The big summit of your 20s is learning how to be alone.
I could write you a list of the events and meals and quiet moments that I skipped in my fear of loneliness, or I could just tell you this. I have “6222 Rose Street'' memorized, the address of the college house where seven of my closest friends lived, whereas I don’t have the faintest idea of what my own San Diego address was. At my friends’ house, I would sit on the sunken couch for long stretches of morning waiting for someone to peer out of their room, sleepy-eyed and slipper-clad, and accompany me on a mundane trip to the store or out for lunch. I could have gone by myself, but I needed companionship to make the maintenance of my life worthwhile. In my frailness, I preferred loitering amongst half-finished boba drinks and year-round string lights to going out into the big, bad world all by my lonesome. I’m better now, I think. Or at least better at faking it. Less adherent to the idea that someone my age needs to be surrounded by people all the time - that if I’m not, it’s a sign that I’m unlikeable and unloved. As part of my reformation, I took a solo trip to Oita Prefecture, home of famous hot springs and not home to anyone I know. I planned to write a blog on the experience, entitle it “Dating Myself in Beppu” and write happily and tidily about the positives of spending time alone. And that’s what I did, mostly, but the writing felt flat and regurgitated and brittle - my words dragging my mind towards a reverence of solitude, my heart left somewhere between codependency and connection. I sat on the blog for some time, busied myself by writing bad poetry, then decided to tell you the truth. Being alone is nice, yes, but being together is precious.
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In my final semester of college, my phone broke and erased all photographic evidence of my undergrad years. When the Apple Genius Bar employee informed me that all my pictures were gone, I thanked him, then had a panic attack in the shopping mall parking lot. I cried until the windows of my car fogged over with anguish. I bargained, wondering whether I’d give a thousand dollars, five thousand dollars, a fingernail to get them back. I cried the next day too, despite knowing how silly it was to grieve for pixels on a screen. Digital dust worth nothing to everyone except me.
I mourned the symbolism of the photos more than the photos themselves. I mourned not being able to return to my prior states of mind, knowing I’d forget how I felt and what I thought was worthy of being captured and stored. I considered the entirety of my coming-of-age being captured through others’ eyes, slivered and hacksawed and peripheral, and wept. For a time, I tried to recall the things that only I would know. Don’t forget about eating mangos on the beach. Don’t forget about your sorority sister’s tiny cat gnawing on your toe. Don’t forget about the market visits with your only local friend in Cambodia. Don’t forget about dancing in international nightclubs to Western mega-hits of the 80s. Don’t forget about that textured yellow skirt, and how the San Diego spring air pulsed with possibility, and how you felt falling in love and swearing it wasn’t so. And then I forgot to stop forgetting, and I kept living. And everything was the same, despite a valuable era of my life existing nowhere except the leaking container of my mind. When the dust cleared, I realized that I am more than my things. And I am only my things. Did I lose something irreplaceable or did I retain everything that matters? It’s a difficult question. But in pondering it, I gained the callousness to pursue minimalism with full intent. It taught me that everything I own is at once, deeply precious, and entirely expendable. The media lied to me because Japanese folks are not all porcelain-skinned. In fact, most people in Kanoya are tan, just as tan or tanner than me from farming and genetics and school clubs under the humid sun that shines all the way through mid-October. This, compounded by my straight-cut bangs and Muji-laden wardrobe, are apparently enough to make me pass for Japanese. The mask probably contributes too. In any case, I lack the shield of appearing outwardly foreign, which means I have many conversations that start in Japanese and end one sentence later with me saying “ごめんあさい、日本語を話しません.” (Sorry, I don’t speak Japanese).
In my new landscape of Japan, I have the communication ability of an infant. It is an interesting phenomenon, to be at the mercy of others’ patience and goodwill. To be rendered mute by my own unknowing. But I suppose, even in our native languages, that is still the case. Many bilingual individuals attest that they’re a different person in every language that they speak. As they switch from one tongue to another, their personality shifts. It might be a consequence of the cultural norms embedded into the language itself, or the context in which it was picked up or practiced. Is it a language spoken by friends, parents, or grandparents? Is it the language of academia or work or leisure? Is it a joy or a necessity to learn? What are your feelings towards native speakers, and theirs towards you? As I navigate daily life with the 100 or so odd words I can say, I’m forming an answer to the question: who is Britney in Japanese? I have been gifted with an especially blank mind.
It hasn't always been this way. I remember the thrumming in the back of my head, where the flat behind my ears curves upwards into the apex. My consciousness would play melodies on loop - sometimes music, sometimes words, sometimes revelations - and sought opportunity to perform, without fear, even in early stages of understanding. I used to lean into the rhythm of math problems and outfit planning and chances to share advice. In the most mundane of places, I found myself in conversations lush with understanding. I defaulted to presence and connections came to me. Today, I sense the new state of my brain. It makes less sound and holds fewer objects. It is there, in its rightful place, like the period at the end of a sentence. But it is not preoccupied or energetic. It lacks its previous underscore, and communicates, falsely, that I am in a soundless production. The small dramas of everyday life go unmarked, and so I soon forget them. My iteration of self is limited to post-worthy announcements. Things of little consequence remain that, and never have the chance to build to discovery. It took me many months to fully recognize and accept this passivity within myself. Along the way, I felt that I was losing my wit, or perhaps descending into a stupor. Surely, the minds of geniuses are always buzzing with ideas and intrigue, and mine was slumbering. To disguise my nervousness, I made off-hand jokes about the irony of education dulling my brain. But I also found it lovely to be so close to calm, to say goodbye to the nagging that used to tug me away from sleep. I am feeling the effects of isolation - of losing social partners who echo and duel and challenge me. Perhaps it’s natural after leaving my college years and their exciting ricochets of self-discovery. Perhaps it’s the good kind of settling, where I am prioritizing rest over creation. But maybe I am selling myself short when I believe that I am too tired or too boring or too stupid to structure my consciousness into words. If a girl speaks into the void and no one is around to hear it, does she make a sound? I often find myself staring at nothing, thinking of nothing, or thinking of more and how I am not it. I crave free time, but do not know what to do with it when it arrives. I am not sure if I am peaceful or numbed, if I am grateful or disturbed. I value stillness as a precursor to solitary transcendence and fear it as a sign of mental decay. I have learned, accidentally, to navigate to idleness in spare, unfocused moments. I have bookmarked the blankness of my mind to revisit over and over again, like a pit stop at a familiar diner on a longer road trip through the mountains. I am writing to remember that my two hands are on the steering wheels and there are many more places I would like to go. |
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