Zéro, Waiting for Myself

I find myself sitting at someone else's kitchen table. The circular clock on the wall to my right indicates the time is 11:30, and I can hear occasional chirping of the birds outside. I turn around to see a balcony. An antique ashtray with a green lighter are neatly placed on the wooden table on the balcony. A pack of Marlboro lights--a flashback to the summer in Manhattan when I walked to lunch with J, a cool, chic lady with...

Then I notice water is boiling in a pot on the stove. Strands of spaghetti noodles are set aside on top of a cutting board while three colors of paprika are lying loosely nearby. One would have chosen linguini or fettuccine if she had known me better. I ponder this until my mind jumps to the next question, what's the sauce going to be? I wonder as my mouth waters imagining the hot, red color of tomato sauce with specks of Parmesan cheese I haven't tasted since 2010, sprinkled on top of a mound of spaghetti.

"You are 27 or 28, right?"*

"I beg your pardon?"

"It is very tough to live at that age. When nothing is sure."*

"How... That's not my age."

"I have sympathy with you."*

"Sir, I don't know which culture you come from, but it's not very polite to presume one's age. Besides, age can be so arbitrary. It's just a measure of comparison, isn't it? It's a measure for how far you've come, how much you've accomplished, what expectations were fulfilled, what more to be fulfilled. For example, I graduated with honors in a subject that would secure me with a good enough job and I entered corporate America by the time I was 22. I felt somewhat invincible then, taken out to fancy restaurants, ordering the most expensive drinks on the menu, searching the hip bars and clubs on weekends, buying clothes that costed well over three-digit numbers on Melrose. But every day, I was miserable. I took public transport in Los Angeles on purpose because that was one of the few things that made me feel human in the city. A colleague of mine said, "Why do you take the bus? Doesn't it smell?" I was well-paid, I could afford expensive gym memberships, people nodded when I told them my profession, but it was like a highly addictive drug that was killing me, slowly but surely. It was the drug everyone else was taking, but people thrived on it except for me."

"Most young people (are) getting jobs in big companies, becoming company men. I wanted to be an individual."*

"The scariest part about this drug was that it was socially accepted, but that wouldn't be the first, would it?"

"I want to be an individual, too. No, I can't help but be an individual. No, let me try that again. I choose to be an individual. That seems to be the most sensible thing for me, but I'm not sure what that means anymore. I feel like I've been lost for a long time, aimlessly wandering about. There are things I enjoy, feel passionate about, even. I have my moments of clarity although... they're rare. I think I have the right ideas, but I'm not sure how to go about applying them. Sometimes it seems like it's too late, or maybe I'm meant to be... stuck like this. A girl who dreamed but simply dreamed of the impossible and stayed asleep, forever!"

"You're not a kid anymore. You have the right to choose your own life."*

"Yes, but..."

"You can start again. If you want a cat all you have to do is choose a life in which you can have a cat. It's simple. It's your right."*

"It seems all simple to you, doesn't it? What if I want to become a millionaire by next year? Let's make that a billionaire while I'm at it. Shall I start robbing banks or selling narcotics or try to seduce someone with billions of dollars? Or, to parallel with your idea of having a cat, what if I'm allergic to cats but want to have a cat so badly? I suppose I could constantly take allergy medicine..."

"You have to be practical. So every time I say, if you want to write a novel you have to be practical, people get bored. They are disappointed."*

"You certainly are de-romanticizing my idea of being a writer, but please don't say you don't write while having an espresso with a cigarette between your lips with crazy hair in your study, or maybe at a posh cafe somewhere in Tokyo."

"They are expecting a more dynamic, creative, artistic thing to say. What I want to say is: you have to be practical."*

"Speaking of practical, what's for lunch?"




to be continued...


*The quotes with * are of Haruki Murakami, a writer.