It is summer again and then also friday, and so I find myself back in Sapporo, that slightly sticky and yet always packed place on 49th street. The only seat for the only me is at the counter. The man next to me is clearly not Japanese, he ordered a salad, which looks very limp and almost transparent. It is not the specialty here.
I will have yet another Hiyashi, that cold bowl in mustard soup, which will have me filled and slow until tomorrow, I guess.
Right now, I can just sit here and listen to the noises and smell the burned pieces of something, the things that did not quite make it in to the broth.
In front of me, in the refrigerated display, I think it might be rice with pink flakes, all wrapped in shrinkwrap, and then some more in tupperware.
There is a bowl of lemons. They must have been prepared a few days ago. The foil on the bowl is slowly changing shape.
I like the animals most. To my right there is a little family of small animals. A grassing horse, almost completely stripped of its original paint, lays on its side and guards a pile of paper napkins… He is the chosen one, observed by three other animals, similar in size, yet not quite as ideal for this particular job. The glass elephant is probably least suited. The little blue guy would probably just break if a hand reached out for him to allow two of its fingers to grab one of the napkins.
The horse is a perfect one for this job.
Hiyashi chukka arrives, it looks like a mess, like leftovers, artfully prepared to please the various senses.
I fold the keyboard and put the palm into my chest pocket. This is where it starts to vibrate, almost immediately.
I do not let it make any sounds. At least no alarm sounds. It vibrates three times.
I have 15 minutes to finish and to get back to the agency. I forgot to enter the location of the meeting. I like entering data by hand. It slows me down, but it allows me to have the feeling that I am dealing with some sort of an analogue device. I feel as if I were the one painting time… colors…I do not think the hiyashi will hold me over until tomorrow.. I will probably try to find something to add to myself before the sun sets. I will probably have to eat a little more.
The man next to me gets up at exactly the same time as I.
I do not even have a receipt. The lady at the door knows me well enough to just request the right amount of money.
Did I tell you that I would like to just lock myself into a room and just draw for at least two years?..
Where did this idea come from?…
I moved on,… it is the evening now… it is wet outside, raining. I took a different train to get here. I took it to avoid the heavy rain. There is thunder outside.
I like typing on a little device that lets me do just that. No distractions… just typing. Tiny letters appearing on a small screen, one by one. I do not trust my fingers. I watch my fingers as I am typing… and yet, looking at the screen works quite as well… it seems…
home is where the greygoose is… and the juice and the water and the key works… and I wish I were somewhere else.
The glass is empty now. There are no doubts about this….
Across the street, on the fifth floor, the mother decided to walk around naked.
The plants are falling asleep, as the sun is setting.
I miss slow conversations in a dark room with a green ceiling. We would find out that my taste was unfashionably mainstream. I would learn that ultra vivid scene music is beautiful, even if there was wax on the record.
The waves of truth are now slowly taking over and my hands would love to perform larger gestures than just typing…
my forehead is sweaty.. .and it feels like the best idea now would be to get more of that colorless french bird… just to completely break all the edges of the evening.
This right here, might be the perfect moment… could it be? Not sure really…