City Girl

You really get to me, in a good way. You make me want to be a better person. Not because of anything very specific that you say, but because of everything you do. When I'm angry, you're calm and steady; you give me a hug, pass me a beer, and tell me not to get too mad. And instead of getting frustrated with you the way I would want to with anyone else not getting mad for me, I feel like I don't have to prove how tough or principled or whatever I am by staying mad, like it's okay to let my anger go. I don't need to be a firecracker all the time, you hear what I'm saying, you're not afraid to tell me I'm wrong. I might be too proud to say it at the time, but I know you're right, and it's so good for me. No one's ever been able to do that before.

I did have a kind of ridiculous night last night, so it's little wonder I ended up getting all kinds of irate. I can blow my top, it's true. Someday soon, I'll be as cool as you. Or at least as cool as me on a good day. And I won't need a beer to do it. Of course, I've been saying I'm gonna stay in every night and be good and take care of my shit, but of course, I'm out the door by 10 without fail. I have little love for this house, I want to be out in the big wide world. The summer wind is blowing in, and it's calling me out to ... town.

You know, I belong in the city. I say it all the time, but I would literally go insane if I had to be anywhere less interesting than this for more than a week. As I said to Lindsey once, "If I went to school here (Dickinson), I would kill myself." I can't sleep without the sounds of sirens. I can't breathe without the smell of cement and exhaust. I can't get along without my bars and my cafes and my parks and my cinemas. I just can't be where people don't walk fast enough. I need sixteen different places to get my produce, and twenty-six kinds of chai. I am a ridiculous person. I want to live in New York, provided it doesn't eat me alive. Maybe not forever, but at least for a little while. For a summer. For a year. I want a taste of it. I ate Tokyo up. I'd never been happier or more alive, in fact.

I miss Japan. I miss the weird culture and the food and the politeness and the perversion. I miss temples. I miss awful little office bitches. I miss the way they play music and commercials on TVs in trains. I miss the way the toilets talk to you. I miss the way Ueno park smells. I miss the crosswalk at Hachiko Square. I miss kyujyuukyu-en sushi. I really need to get back, bad. But I also need to see the rest of the world. It's a matter of sacrificing the familiar for the wonderful strange unknown. I'll take the future over the past any day.