the old, much larger backpack so picked up the pieces, happy they all fit in then went to put it on my back and Ugh! Rocks are heavy you know it! 

But doable methinks.  Quick run over to ring the bell, breath in, breath out. Okay grab the pack let's try this.

The descent was slow and careful and still I about slipped and went down hard a couple times on the wet moss and decomposing leaves covered used to be a road path back to my bike but made it just the same.  Back on the bike I put all my weight back as far as I could, locked up the back disc brake and kept the front brake clinched tight to slowly and safely as possible cruise down to the bottom. Back on the residential road then just a short mile home and done! I just had to weigh myself then weigh again holding the backpack full of stones before taking them out of the pack.  22.2 KG! Holy cow that's almost 50 lbs! No wonder it felt haevy! 

Stones out of the pack puzzle time--fit the pieces together and hey! This is perfect!  

And so goes the tale of my gift from Mt. Daisen, and no cheap gift either mind you.  Call me a tightwad but I'd much rather have an adventure getting my stepping stones than pay 2,000 to 3,000 yen for big ones still not even half this size at the home centers here.  

And so I'll file this one under "The joy of making myself move"