I began this weblog over two and a half years ago (April 2003) as a bid to maintain my sanity in what was for me an utterly surreal environment, Japan.  I lived in a fairly rural area and was often alone, if not always physically, then at least in my experience.  Writing forced me to focus on just one thoroughly overwhelming thing at a time, and sharing them with someone, anyone, even via impersonal keyboard,   somewhat diluted the constant explosions my senses were setting off inside my head.  Every sight then was a drug, and every motion an epiphany, and keeping it all inside often felt too much a strain.

Before I wrote online, I kept a journal, primitive-style, in a big paper book.  On December 9, 2001, I was reading Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and a passage there more accurately described my feelings that moment than anything else I could think of myself.  I added it to my journal.

"Ford was holding up a small glass jar which quite clearly had a small yellow fish wriggling around in it.  Arthur blinked at him.  He wished there was something simple and recognizable he could grasp hold of.  He would have felt safe if alongside the Dentrassis' underwear, the piles of Sqornshellous' mattresses and the man from Betelgeuse holding up a small yellow fish and offering to put it in his ear, he had been able to see just a small packet of cornflakes."

There was no small packet of cornflakes for me either, so I started a journal to serve the purpose.  It was a tiny, normal, familiar, comforting, inconsequential world I could grasp in my hand and control, and it made sense, if absolutely nothing else did.  I could focus in on it when I needed to breathe, and let everything else slow-fade into the background until I regained my equilibrium.

Just over a year ago, I left Japan and returned to my former hometown, and now it's me that no longer makes any sense, and that's much harder to write about or to understand. In Japan, sharing was part of the thrill, and the thing that best helped me grasp what I was experiencing and how it was affecting me.  It all felt too big to keep inside in Japan, but what I've gone through since I decided to leave has been too big for me to let out.  Now I'm focusing in on little pieces of Japan for equilibrium, a Hokusai print here, an Ultraman toy there, the little things I stowed back with me, maybe sensing this would come.  In Japan, it was easy to understand why nothing made sense.  It was to be expected, and it was okay.  In my hometown, with a familiar face on every block and a memory on every corner, losing equilibrium feels a lot more poignant.

Comments

[From Texas, can relate]

I don't think what you're feeling is at all unusual. I lived in Japan for four years, then moved back to the U.S. (Texas, like yourself), where I've been for the past three and a half years ... and have found that I don't really like it here anymore. I feel out of place, and often daydream of the sights and smells of Japan. Yes, in Japan I would occasionally be homesick for America ... but to be in America and long for Japan? To me, that says something: it says that "belonging" isn't so much an action as it is an idea.

I hope you find a way to address the feelings you currently face. As for me, I've already made up my mind -- I'm moving back to Japan.

[J.]

Glad to see you posting again!

[M Sinclair Stevens]

I, too, felt more comfortable in the surrealness of Japan precisely because I had a reason to feel out of place. And on returning to Texas, I lost that reason and went back to feeling odd again.

I don't know if it ever changes, but you express it very beautifully and I enjoy reading your observations.

[Jef]

Yay... my psychic-prodding worked.

You are far too good a writer to leave your words unread.

[paganpoetry]

hello, i am commenting here for the first time, but have always liked your blog. this entry especially spoke to my heart -- i'm the opposite of you, being Japanese and spent time in the U.S., but can relate to what you must be going through. i found myself terribly lost when returning "home", nothing felt right, and i felt so out of place. you express your experiences beautifully!

[Lisa]

Welcome back, Karla. I've been popping by hopefully every now and then.