Friday, November 14, 2008

the final send off was im-perfection

I am leaving for the airport and will say good-bye to Tokyo and my mom in just a few hours. I feel so many emotions but the first and foremost is that I am sad I will no longer have the pleasure of experiencing Yoko in her natural habitat living her daily life. So my departure will also likely mark the end of my blogging days. Well, blogging with any kind of regularity I mean. She will still do amazing things I'm sure, but my noting them will certainly be fewer and further between.

Last night we went out to eat, just the two of us. Our beverages arrived first and my mom lifted her hot tea to toast me. Of course she immediately splashed hot tea on herself. The toast went like this, "Bon Voyage! Achiiiiiiie!" which loosely translates as "
Hot! Ow! Ouch!"

I laughed and cried both tears of joy and sadness. This is kind of how I am summing up this past year, with tears of joy and sadness.

Monday, November 10, 2008

I swear to God this really happened.

Abbot and Costello have nothing on us:
Y: You know, I found that in your room today.
N: (abject terror) WHAT?! 

Y: My metronome.
N: Oh! I thought you were going to say mukade. Don't scare me like that!
Y: (enters my room) Ha ha. I forgot about mukade.
N: Well, I haven't.
She looks at the kimono I have hanging up air-pressing wrinkles out before I have to wear it on Wednesday.

Y: This is nice!
N: Yeah, I'm going to wear it Wednesday to the sobetsukai.
Y: Where's mine?
 
I'd sent three out for cleaning; they'd belonged to my grandmother and hadn't seen the light of day since whenever, a long time ago. Two I will bring with me back to the US. One is a formal kimono of the style of a married woman, with the Matsuda crest on it. My mom told me I should have it cleaned for her. 
N: Over there in the wrapping.
We open the package and look at it.
Y: That's not mine. I've never seen it before.
N: Yeah, I know. It was baba's.
Y: You're not going to take it with you?
N: No, I can't wear it because you can only wear it if you're married.
Y: But, I'm not married.
N: Argh! You know what I mean! Anyway, Sumie-san said that you can wear it to a formal event, like if I ever get married or whatever, you can wear it to my wedding.
Y: Will you get married then, so I can wear this kimono?
N: Ha ha ha!
Y: Really. It doesn't matter to who.

Friday, November 7, 2008

Why she is great

Obviously there are too many reasons to put here now. This blog can only exist because of why she is great. Here is one more reason:

A few weeks ago she was getting ready to go play a concert in Tateshina. I happened to find her list for the concert. Listed, in this order:
Violin
Music
Music stand
Coffee etc.

I didn't comment on it at the time, but when I finally thought to tease her about needing to write 'violin' on her list of things to take, she told me that she always does because once
on the way to the airport to begin a tour she realized she'd forgotten her violin at home . She had to borrow a violin for the first venue. It's amazing to me, too.

I was talking about this kind of thing with Jun chan who had stayed at our house to take care of gramps while we were on our trip. It came up because my mom almost left to teach with out her violin the very morning after we'd joked about the list. Anyway, she told me about a time she was talking to her boyfriend on her cell phone getting ready to leave and was freaking out because she couldn't find her cell phone. Her boyfriend told her he was sure she'd find it the moment they hung up. And of course, she did. It's good to know that this greatness will continue into the next generation. Hopefully one day Jun chan's child will also start a blog, but they'll need to come up with a different name than 'my crazy tokyo mother' or else I swear I'll sue.