12.5

 'What a dreadful storm it was! The night was so black that little Hans could hardly see, and the wind was so strong that he could scarcely stand. However, he was very courageous, and after he had been walking about three hours, he arrived at the Doctor's house, and knocked at the door.
    '"Who is there?"' cried the Doctor, putting his head out of his bedroom window.
    '"Little Hans, Doctor."
    '"What do you want, little Hans?"
    '"The Miller's son has fallen from a ladder, and has hurt himself, and the Miller wants you to come at once."
    '"All right!" said the Doctor; and he ordered his horse, and his big boots, and his lantern, and came downstairs, and rode off in the direction of the Miller's house, little Hans trudging behind him.
    'But the storm grew worse and worse, and the rain fell in torrents, and little Hans could not see where he was going, or keep up with the horse. At last he lost his way, and wandered off on the moor, which was a very dangerous place, as it was full of deep holes, and there poor little Hans was drowned. His body was found the next day by some goatherds, floating in a great pool of water, and was brought back by them to the cottage. 'Everybody went to little Hans's funeral, as he was so popular, and the Miller was the chief mourner.
    '"As I was his best friend," said the Miller, "it is only fair that I should have the best place;" so he walked at the head of the procession in a long black cloak, and every now and then he wiped his eyes with a big pocket-handkerchief.
    '"Little Hans is certainly a great loss to every one," said the Blacksmith, when the funeral was over, and they were all seated comfortably in the inn, drinking spiced wine and eating sweet cakes.
    '"A great loss to me at any rate," answered the Miller; "why, I had as good as given him my wheelbarrow, and now I really don't know what to do with it. It is very much in my way at home, and it is in such bad repair that I could not get anything for it if I sold it. I will certainly take care not to give away anything again. One always suffers for being generous."
    'Well?' said the Water-rat, after a long pause. 'Well, that is the end,' said the Linnet.
    'But what became of the Miller?' asked the Water-rat. 'Oh! I really don't know,' replied the Linnet, 'and I am sure that I don't care.'

'It is quite evident then that you have no sympathy in your nature,' said the Water-rat.
    'I am afraid you don't quite see the moral of the story,' remarked the Linnet.
    'The what?' screamed the Water-rat.
    'The moral.'
    'Do you mean to say that the story has a moral?'
    'Certainly,' said the Linnet.
    'Well, really,' said the Water-rat, in a very angry manner, 'I think you should have told me that before you began. If you had done so, I certainly would not have listened to you; in fact, I should have said "Pooh," like the critic. However, I can say it now;' so he shouted out 'Pooh' at the top of his voice, gave a whisk with his tail, and went back into his hole.
    'And how do you like the Water-rat?' asked the Duck, who came paddling up some minutes afterwards. 'He has a great many good points, but for my own part I have a mother's feelings, and I can never look at a confirmed bachelor without the tears coming into my eyes.'
    'I am rather afraid that I have annoyed him,' answered the Linnet. 'The fact is, that I told him a story with a moral.
    'Ah! that is always a very dangerous thing to do,' said the Duck.
    And I quite agree with her

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Originally written by Paul Sutton on January 6, 2009 4:59 PM Just (re)read the Murakami story and the tears are still in my eyes. Thanks Nana! He is just the greatest. (He and Cortázar.) Whenever I read Murakami, I always find deep resonances with what I'm doing, or just did.

Thank you, Paul. It means a lot to me that you (and other people too) can see the beauty in Murakami's books and short stories. I was introduced to A Wild Sheep Chase by a close Japanese friend.

Interesting about the resonance. It wasn't till I read the second book, Dance Dance Dance that my heart jumped into my throat. I knew then that Murakami had something to say that I wanted to hear.

I appreciate your sharing, Paul.

Nanna

Originally written by Paul Sutton on January 6, 2009 5:54 PM here's another quote I like, read in a recent interview with Yoko Ono : "Vibrations from love or music can be felt everywhere, at all times."

Yoko Ono opened her exhibiton in Warsaw three months ago. “During the opening in Warsaw, she asked the audience to join in a performance of switching on a torch and saying "I love you." (http://www.warsawvoice.pl/view/18717) We were thus invited to send and receive “I Love You” messages with small flashlights to and from Yoko Ono, but I must say  there was not too much enthusiasm about that in the audience. “The message "I love you" sent by Yoko Ono at her opening in Warsaw in September, as well as other spiritual suggestions, were just repetition from the hippie times, with no power today,” wrote the satirical http://thekrasnals.blogspot.com/2008/10/yoko-ono-i-love-you-catholic-voice-at.html

For more on Yoko Ono's interaction with the public today see for example this info on how to use Onochord flashlights she distributes during her performances:

Onochord | IMAGINE PEACE

The fact is that both Yoko Ono's and Dalai Lama's recent visits to Warsaw generated an enormous interest and resulted in huge lines of people waiting to get in and see those events.

A tribute to the poster and the lovely idea found in post #172904 and dedicated to Paul Sutton.

HARUKI MURAKAMI

WHERE I'M LIKELY TO FIND IT

Translated by Philip Gabriel

13.1

My husband's father was run over by a streetcar three years ago and died," the woman said, and paused.

I didn't say a word, just looked her right in the eyes and nodded twice. During the pause, I glanced at the half-dozen pencils in the pen tray, checking to see how sharp they were. Like a golfer carefully selecting the right club, I deliberated over which one to use, finally picking one that wasn't too sharp or too worn, but just right.

"The whole thing's a little embarrassing," the woman said.

Keeping my opinion to myself, I laid a memo pad in front of me and tested the pencil by writing down the date and the woman's name.

"There aren't many streetcars left in Tokyo," she went on. "They've switched to buses most everywhere. The few that are left are kind of a memento to the past, I guess. And it was one of those that killed my father-in-law." She gave a silent sigh. "This was the night of October first, three years ago. It was pouring that night."

I noted down the basics of her story. Father-in-law, three years ago, streetcar, heavy rain, October 1, night. I like to take great care when I write, so it took a while to note all this down.  

"My father-in-law was completely drunk at the time. Obviously, otherwise he wouldn't have fallen asleep on a rainy night on the streetcar tracks."

She fell silent again, lips closed, her eyes steadily gazing at me. She was probably wanting me to agree with her.

"He must have been pretty drunk," I said.

"So drunk he passed out."

"Did your father-in-law often drink that much?"

"You mean did he often so much that he passed out?"

I nodded.

"He got drunk every once in a while," she admitted. "But not all the time, and never so drunk that he'd fall asleep on the streetcar tracks."

How drunk would you have to be to fall asleep on the rails of a streetcar line? I wondered. Was the amount the person drank the main issue? Or did it have more to do with why he was getting drunk in the first place?

"What you're saying is that he got drunk sometimes, but usually not falling-down drunk?" I asked.

"That's the way I see it," she replied.

"May I ask your age, if you don't mind?"

"You want to know how old I am?"

"You don't have to answer if you don't want to."

The woman rubbed the bridge of her nose with index finger. It was a lovely, perfectly straight nose. My guess was she had recently had plastic surgery. I used to go out with a woman who had the same habit. She'd had a nose job, and whenever she was thinking about something, she rubbed the bridge with her index finger. As if she were making sure her brand-new nose was still there. Looking at this woman in front of me now brought on a mild case of déju vu. Which in turn, conjured up vague memories of oral sex.

"I'm not trying to hide my age or anything," the woman said, "I'm thirty-five."

"And how old was your father-in-law when he died?"

"Sixty-eight." 

"What did he do? His job, I mean."

"He was a priest."

"By priest you mean a Buddhist priest?"

"That's right. A Buddhist priest. Of the Jodo sect. He was head of a temple in the Toshima Ward."

"That must have been a real shock," I said.

"That my father-in-law was run over by a street car?"

"yes."

"Of course it was a shock. Especially for my husband," the woman said.

I noted some more things down on my memo pad. Priest, Jodo sect, 68.

The woman was sitting at one end of my love seat. I was in my swivel chair behind my desk. Two yards separated us. She had on a sharp looking sage green suit. He legs were beautiful, and her stockings matched her black high-heeled shoes. The stilettos looked like some kind of deadly weapon.

"So, what you've come to ask me," I said, "concerns your husband's late father?"

"No. It's not about him," she said. She shook her head slightly a couple of times to emphasize the negative. "It's about my husband."

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Originally written by Nanna Mercer on April 4, 2009 11:17 AM ...dedicated to Paul Sutton...

Today had been a very hard day for me, for many reasons. So I absent-mindedly log in here (something I hadn't done for ages) quite late (remember I'm a country lad who gets up before dawn), and Nanna's gentleness warms my heart. Thank you so much Nanna!

RIght now I'm reading Rubin Jay's biography of Murakami. I quite like his translations, but I'm not really keen on his analysis. Shit, I mean if the writer himself says there's no particular symbolic significance in writing about sheep, elephants or whatever, then let's accept that. There again, he's not as bad as the idiot critic (can't remember who) who described Sputnik Sweetheart as a study into lesbianism. That's just about the most mindless crap I have ever heard. If Sumire falls in love with a woman, it's just because unencumbered by the need to deal with sexual jealously, Murakami can concentrate purely on the power of the hero's love for Sumire.

On reflection, I think Sputnik Sweetheart and South of the Border are my favourites. I've probably said this before, and not just once, but I don't think anything outside music has ever moved me so much. The guy is just an absolute genius, the brightest of my literary lighthouse figures.

Interesting to find that Murakami has a rare understanding of how language actually works, from a linguistics point of view: "It is my unswerving belief that all languages are of fundamentally equal value, and without such a recognition there is no possibility of genuine cultural exchange". That's a real translator talking!

13.2

"Is he also a priest?"

"No, he works at Merrill Lynch."

"The investment firm?"

"That's right," she replied, clearly a little irritated. What other Merrill Lynch is there? her tone implied. "He's a stockbroker."

I checked the tip of my pencil to see how worn it was, then waited for her to continue.

"My husband is an only son, and he was more interested in stock-trading than Buddhism, so he didn't succeed his father as head priest at the temple."

Which all makes perfect sense, don't you think? her eyes said, but since I didn't have an opinion one way or the other regarding Buddhism or stock-trading, I didn't respond. Instead, I adopted a neutral expression that indicated that I was absorbing every word.

"After my father-in-law passed away, my mother-in-law moved into an apartment in our condo, in Shinagawa. A different unit in the same building. My husband and I live on the twenty-sixth floor, and she's on the twenty-fourth. She lives alone. She'd lived in the temple with her husband, but after another priest came to take over she had to move. She's sixty-three. And my husband, I should add, is forty. He'll be forty-one next month, if nothing's happened to him, that is."

I made a memo of it all. Mother-in-law, 24th floor, 63. Husband, 40, Merrill Lynch, 26th floor, Shinagawa. The woman waited patiently for me to finish.

"After my father-in-law died, my mother-in-law started having panic attacks. The seem to be worse when it's raining, probably because her husband died on a rainy night. A fairly common thing, I imagine."

I nodded.

"When the symptoms are bad, it's like a screw's come loose in her head. She calls us and my husband goes down the two floors to her place to take care of her. He tries to calm her down, to convince her that everything's going to be all right. If my husband's not at home, then I go."

She paused, waiting for my reaction. I kept quiet.

"My mother-in-law is not a bad person. I don't have any negative feelings toward her. It's just that she's the nervous type, and has always relied too much on other people. Do you understand the situation?"

"I think so," I said.

She crossed her legs waiting for me to write something new on my pad. But I didn't write anything down.

"She called us at ten one Sunday morning, Two Sundays - ten days - ago."

I glanced at my desk calendar. "Sunday the third of September?"

"That's right, the third. My mother-in-law called us at ten that morning," the woman said. She closed her eyes as if recalling it. If we were in a Hitchcock movie, the screen would have started to ripple at this point and we'd have segued into a flashback. But this was no movie and no flashback was forthcoming. She opened her eyes and went on. "My husband answered the phone. He'd been planning to play golf, but it had been raining hard since dawn, so he canceled. If only it hadn't been raining, this never would have happened. I know I am just second-guessing myself."

September 3rd, golf, rain, canceled, mother-in-law phoned. I wrote it all down.

"My mother-in-law said that she was having trouble breathing. She felt dizzy and couldn't stand up. My husband got dressed and without even shaving, he went to her apartment. He told me that it wouldn't take long and asked me to get breakfast ready."

"What was he wearing?" I asked.

She rubbed her nose again lightly. "Chinos and a short-sleeved polo shirt. His shirt was dark gray. The trousers were cream-colored. Both items we'd bought from the J.Crew catalogue. My husband's near-sighted and always wears glasses. Metal-framed Armanis. His shoes were gray New Balance. He didn't have any socks on."

I noted down all the details.

"Do you want to know his height and weight?"

"That would help," I said.

"He's five-eight and weighs about one-fifty-eight. Before we got married, he weighed about one thirty-five, but he's put on some weight."

I wrote down this information. I checked the tip of my pencil and exchanged it for another. I held the new pencil for a while, getting used to the feel.

"Do you mind if I go on?" she asked.

"Not at all," I said.

She uncrossed and recrossed her legs. "I was getting ready to make pancakes when his mother called. I always make pancakes on Sunday morning. If he doesn't play golf on Sundays, my husband eats a lot of pancakes. He loves them, with some crisp bacon on the side."

No wonder the guy put on twenty pounds, I thought,

"Twenty-five minutes later my husband called me. He said his mother had settled down and he was on his way upstairs. 'I'm starving' he told me. 'Get breakfast ready so I can eat as soon as I get there.' So I heated up the frying pan and started cooking the pancakes and bacon. I heated up the maple syrup as well. Pancakes aren't difficult to make --- it's all a matter of timing and doing everything in the right order. I waited and waited, but he didn't come home. The stack of pancakes on his plate was getting cold. I phoned my mother-in-law and asked her if my husband was still there. She said he'd left a long time ago."

She brushed off an imaginary, metaphysical piece of lint on her skirt, just above the knee.

"My husband disappeared. He vanished into thin air. And I haven't heard from him since. He disappeared somewhere between the twenty-fourth and twenty-sixth floors."

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