Last night, I bought two cans of Lemon Sour from the grocery store and drank them alone in my room, with some bad salami. I started feeling happy for no real reason. I ended up on the phone with a boy, I don’t even remember what we were talking about. By the time I noticed, we were having phone sex. It’s not so fun for me, but somehow that is where I land. 

 This is a fairly ordinary way for me to spend time.

I like talking to people, but I don’t want to know them too well. In fact, I prefer not knowing them. Learning too much about someone spoils the story, and I’m left with a quiet sense of disappointment. Not knowing leaves space for imagination and through that, I can experience something without getting hurt. A glimpse, not the whole picture.

Since my friend left, I’ve been exploring Tokyo through the eyes of a traveler. It helps me understand what others come here looking for. But it is the smallest things that surprise me, perhaps the travelers wouldn’t like them at all. The other day, I wandered into a bookstore called Flying Books, and people were talking about Jonas Mekas. Experimental film feels like such a dead thing now, or so I thought. But people still talk about it. There’s something enduring in it. I’m glad I spent my college years watching those films instead of endless YouTube videos. It was time well wasted, because it was like learning another language. A visual one, a silent one, and a very humble one.

Later that night, I called my sister. She told me my niece had a violin recital nearby.

“Please come, please,” my niece said. I smiled. “Well, I love women who are straightforward.”

So I went. 

I watched my nieces play nervously on stage. There’s something about amateur performers that speaks to me. It’s like reading a child’s essay. Not polished, not sophisticated, but candid. And that moves me. I listened , while imagining their ordinary lives.

Now I am at a falafel store in Shibuya called “Kuumba du Falafel”, the sandwich was 1200 yen, and delicious.