The ハト locker

In Japan, knowledge and smartness were the meat and drink of my trade.  But now, back in America, meat is the meat of my trade.  The drink might be animal blood, but it could also be Popov.  I'm not really sure where I'm going with this analogy, but did you know "smartness" is actually a word?

Remember that one time I was whining like a little bitch that I was going to have to step out of my comfort zone and actually teach rather than just do the eikaiwa formula?  Man, those were the days.  Back then, you could actually buy gas for $3 a gallon, or hold an iPhone in your hand without it dropping your call.  Simpler times.

But on the plane ride back to the United States I started thinking to myself: "My bank account is less than my age; I should probably do something about that.  And how am I going to get myself out of this suitcase without arousing suspicion?"

Cirque du Soliel only tell you how to get into the bag, dammit!

Perhaps it was the altitude sickness due to a 14-hour flight in the cargo bay of a 737, perhaps it was the oxygen deprivation from spending it locked in a Samsonite.  Whatever it was, I found myself the next day behind the counter of the meat department at a local supermarket interviewing for a job.  I remember thinking to myself "they do interviews for supermarket jobs?"  Then thinking "awww yeah, making money, taking graduate classes, no more hyperactive kids.  Life is sweet."

That's how I became a meat man.  A butcher.  I butch for a living.

My final weeks in Japan seemed like a formality.  As my departure crept closer, every day disassembled itself into 45-minute increments of perfunctory, dispassionate, semi-exhausting routine not unlike my sex life.  I remember the secret number-crunching of one lunch break where I broke down the exact number of classes that remained until that freedom-flight back to American soil.

Three years is a long time to be away from home.  I missed it.  My friends, the food, the television that didn't grate like a butthole full of gravel.  Admittedly, it came with having to give up the jealous stares of overweight, middle-aged men at the public bath but wait no I guess there is that one place "The Sousing Bear Club" near my apartment I could swing by sometime and check that out so never mind yeah America has everything.

Re-acculturation has been easy if all I ever wanted to do was become a member of society again.  Except for suddenly having nothing to write about.  That sucks.  I'm serious, I'm trying my best for you guys* but it's like "maybe I could do an article on running out of cereal in the morning.  You know, don't you hate it when you've got this big bowl of milk and you're pouring your Kix and then it's like... you know, there's like just crumbs coming out and you're like 'whoa oh no where's the cereal?  What am I going to do with this big bowl of milk?' Doesn't that, like, suck?"

*I understand no one is actually reading my blog

I spent the better part of a year convincing my wife how coming to America would be the best thing we could ever do for our young family.  How 64 ounce fountain drinks and footlong chili cheese coneys would somehow fill up the void of not just our stomachs but also a more metaphorical void I think you get what I mean.

But lately, all I can think about is going back.

I miss the long midnight walks to the convenience stores, flanked by men in business suits buying ready-to-eat bento boxes after a long night at work, yanki kids sitting out front drinking beers and scarfing piping-hot microwave ramen.  I miss being able to buy booze from a vending machine and being interrogated by a police officer on the corner for not having my Alien Registration Card on me.  I miss the smokey arcades that throbbed with electronic life, packed to the rafters long after dark with the best of the best and me.  I miss salesmen on street corners barking into megaphones shoving tiny packages of tissues into my chest in the misguided hope that maybe this time I'll really want to duck into that pachinko parlor and relieve myself of a couple thousand yen.

As per Japanese law, there must be at least 15 of these guys on every corner

I miss riding the train, shoulder-to-shoulder with sleepy, irritable people, each twist and turn of the track giving way to another remorseful, accidental press of my buttocks against a tiny, hard, cylindrical object in the front pocket of yet another pair of business slacks.

Asthma is apparently a serious issue among the male 18-55 demographic in Japan

The fact is, most of my adult life was spent as a fish out of water.  I suppose it was only natural that I would evolve into some sort of fish with lungs.  A "lung-having-fish," if you will.  But now here I am, reintroduced to what should be my natural habitat, living the life I had before; a small fish in a big pond.

So why does feel like I'm drowning?