2024/03/15

The following is a piece I wrote in my hospital room on August 7, 2011.
This morning, as I was dozing, this song was playing in my mind……2016-05-30
The following is a piece I wrote in my hospital room and shared with the world on August 7, 2011, during my eight-month hospitalization for a life-threatening illness.
August 7 immediately brings Tanabata to mind for the people of Sendai.
I am deeply moved by the thought that I was writing this piece on that very day.
Yesterday, as usual, I woke up before five in the morning.
I wake a little early because I go to sleep when the little birds go to sleep and wake when they wake.
As I lay dozing in bed, thinking it was still a little too early, John Lennon’s “Isolation” came to mind.
As I wondered which song had started playing, the next one I heard was “God.”
Well, well, what an outstanding song.
I must find the best photograph to suit this song.
But then I remembered what Ms. Kurikinton had said yesterday.
“They are such good photographs that it would be a shame to publish them for free.”
I thought again, “Yes, that is quite right.”
Last night, I went to sleep after watching the final episode of NHK BS’s special program on Zhou Enlai, and today I woke up at four in the morning, even earlier than yesterday.
As I lay in bed, thinking it was still a little early to get up, Arcade Fire’s “Lenin” came to mind.
That such things happen in a brain like mine is no act.
There is a reason for everything.
All right, let’s get up and have a look at goo.
And since so many people are reading my writing on goo, I will post a few of my beautiful photographs as a thank-you.
Yesterday, I wrote about Takaaki Yoshimoto.
Simply put, as my readers, close friends, and those around me know well, I have lived my life as a thoroughgoing outsider.
As I have written many times, it is no exaggeration to say that I have walked the same path as Buddha and Christ. (Loud laughter.)
Unlike the so-called cultural figures, I chose Bob Dylan and John Lennon as giants of thought, or “companions on this journey” (of course).
I have visited Hawaii 47 times.
I should have written a story about this island that only I could have written.
Had I done so, it would probably have become a huge bestseller by now. (Laughter.)
For example, toward the end of a trip to Hawaii, when I was alone in Waikiki, listening to John Lennon on my iPod, looking out at the sea from the sidewalk facing the Waikiki beachfront, and repeatedly sensing the lament in my own eyes, I had what Kierkegaard called “Fritjof’s eyes gazing out at the sea.”
My reflections there, far from being inferior to Takaaki Yoshimoto’s, surpassed them. (Loud laughter.)
Why that was, I shall leave a mystery for now.