The word emit means to give off or out. A good thing, most would agree. Emit spelled backwards, however, reads 'time'. And I think few would argue that time gives off or out nothing, the word standing diametrically opposed to its anagrammatical mirror self. Not to sound nihilistic, but time draws from us life like a drain unplugged, leaving us cold in the tub. And sometimes time goes down that drain with the gravitational pull of a black hole, leaving us wondering where it all went. Still, in some of life’s most pressing cases, time can emit a saving grace, somehow stopping itself just long enough to save someone’s sorry butt.
Time is both good and bad, on our side and against us, an ever-constant dichotomy we all must live with till our time is up. Conventional wisdom will tell us the more of ourselves we give to time, the more time takes from us, as illustrated in the proverb “the candle which burns the brightest, burns twice as fast.” However, shedding a positive cant of light on the subject, without time there would be no future, no now, no past. Time, you could say, is one of those necessary evils, on our good side or bad, depending on which side of the mirror you're standing. From that perspective, should time be removed from the equation altogether, there would be nothing on which to reflect, and, with regard to this journal, no need to write a single word. So in this sense, time is on my side, and in my best interest, in that I like to write. And so I do. I enjoy measuring with words the cadence, meter, beat, rhythm and melody of my time on this planet: reflections of what I emit in this life.
But here is where it all breaks down.
Two weeks into our 'new life' things are going surprisingly smooth, contrary to what wife, Miko, and I had dreadfully forecasted in the calm before the storm. We thought that when our lives hit the switcher on April 13, our respective trains would certainly hop track, never making it back to the yard. You've got my son, Kai and my one and a half year old daughter, Hana in school for the first time in their lives, me teaching in Tokyo or Yokohama after a long break, and Miko flying to or from some foreign port of call. Craziness. But for whatever reason, it works like a Swiss watch.
Sort of.
Yesterday, with Miko high over the Pacific, and at the height of the morning shuffle here in Kamakura, while I wasn't watching, Hana managed to mousse her hair with—of all things—strawberry jam, and just minutes before having to leave the house, at which time she finds the urge to crap her diaper. Unknowing of this (I have a stuffy nose), I put her on my lap—as I do—to get her situated for quick dressing. It isn't until she sits down that I notice her diaper has turned into a cake decorating bag from hell, as warm brown fecal frosting extrudes out the elastic gathers and onto my freshly ironed slacks.
I think I screamed.
Well, whatever I did, this caused Hana to jump up, turn around, and grab my freshly ironed white shirt. Looking down, I see that my little patissiere/slash/hairdresser extraordinaire still had 'mousse' on her hands. Mind you, this string of events happened within the frame of, say, 40 seconds. And with only a minute or two left to get out the door, I decide to rush Hana into the shower for an improvisational bidet, taking no time to take my socks off, thus adding to the list of unwearable items on my person. So, here we are, Hana now clean as a whistle, yet both of us essential naked: Hana in the literal sense, me in the sense I've nothing else ready to wear except for maybe a fresh pair of socks. I dress Hana at the speed of Superman in a phone booth, and do my best to dab clean the colors, 'pooh bear brown' and 'Fourchon strawberry jam red', and just hoping and praying my students won't notice.
On the upside, Kai was a Superhero throughout all this fuss, having dressed himself while the mayhem unfolded. With no seconds left to spare, we found ourselves propelled in a dematerialized state of hyper acceleration, as if teleported through the door, down the street, and into the schoolhouse, at which time the clock overhead punctuated this feat with resonating agreement.
Time, while in perhaps a strange wrinkle in its otherwise perfect and pendulous march to the everlasting, had emitted its hidden grace on me.
Kamakura
April 25, 2007
Time is both good and bad, on our side and against us, an ever-constant dichotomy we all must live with till our time is up. Conventional wisdom will tell us the more of ourselves we give to time, the more time takes from us, as illustrated in the proverb “the candle which burns the brightest, burns twice as fast.” However, shedding a positive cant of light on the subject, without time there would be no future, no now, no past. Time, you could say, is one of those necessary evils, on our good side or bad, depending on which side of the mirror you're standing. From that perspective, should time be removed from the equation altogether, there would be nothing on which to reflect, and, with regard to this journal, no need to write a single word. So in this sense, time is on my side, and in my best interest, in that I like to write. And so I do. I enjoy measuring with words the cadence, meter, beat, rhythm and melody of my time on this planet: reflections of what I emit in this life.
But here is where it all breaks down.
Two weeks into our 'new life' things are going surprisingly smooth, contrary to what wife, Miko, and I had dreadfully forecasted in the calm before the storm. We thought that when our lives hit the switcher on April 13, our respective trains would certainly hop track, never making it back to the yard. You've got my son, Kai and my one and a half year old daughter, Hana in school for the first time in their lives, me teaching in Tokyo or Yokohama after a long break, and Miko flying to or from some foreign port of call. Craziness. But for whatever reason, it works like a Swiss watch.
Sort of.
Yesterday, with Miko high over the Pacific, and at the height of the morning shuffle here in Kamakura, while I wasn't watching, Hana managed to mousse her hair with—of all things—strawberry jam, and just minutes before having to leave the house, at which time she finds the urge to crap her diaper. Unknowing of this (I have a stuffy nose), I put her on my lap—as I do—to get her situated for quick dressing. It isn't until she sits down that I notice her diaper has turned into a cake decorating bag from hell, as warm brown fecal frosting extrudes out the elastic gathers and onto my freshly ironed slacks.
I think I screamed.
Well, whatever I did, this caused Hana to jump up, turn around, and grab my freshly ironed white shirt. Looking down, I see that my little patissiere/slash/hairdresser extraordinaire still had 'mousse' on her hands. Mind you, this string of events happened within the frame of, say, 40 seconds. And with only a minute or two left to get out the door, I decide to rush Hana into the shower for an improvisational bidet, taking no time to take my socks off, thus adding to the list of unwearable items on my person. So, here we are, Hana now clean as a whistle, yet both of us essential naked: Hana in the literal sense, me in the sense I've nothing else ready to wear except for maybe a fresh pair of socks. I dress Hana at the speed of Superman in a phone booth, and do my best to dab clean the colors, 'pooh bear brown' and 'Fourchon strawberry jam red', and just hoping and praying my students won't notice.
On the upside, Kai was a Superhero throughout all this fuss, having dressed himself while the mayhem unfolded. With no seconds left to spare, we found ourselves propelled in a dematerialized state of hyper acceleration, as if teleported through the door, down the street, and into the schoolhouse, at which time the clock overhead punctuated this feat with resonating agreement.
Time, while in perhaps a strange wrinkle in its otherwise perfect and pendulous march to the everlasting, had emitted its hidden grace on me.
Kamakura
April 25, 2007
No comments:
Post a Comment