Oh,

  I completely forgot I had this account. I also didn't think the password I typed in was going to work.
  Anyway, I'm back. it's been more than a year. Last one was about my mother's death. How gloomy is that. So, to change the direction I am writing something cheerful.
 I'm alive!! Isn't that enough?
 I will be back less than a year this time to write something.

My mother died of cancer

  My mother has been dead for 11 days. I has been really hectic since she was diagnosed with rare case of stomach cancer last Decmber. She didn't even last a month after we discovered the news. She had been suffering from a backache from around last summer and no one thought that was caused by cancer. We believed a sergery would let her ged rid of the pain. We were worried how my father would cope without my mother for a week (she was planing to stay at a hospital after a back sergery). But now she's gone and we don't know how he will manage without her for his entire life.
  Since my mother ran the flower farm by herself, we had hard time to figure out the management (still not 100% sure). We have no time to moan over her death yet. It is sad to lose a family member, but we are the ones still alive. We've got to keep moving.
 

The beach

Finlay and my wife and I went to the beach in Naruto on Sunday. Jodi’s birthday party-ish thing took place. Only she arrived about an hour later than she said she would show up. Some people already stared barbequing. Since we ate before came, we did not join the bbq part. Instead we played at the beach hard.

Finlay must have forgotten he played at a beach last year—he is only less than 2 years old. He seemed interested in sand and waves. We carried him into the sea. Finlay has a habit of drinking water out of a swimming pool. I hope he would decide to lose the habit when he found water could be salty.

Anyway, it was very nice to see friends again. I hadn’t seen them for a half year or so. Their kids grew. So did ours.

memory hazard

Oh I cannot write. I used to tell my hobby is writing stories. And that was. However a number of writing became less and less every year. I think I wrote only 1 or 2 stories last year. I suppose that I have not written any this year.

Just a while ago, I was trying to write something and sat in front of my computer. I waited and waited till an idea to write come up. Nothing occurred to me. Well I got a sort of idea to write about a guy who cannot write. And I found that I couldn’t even write about it either.

It seems okay to write a journal. I don’t know why. It probably I just ran out of what to write about. Or simply I realized that writing was phony deed to carry out. The last writing I can remember is about a boy who attends a funeral of somebody he doesn’t know at all. And he cannot distinguish if the dead is man or woman. I thought that was a funny story; however my wife found it boring. Owing to nothing much else happens in the story.

I have one thing I want to write in my mind. But I haven’t got courage to actually write. I know the story will be longer than anything I wrote. I know myself disgustingly very well. What put me off writing story the most is that I will not be able to get it through. I don’t want to be disappointed with myself for not writing through.

I know my writing is getting worse and worse day by day. I need to write to keep my writing skill. By the way, I became unable to memorize things. Not only unable to memorize but also it seems I forget words too.

Happy New Year

I did not want to see workers today. I knew if I managed not to see them I would not have to say stupid “Happy New Year” crap. It will become weird to say that word in second week of a year.

There are 2 reasons I did not want to say the word. One is that I was not allowed to talk to them under our company’s unspoken rule. This is a strange company which I work for, my parents business. Only things I am allowed to say to them are “Good morning” and “Goodbye”. But it is also strange not to say “Happy New Year” to them when a new year just started. Last year I managed not to say the word to them due to the forming climbing roses job kept me so busy sitting in one green house for a month. This year it seems I managed again. And you cannot say “Happy New Year” on second week of a year. This is probably my own rule, but that works. So I do not have to say the word to them again this year.

The other reason I do not want to say “Happy New Year” to anyone is that I really do not think changing the year won’t turn over your life suddenly happier. The New Year’s Day is just a sequel to the day before. So this year some people said to me “Happy New Year”. You may think I thought “what the hell you are saying. Nothing has been changed except for Jesus’s age”. That’s practically No. I just couldn’t understand what they were on about. “New Year Day” shit does not run in my blood. It took me a while to remember the Japanese, or world’s, ritual to say the word. I even told one guy that “nothing is happy or unhappy”. He happened to be my in-law brother. He did not seem to understand it.

Anyway, I could avoid saying “Happy New Year”. That makes me “Happy” It is ironic.

Chicken

It was one of the most memorable year-end day yesterday. I was cleaning the entire house with my wife all day. About 4pm we had finished and I started browsing internet. It was then my mother called me on the phone. I was reluctant to answer but I had no choice. My mother’s phone calls fall into either offering food or asking me to work. And as most phone calls are, that was the latter one.

She asked me to help my father to insecticide all green houses. What I had to do was dealing with the hose of the machine so my father did not have to struggle. When I rushed to my father, he had almost done it. I was glad. Instead of helping him, my father asked me to close the green houses special insulation roof; that’s an easy job. I finished doing it in 5 minutes. I was thinking what to eat to conclude the year when my father ran to me and said one green house’s roof was blown off.

There was snow from 30th night through the next morning. The snow must have made holes on the roof. And the window; the combination of snow and wind ripped the roof. In retrospect, I should have taken a picture of it, because the view was so astonishing for a year-end day. I had premonition endless work was coming up.

I do not want to go into what we did and stuff. It is boring and would make me sigh. Around 8pm we finished patching up the green house. We all were covered with mud and fatigued. My stomach was achy for cold. When I got home I was freezing. I took a long bath. I had no appetite. I just had wine. When I was about to go to bed, suddenly I got hungry. I micro waved frozen chicken ate with salt and pepper. The chicken was cheap and dry. I realized the crappy chicken was the last meal of the year.

foam

My son and wife came back from Scotland. However this journal is not about their return. Of course that was really nice to see them again. Don’t give me wrong.

The journal is about the Tully’s coffee at Tokushima station. They never gave me what I ordered. I know my orders are always confusing, though. A cashier usually just tell a person who makes drink with one call. If you order tall-sized latte, they call “tall latte” when you add an additional espresso shot it’s going to be “Double tall latte”. Instead of those drinks written on manual, I ask them to make its milk very hot, do not put any foam in, or make with non-fat milk (which they do not always have). So yesterday I asked a non-foam latte, they gave the foamiest latte I ever had the day. I knew they did not listen to me. I must try Starbucks next time. One just opened in the station a month ago or so. Well they maybe all same.