Political ignoramus that I am, I'm not sure if it's election season here in Tokyo, but the Yelling Man (YM) outside my window isn't likely there for any other reason, though thankfully I can't clearly hear what he's spewing, er, saying.
Perhaps this man somehow overheard the comment I made to Yuko last week. Context: a van carrying a similar (or the same?) man yelling through a loudspeaker rushed past us. I said, "Those trucks with yelling men are super annoying; worse yet, how can they convince anyone of what they're saying when they never stop long enough for one to hear a full sentence?!" or something like that (hey, it was a week ago, and besides, we were actually conversing in Japanese at the time).
So now, YM has parked himself near our window just as Koji's in the midst of his nap. Argh. I would be more frustrusted, but, there's nothing I can do about YM and his chosen location. And, Koji's EXHAUSTED today from being up until 2 am this morning ("a two year old up until two am?! what kind of parent are you?!" you may ask. "An in-process learn as I go parent who is doing my best--by the grace of Jesus--sadly often at the expense of my unwitting but adorably two year old son" I will plaintively reply). Therefore, I'm literally praying that he's good for at least a three hour nap today, YM or no.
Lately I've been wondering if my claim to living here in Japan for 10 years is actually true. This is my fifth time to move here. Exact (make that, exact as I can recall, which is not so exact) dates were as follows:
August 1984--July 1987 (two years & 11 months)
August 1988--June 1989 (10 months)
August 1995--April 1998 (two years & nine months)
August 1999--March 2001 (one year & eight months)
March 2005--present (four months)
That's 102 months. But, correct me if I'm wrong, 10 years would be 120 months. I'm a whole 18 months short! Yikes! In defense of my heretofore poor arithmetic, I suppose I felt OK about rounding up...? So, my first stint here was three years, my second one year, and so on.
One trend emerges from this list; I have a history of moving back to this country within a year or so of moving away. Therefore, does God have a plan for us to be back here in November of 2007?! Probably not, because that would make our future predictable, and life following Jesus is anything but...
2 comments:
So your longest breaks were between 1989 and 95 and then 2001 to 1995. You could count the six weeks or so that you have been there for business between 2001 and 2005. That would give you another month!
I meant 2001 to 2005. It's so embarrassing to comment and have a glaring error. (red face)
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