My Friend, Japan

What is this? The sun is now setting at a later time, and I am overjoyed at the fact daylight is slowly increasing again. I've had quite enough of the winter darkness. Sometimes I am jealous of the bears that sleep all winter. What a life.

Probably not too realistic though. What excitement though, that spring is heading this way, oh so slowly. As I was walking yesterday, I saw a flock of birds in their typical V, heading north. I was so beside myself with excitement and fascination - exclaiming in my head that this must be a sign of spring's forthcoming arrival. Although to many, the weather really may seem like nothing, what with endless sunny days and daytime temps typically around the 40s or 50s. Yet, I rarely leave the warmth of my heater. Nonetheless! I await spring with anticipation.

So tomorrow marks 6 months since I arrived in Japan (and ironically, today marks 6 months till the wedding). The months have surely flown by, and yet at times the days have a tendency of dragging on forever. Lately I have been contemplating the development of this pre-wedding relationship between David and I - how it changes, adjusts, and adapts. The more I thought, I realized the same idea applies to my relationship with Japan. Yes, relationship.

Those first days of overwhelming amazement, awe and fascination, strikes out on that note. I "fell in love" so to speak, as it wooed me... As time went on, its characteristics became more or less normal, feeling nothing out of the ordinary. I wave my hand to anything..."oh yes it's just Japan." And then, I realized recently, as time has continued, Japan has become a dear friend. As I learn its strengths and weaknesses, good and bad points, and experience it for what it really and truly is, it touches a deeper part of my heart. It reveals its true self, showing vulnerability and yet, unveiling the beauty God bestowed on it from its beginnings.

Though I still experience times outside of my comfort zone (which I am thankful for), this place is a comfort to me. I love to share its joys and sorrows, of course, primarily from my personality, and an outsider. I enjoy getting to know it, to learn about it, and understand it. So, I find there isn't another way to describe how I feel now about it other than express the blossoming of my friendship with Japan.

Of course, it likes to tease me as many of my friends do, and David (who leaves me with sore abs and cheek muscles from laughing so hard when we're together). A couple weeks ago, I put out a few items of laundry to hang in the sun for a bit. Since it has been so dry here, I usually hang the laundry inside to up the humidity a bit, but this particular day I thought to hang some outside. Well, as I mentioned previously, Shizuoka is a wind tunnel or something, at least western Shizuoka. Normally, if the wind is blowing and my clothes are out, they just get blown together at one end of my drying pole. But not this day.

I am sitting on my computer, as usual, after I hang the clothes outside. A little while later, I suddenly hear a crash and some other loud noises. I run to the balcony and pop out the door, to find nothing but a pair of underwear laying on the balcony floor. Um, WHERE are my CLOTHES??? I practically hang over the balcony railing in search of my clothing items, figuring they must have fallen into someone's yard. Sure enough, they had. Interestingly enough, not the neighbor directly below me, but the neighbor below and adjacent to me. There were my clothes, strewn about the yard, one shirt caught on a hook outside their back door.

I ran downstairs and rang the neighbor's doorbell. No one home. Blast. I ran back upstairs and wrote a note, detailing all the items I had lost in their yard to tape to their door for when they arrived back home. Thankfully, the note worked and all my clothes were returned. Probably the most important point of this story is that somehow the underwear had slung itself off the hanger and flipped back to the balcony while everything else decided to take a trip to the neighbor's yard. That, I believe, saved quite a bit of embarrassment for me and the man who brought my clothes back. Ah....sumimasen....

Friends also like to do nice things for friends - and because of various health issues I have been dealing with over the past couple years, I am going to try a stringent diet for a couple months or possibly longer (it's not weight related, so don't worry, if anything I could stand to gain a pound or two) to see if I can't fix anything. Well, to my amazement, I have suddenly discovered various websites I can order all kinds of organic and whole foods from, even vegetables. I was smiling and dancing around my apartment by all this good news. And when a box of goodies I ordered from one place came, it was like Christmas opening it. (It really did feel more like Christmas than the actual Christmas, at least the opening presents part.) So, we'll see how this goes.

Speaking of food, I need to go clean up the kitchen and make something to eat. Here's to 6 months.