autumn tactics

Some things seem over the years to lose meaning in a sense, things like Christmas. As a beloved childhood memory, Christmas was a glorious five weeks starting with Thanksgiving and ending with the trip to my grandmother’s house on Christmas Day. The songs, the lights, the decorations in town. The magic of everyone being kind and considerate to each other, the different crackle in the air. But as I grew older and focused on increasingly daunting pursuits, that magic seemed to fade, like a dream after waking. Christmas changed from a season to a couple of weeks to detox from the stress and bustle my 180bpm lifestyle, punctuated with a couple customs to share with a significant other. As much as I didn’t want to lose the magic of Christmas, I stopped seeing it and wondering what that meant of my soul.

Rooted in religion, commercialized by the 20th century America, adopted by the world’s shopping malls, Christmas means so many things that it’s become fettered in my mind with cynicism. But beyond language or divinity. But beyond language or divinity, the message still rings true with me, like a lone candle left burning after a storm. Peace on earth. Goodwill towards men.

This night may end in twenty minutes, after two hamburgers and a chicken sandwich, or it could be tomorrow at 8:30 with my haircut, but whatever, it becomes doesn’t matter. It’s mine, and a day I will remember. Like so many things it starts with alcohol, a glass of twenty-two dollar wine from my neighborhood liquor store. The only thing I had today was 650 yen worth of sushi before heading to Nakano in search of a wide angle lens for the A-1, so a generous glass of Bordeaux was enough to make beat-tired me happy and forego Resident Evil 4 for a little space. When is the last time I had a night to myself, really? So I’m in McDonald’s with a poorly mixed 20 oz. shouchu/tea cocktail and listening to ソルファ while reading the Book of Matthew and thinking about my life. I remember when I was a traveler, using places like this to write and put my feet up before walking twelve miles through some city not my home.

But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.

[In the end, Saturday night was not a mistake, or a series of misadventures, but a controlled and mellow buzz into the late night. I sat in front of Shinjuku station's north exit and while smoking the top of a Camel hard pack, watched some performing kids draw a large crowd. Then I wandered down towards Kabuki-cho, finished my chuhai and took an hour alone in Karaokekan working on some of my favorite hits. After that, it was about eleven-thirty and I was bushed so I went home, though I don't really remember doing it. I finally went to bed after some more RE4 at two. Blah, blah, blah.]