Writing introductions is a bit tedious so....just take a look at my first post if you want to know more....

....and if you get curious about the name of this World or my posts, check out the second one.

Higher Than the Moon

Every morning I look out across the city from my 6th story balcony and try to see Mt. Fuji. If I can see it I know it's going to be a good day. I know it because I tell myself it's going to be a good day. It's something I decided a long time ago, the first time I saw it. Just the way I decided the moon makes me stronger. It's the best kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. The moon let me down a bit last weekend....

I couldn't sleep so well last night. Probably from all the sleeping I did over the weekend I'm sure. Whatever the cause I woke up feeling a bit.....grouchy. My first thought was, "I need aleve." my second, "No way am I listening to my Japanese language podcast on the bus to school."

I went out the front door and looked automatically to the east (it's the way out of the building, I have to). There it was, big & cold as ever & I thought, "Maybe today won't suck after all." Then, for no reason at all I turned around and looked back. And there was the moon, not quite full anymore, but shining all the same reflecting the barely risen sun. Definitely not the beginning of 2009's first bad day.

Know what my podcast was about? Why Mt. Fuji isn't a World Heritage site. It's too bad people don't care enough to try and change that, but who knows? Someday they might be different. It's got a better chance than the moon anyway.

Wasted but Wanted

I think I might be turning into my cousin. I've been spending ridiculous amounts of time putting on makeup...

For me the world is often very black and white. It's one thing or the other. (Surprisingly, one of my favorite colors is gray.) If there are sides I'm on one of them. And therefore, not the other. But despite whatever small armies might form there'll always be one person more important than any other.

My Nichole. It's her birthday tomorrow. I couldn't believe how much she actually had missed me when I went home. Missed me to the point that she was jealous of Stacey. I never thought I'd see the day. And as it turns out, they're not so similar after all. I may have to think of a new analogy...

Except for one thing. Both of them, despite the overwhelming evidence that it's a bad idea, love me. It's a strange feeling. It's something I always thought I decided on my own. "That girl needs me to protect her so I'll be her friend." or something self-serving like that. Turns out it wasn't. Turns out I was blind again. For some weird reason, they chose me. I might never figure that one out...

Will You Be My Enemy?

I wasn't prepared to hear them say they'd stay. I wasn't prepared for him to hug me. I definitely wasn't prepared for her to get mad about something I wasn't aware she wanted. But that's always the way of it. I think and I think, and I think that I'm thinking. In the process of which I don't notice what's actually happening. It's a bit of a problem. Being concerned with loss. Being tongue-tied with embarrassment. Being overwhelmed by fear. These are things I thought I was finished with, but the cold creeps in and the child of the sun shrivels and hides. She may not wake up again till Spring. And by then it may be too late. They just might give up on me like they did someone else.

It's amazing how tight the trigger has gotten. But no matter how many times it's fired the tension never lessens. (wow, this could read really disgustingly....) Maybe it's because the target doesn't really exist. It's a doppelganger. Not even a shadow of it's own image. Just something created with smoke and mirrors. But I think and I think, and I think and the swirling obscures reality so it can never be found again. Too many costumes have been fitted one over the other and the actor himself has been lost from sight. (wow, can I think of another metaphor?)

I think I'm done for today.

Hole in My Heart

I want to write something but I can't think of anything important that's happened. Interestingly, I just realized that while Japan has become home, the friends of Florida still remain my friends. It's the ones of now that are the "friends". Sad. I love them. I'll miss them. I have the distinct feeling very soon in fact. We're having dinner tomorrow night & I'm almost sure, based on the lack of much other communication from them all week, that they've decided to go home next summer. For good. I don't want to see them.

Second Contact (it was beyond the scope of our understanding)

I went home for Christmas. That's what they called it at least. "Coming home for Christmas." I'm not really sure what I'd call the trip. I went to Gainesville, Florida. My once, twice, and (perhaps) future home. But not my home of now. The home of now is filled with riceballs and mountains, cold and colder and coldest, and the anticipation of hanami in 4 more months.......therefore, Japan=home, Florida="home". Which is better, I don't know.

At the suggestion of my dear "Mokuba-niisan", who, being German, has been going through this all his life in the States, I'm going to make a list of all the once-ordinary-now-insane things about my "home". The first thing he said after he hugged me hello was, "Are you having culture shock?" and I had a new appreciation for him. He knew, like nobody else could what I was feeling that first morning after the 26 hour journey and 8 hour nap.

Niisan's farm

Even before I saw him and his crazy wife and active, blond, doomed-to-a-too-full-life sons I knew I was having a hard time readjusting to the US. The first signs came in the Minneapolis airport.
Sign #1 - I had no idea what to order at any of the fast food restaurants, and was hysterically afraid of even walking up to a counter so I ate a riceball from my backpack.
Sign #2 - despite my nearly dead iPod battery I turned it on in the waiting room in order to block out the sound of the CNN lady speaking English. Unfortunately her overly made up face was still visible. That and the proximity of 3 portly old men who I could almost hear forced me to move seats so I could be one of the first on the plane despite the freezing blasts that issued from the boarding door every time it opened.

After niisan suggested I write the list and flew off to Germany with his artist family I foolishly thought it was perfectly fine for me to hop in the car he'd loaned me and drive over to Publix, the "local" grocery store. Publix might be Florida's biggest corporate icon, right after Disney of course.
Problem with Publix #1 - I forgot where everything was
Problem with Publix #2 - the shelves were so tall I felt claustrophobic

Darwin doesn't mind close-ups

By the time I'd left Publix I spent nearly $100 without even realizing it, but I had started to notice 2 definite patterns in my shock-freakout.
Pattern #1 - I'd forgotten how to use American money
Pattern #2 - I was petrified of people speaking to me b/c I didn't know how to answer them

That evening I went out to eat Mexican with two girls I used to teach preschool with. I'd been looking forward to this meeting for over a month at least but it turned out both embarrassing and disappointing.
Embarrassment #1 - I couldn't read the menu, the letters just kept swimming in front of me. This was probably more due to residual jetlag than any loss of English ability, but made me panicky nonetheless.
Disappointment #1 - Angie and Amanda didn't seem to care much about my pictures and stories of Japanese life, just if I had a boyfriend.
Embarrassment #2 - I answered the waiter in Japanese when he brought the food.
Disappointment #2 - My two friends now seemed closer to each other than they'd ever been to me, even though it was me who introduced them. I couldn't really understand most of what they talked about. It seemed really small and trivial just like the cliched "reverse culture shock" essay in the JET manual.
Embarrassment #3 - They were rude to the waitress. She was a bitch, but still, they were rude.
Disappointment #3 - I couldn't finish my food. And it, at least hadn't let me down. Damn good Mexican.

Really.

After that I felt like I was running around town the rest of the trip. It was nothing but unexpected expenses and misplaced guilt.
Unexpected expense #1 - 2 cavities $404
Unexpected expense #2 - eye doctor $150
Misplaced guilt #1 - I slept through an "international potluck" my second day in town where I could have seen a bunch of old students.
Misplaced guilt #2 - I neglected my brother, my mother, my best friends, there was always someone....

There were a few contradictions laced into that crazy blur that made it sometimes easier, sometimes more surreal.
Contradiction #1 - I could drive. Well. Without a second thought.
Contradiction #2 - all my friends had warned me, "the first thing you'll notice when you go back to the US is everyone is fat & loud" but I mostly just noticed them being tall. Some were fat, I gradually began to see, and some were loud, but mostly they just talked about inappropriate things in normal voices.
Contradiction #3 - the cats I'd left behind years ago, 1 with each of my parents, were far more excited to see me than the 2 with my aunt who'd spent their entire lives with me until I moved to Shizuoka. Damn Egyptian priestess...

Like chickens with our legs cut off.

I'd like to say more about the trip, and maybe my New Year's Eve but not now. It wasn't all bad. This was just the bad post. The list of why I'm glad to be back in Japan in reverse. Looking forward to 3 months of not running around.

Casey: The rest of you are all out there running around like chickens with your legs cut off.
Jeremy: You mean heads.
Casey: What?
Jeremy: Running around like chickens with our heads cut off. If our legs were cut off we wouldn't be running around at all.