A moment for me

Every now and then, when there's nothing to do and everything in the refrigerator's been eaten, when I think I've come across the perfect game of Internet Reversi (I don't think it gets better than 63-0), I have time to contemplate what's left to do in this life.

Then, naturally, I destroy the blog I'm currently writing for (this is, perhaps, the third or fourth incarnation of a personal/semi-personal blog) by writing about the three girls in elementary school/high school that I've fumbled on.

So, let's not go there. You can go and try to Google that later.

Two weeks before the start of classes...still have to buy a new MP3 player, get a parking permit so my car isn't towed away while studying at the library, and figure out how I want to use the next year and a half to shape the rest of my life.

Call it my list of errands.

A couple of months before I moved back to New York, I was looking at apartments in Yokohama. And not for rent, either. Working under the false, Western culture-induced assumption that all property appreciates in value, I was searching for a sense of permanency in Japan. Best-case scenario was eventually a career that was stable enough (say, at a university in America) that I could always have a place to go in Japan.

The assumption proved false - over there, it is rich in history and respect for history, but anything valued in money is bound to depreciate, unlike houses over here - but my thinking hasn't changed.

I don't think I've ever been content staying put in one place. For the moment, I'm comfortable, but I don't plan to stay where I am for very long.

Just like that ridiculously wealthy old man in Contact that spends half a generation manipulating Jodie Foster, I've always appealed for a bit of mobility. Moving back and forth and around from place to place. I could've stayed at one hotel in Germany for the World Cup, but instead I wanted to move around between games, so where the US went, I went.

The problem is, though, that guy in Contact died alone. What a horrifying thought.

I'd like a little of both; a mobile life, and a family that enjoys the mobile life. And I don't really think I can wait 'til I'm retired to fly around on a whim. No one in this house except me loves to travel as I do. Any takers?

So, that's how I want to live the rest of my life.