7/21/2021

i apologize for not being more diligent in writing in this blog. to be honest, iʻve been busier than usual, even though it was the summertime. i have been trying my best to earn enough money to send my daughter over to berkeley, which costs about $60,000 a year (at least). so i took on a couple of classes at the acupuncture school, and taught summer hub (summer school). i also have a gig developing an online lesson on hawaiian shark teeth, through nprʻs educator phenomenon forum. so between those three things, itʻs been pretty hectic. not to mention just sort of keeping up with other things, like the car maintenance, or coaching robotics. i get tired at the end of the day, and i just stopped doing my routines...

sometimes keeping busy keeps me from thinking about things overmuch. like the fact that my daughter will be leaving soon. it seems so swift, the passage of time. i remember not so long ago when i would hold her up in the air laughing... or i would do her hair in pony tails so she could go to preschool... her happy laughter. when did that little girl transform into this woman? iʻm not sure... i suppose it happened at the same time that this youngish father began to turn old and decrepit, lol.

iʻm still working on the writing of that stupid story. at times, i have faith that just hanging with it will eventually lead to something. it seems sometimes that persistence opens up a new pathway, a new perspective on the writing, and iʻm able to proceed just a little... but then, i end up writing myself into blind corners. it gets really frustrating. thereʻs no core, or structure, that can prevent you from making these mistakes, because you are the one weaving this house of lies from thin air. you make the walls, you make the rooms, and if itʻs not believable, well, that omnipotence of creation comes with a price, because you can definitely make something incongruous and ridiculous; nothingʻs stopping you from doing that.

i havenʻt drawn anything in a while.

i also havenʻt practiced japanese in a while.

i also also havenʻt done taijiquan in forever.

and my health is probably going. i just eat and sleep. and cough. i have this insistent nagging itch and irritation in my throat. itʻs definitely not covid, but itʻs just a sensitivity in my throat to the things that i eat: especially greasy things. i wish the irritation would settle down, but it hasnʻt gone away in probably years. i suppose that now that i have insurance, i should visit a doc and get it checked out. but i tend to put things off when it comes to my own self-maintenance... heck, maybe iʻve got cancer, colon cancer, who knows...

there really isnʻt much to update you all on. my life is just routines that i put off and routines that i honor. iʻm just trying to survive, and keep up with the endless obligations. i hope you are alright, reader, and things are going okay for you. i think that the way the world is going right now, we all just need some moments where it seems like things are alright... i think if you narrow your focus, and your context, you can at least pretend a peace. like, i canʻt control tomorrow, and i canʻt answer for yesterday, but in this moment, in this inescapable, fleeting moment, i can just- i donʻt know- be...

and with that little piece of bs, iʻll leave you... till the next check in.

dream 7/11/2021

i canʻt recall all the details of this dream. i do remember standing next to this beautiful woman, in a room with people all lined up, as in some kind of dance. and we would all be cued to do the motions for some kind of dance. i recall one "line" of the song had people clapping their hands, and the woman suggested that i clap behind my back (apparently that was more "in style"). the line wrapped around the room, and so i could see the back of one large dude somewhat across the room. he was wearing this big t-shirt. he was a big framed korean dude. anyway, it seemed as if he was looking for some "company" (i recall the word "sticky" as in warrior), and the person who headed the place (i guess you could call him the pimp) laughed at him. and then when i saw the big dudeʻs face in profile, i could see why. his head was somewhat chinless, and resembled the pale extension of some worm, with his neck rising up straight to his buck-toothed maw. and the skin was covered in pink and purple zits. he certainly didnʻt look desirable. but i thought to myself that i was sure that all sorts of ugly went through whorehouses, and the workers couldnʻt be picky about their clientelle... still, it seemed as though he wasnʻt going to get any that night.

somehow the dream transferred over to the big korean guyʻs line of work. he was apparently some sort of delivery boy in a very cutthroat and competitive field. he would ride/drive this compact one seater (it resembled some sort of bicycle, only it had a thin shell of some sort of flimsy metal wrapped around its entirety like a burrito). i watched as one competitor raced down this grassy hill, only to crash and tumble down the slope, while the big korean guy had discovered a hidden path around the slopeʻs periphery...

near the bottom, as he was waiting to get his delivery accepted (it looked like he was selling a bunch of different kinds of cigarettes), he noticed one of his other competitors lying in the shade. it was a girl, but she looked like a boy. her hair was cut short and sloppy. she was lying in the grass, dressed in a t-shirt and shorts, with twigs all over her. you could just see the shape of her nipples poking sharply, through the t-shirt. apparently, she was the master at this game of competition, and here he was, seeing her in a moment of rest...

[thatʻs all i really remember/]

dream, 6/6/2021

this was a morning dream. meaning, i had already woken up once, but still in that sleepy grip, lapsed back off again while the sun was already up. i dreamt i was back in williams, but again, a williams i would say i had a hard time recognizing, or navigating through. i supposedly had a beautiful room, in one of the "wings" of this building, but as much of the building was still under construction, i was having a very difficult time getting to it. there would be entire sections of the building that were closed off. so i remember kind of making my way around to get to where i was supposed to be. on the way, i think i stumbled into some forgotten places. it looked as though at one point, i was clambering over a storage space, and looking into a lot of flotsam and jetsam from students over the decades: a mirror with the profile of people cut into it. other things. at the same time, i came to the realization that it was friday, and that all the "kids" were itching to party. and i thought how odd it was, and how i couldn't really feel that, or feel the same way.

there was that feeling, of not measuring up. it was strange, but i wasn't at williams as in a memory of the place. i was conscious that i had already graduated. i had already "passed" this place. but somehow i was back, perhaps to earn a different degree or something. there was this notion that the only place i could perform to a higher standard was here, because i was pushed to excel here. everywhere else, i was only degenerating...

*****

i recall now that there was an earlier part of the dream, one in which i was travelling back somewhere. i had some sort of strange (but cheap) vehicle; it was elongated and yellow, with tapered ends. at the "center" where the driver sat, there was some sort of (motorized?) wheel. basically, the thing ran almost like a fulcrum, with the ends gently going down to the ground as i moved... only, at one point the tip of my vehicle kind of broke... i believe me father was there, i recall him talking to me. and other people. and all around where other inventions, similarly strange vehicles. this was on an old cracked sidewalk... 

dream, 5/18/2021

i remember walking around with this huge backpack. and these two kids asked for something back, something i carried in the backpack for a long time. and i remember them going in and taking them, two dolls. the kids were siblings, and they missed their dolls, the ones i had been carrying for an inordinately long time. i recall that the bag seemed cavernous as i looked into it. i saw other dolls, other things. and scraps of paper, some with writing like "free william faulkner" from a student that i doubted had ever read faulkner. also, a room, a library, with walls of glass, and very colorful art projects, one in all yellow and green... there seemed a purpose to my journey, but then again, it seemed like i was just looking... can't recall other parts of the dream at the moment...

i've been inordinately tired. like super tired. i think this whole graduation thing (my daughter just graduated from high school) is really bearing down on me... well, there are so many other things. thinking about how to pay for college. my mother's amnesia.

dream 5/13/2021

so some time has passed, and i can't remember all the details of the dream... i remember driving out of the garage at my home when i was in high school, the two story one in the middle of the culdesac. i wasn't quite in control of the car, maybe was reaching for something behind me as i reversed, so at the last moment, i flipped the gear to park just so that it wouldn't run into anything else... there was another car at one point, and we (there were others in the car too) had to wait... and then it was again a rolicking ride out of the culdesac and into the looping block...

at some point, i got out. i was driving some sort of mini-scooter, motorized. i was taking these obscure back pathways around the block, behind people's lots. there was actually one point where the ground dropped sharply away, next to this fence, and i had to get off the scooter and sort of walk things down to get to the other side... anyway, i managed to complete the block on the scooter. it actually took my out of the way of where i needed to be... and i realized that i would have to run my way (?) back to where the car was, so i could continue to drive to work...

oh yes. in the background was this sneaking suspicion (?) that i was late for work. so all the while that i was scootering around this block, i was thinking about what was going on in the classroom... people were trying to operate things without me... it was now one hour late, and i hadn't contacted anyone to let them know what was going on... just general anxiety about stuff... so i suppose that's why i HAD to run once i completed the block (again, not sure where that scooter thing went)...

and that's it. boring.

preliminary thoughts, mother's day; 5/9/2021

 my grandma mitakara always spoke of innen, roughly translated as "causality." it was an idea, common to buddhism, of the ways in which past actions (sometimes even in past lives) shaped the present. there was this notion that patterns repeated, sometimes across generations, due to some unacknowledged or unaddressed causal factors...

it's funny, but in 2009, after my grandmother's funeral, and before the epic falling out i had with my brother, i had concerns about what my grandmother's death would do to our family. it was she that tied us all together. before her death, we would have get-togethers every now and again at the ewa beach house...

it was common knowledge that my mother didn't get along all that well with her siblings, my aunty kiyomi and uncle masao- all the more reason why those occasional get-togethers were so vital. so i guess in 2009, a bit after the funeral, i had written a message to my then fb friend brother and my cousin about this, suggesting that we, as the grandchildren, make an effort to have our parents (and uncle masao) get together periodically to continue the tradition and wishes of my grandmother; perhaps hosting some informal lunch or something... i had even thrown out suggestions for rules of engagement, just in case things got out of hand... the message was dated 7/9/2009.

it's now 2021, and i suppose our efforts failed. to be honest, i can't even recall that effort, or even that i had that idea. the irony was that i had this inkling to contact my brother via facebook, just to send him a message (but of course, i can't, as apparently, i have been blocked from messaging his personal account; i can only send messages to his "professional persona," which would likely be monitored by people other than himself). the reason, i suppose, was that i felt a lot of things were coming to a head. my daughter's graduating next week (not that he or his family were expected to celebrate that)... but more than that, is the fact that tomorrow (today) is mother's day.

my mother, i fear, is developing dementia. it's not unexpected, i know, for people her age. but i suppose it's ominous and sad because she is such an involved person, involved in the sense of always extending both invisible and tangible lines of support to all corners of the world (and, of course, our family)... my mother has always been someone who only offered the bright and generous side of herself to the world. it is only in off moments that she discloses (beside herself) the things that sadden or concern her... the dementia, i suppose, betrays the secret rifts in her heart.

today being mother's day, i know that one of those rifts were those severing my brother, sister, and i. i know that one of her wishes was to have all of us kids together under the same roof, sharing a meal.

5/8/2021

yes, it has been over a week since i last posted. again, a lot has been going on. i started teaching a new course at the acupuncture school, on therapeutic ethics. i had to prepare for the class, and actually am still working on it to make it the best that i can. i had to change a lot of the prepared statements from a previous instructor, because he spoke a lot about "spirituality" and "religion," which i feel are precisely the worst things to talk about in a class about ethics. i think, first of all, that one of the biggest dangers or downfalls of a professional of any sort is to think you are an expert in any and all things, and i think once you start straying into "spiritual" guru-hood, you are asking for trouble. i believe that professionals should be humble. they have a specific expertise, and they can be masters in that field, and can provide advice, etc. related to that; but once you start going outside of that, and speaking to people about problems or issues which you could not possibly understand intimately... well. that's how ethical boundaries are broken.

just my opinion, of course.

it's not that, personally, you can align what you do with your spirituality. it's that i feel that should be a private matter. if it makes your actions resonant with your personal beliefs, then fine. do that, believe that. i think the trouble lies in claiming some sort of superiority to your clientelle in those fields. and as "spirituality" nowadays tends to have this all-encompassing reach... again, i feel like i'm just recycling my argument. it's dangerous.

i'm preferring to make the class as open-ended and ambiguous as possible. i'm trying not to make my own personal viewpoint authoritative. i DO intend to share the codified ethics of various organizations and levels within our profession, just so that students know what the legal stance is, regardless of their personal morality or communal ethics...

*****

school is slowly winding down. i think the kids feel it. they're certainly acting like it...

i may have mentioned but my daughter is going to attend berkeley, which has a $60,000 a year estimated price tag for out of state students... there are no grants for out of state students, which means that we would have to depend upon loans. needless to say, i'd rather not do that. of course, she's attending at the worst time for us, financially. i may have mentioned my wife lost her job of 20 years due to the pandemic. she's been trying to find new employment, but it hasn't been easy. meanwhile, with my state job, and its crappy union benefits, i've had to foot the bill for our family's health insurance, which is exorbitantly expensive... for teachers in our state, paid pretty much last place when cost of living is taken into account... for these teachers to be forced to take such a huge cut out of that shit that they pay us, just for basic medical insurance... it's an insult. and now, our family is reduced to one fourth of what our income used to be... and being held to pay for my daughter's college at the same time.

so again, that's why i'm working a bit more classes at the acupuncture school... i have these stupid ideas of finishing my book and trying to sell it. but i think most people buying it would be doing so out of pity. i've realized long ago that no one really wants to read my stupid stories, and as i age, i have less compulsion to tell them, and less memory to find them... so... it would be nice if our financial situation pushed me to write a masterpiece, but i guess you can't force a cannonball out of a pistol... just doesn't work that way.

*****

i get inspired at times... i think i'm inspired, for a time, whenever i listen to salman rushdie. i really like the guy... a very knowledgeable and patient instructor, frank... but when i run up against myself... against the dead weight that is me... it gets very frustrating.

*****

i listened to some electronic music from french??? they had this song called "hometown." the video just sort of tells the story of 4 separate strangers who each encounter some sort of phenomenon that they cannot explain, a "signal," i guess, and they each get inspired in different ways... i was thinking of utilizing that "feeling," the feeling of seeing something you can't explain, in the next story, on "kipapa." seeing the night marchers... usually we connote it with horror, because that is what you are supposed to feel when seeing those macabre lines of torches... but perhaps it could also connote a sense of wonder. and maybe a feeling of commonality with those isolated few who happen to see it too. you belong to a sort of club... and the idea of having it inspire people to attempt to capture that signal again... the idea that life is empty and meaningless after having seen something wonderful and terrifying like that... i would like to convey that somehow...