I heard the door close, and when I was alone I realized I was dead tired. The room was so unearthly quiet, I lost all sense of time being divided into seconds. I felt that I was the only person alive and moving in a world brought to a stop.
Houses always feel like that after someone has died.
I sank into the sofa and stared blankly at the melancholy early-winter gray outside the large window. The heavy, cold air of winter permeated every part of this little neighborhood—the park, the walkways—like a fog. I couldn't bear it. It oppressed me, and I felt like I couldn't breathe.
Truly great people emit a light that warms the hearts of those around them. When that light has been put out, a heavy shadow of despair descends. Perhaps Eriko's was only a minor kind of greatness, but her light was sorely missed.
I flopped down on my back and looked up at the dear, familiar ceiling. Right after my grandmother died, I had stared at this same ceiling many an afternoon while Yuichi and Eriko were out. I remember thinking to myself, my grandmother is dead, I've lost my last blood relation, and things can't get any worse. But now they had. Eriko been enormously important to me. In the six months spent together she had always been there for me; she spoiled me.
To the extent that I had come to understand that despair does not necessarily result in annihilation, that one can go on as usual in spite of it, I had become hardened. Was that what it means to be an adult, to live with ugly ambiguities? I didn't like it, but it made it easier to go on.
My heart was so heavy now because of just that. I watched the gloomy clouds and the orange of the sunset spreading across them in the western sky. Soon the cold night would descend and fill the hollow in my heart. I felt sleepy but said to myself, if you sleep now, you'll have bad dreams. So I got up.
After a long absence I was once again in the Tanabe kitchen. For an instant I had a vision of Eriko's smiling face, and my heart turned over. I felt an urge to get moving. It looked to me like the kitchen had not been used in quite a while. It was somewhat dirty and dark. I began to clean. I scrubbed the sink with scouring powder, wiped off the burners, washed the dishes, sharpened the knives. I washed and bleached all the dish towels, and while watching them go round and round in the dryer I realized that I had become calmer. Why do I love everything that has to do with kitchens so much? It's strange. Perhaps because to me a kitchen represents some distant longing engraved on my soul. As I stood there, I seemed to be making a new start; something was coming back.
kitchen; banana yoshimoto
Houses always feel like that after someone has died.
I sank into the sofa and stared blankly at the melancholy early-winter gray outside the large window. The heavy, cold air of winter permeated every part of this little neighborhood—the park, the walkways—like a fog. I couldn't bear it. It oppressed me, and I felt like I couldn't breathe.
Truly great people emit a light that warms the hearts of those around them. When that light has been put out, a heavy shadow of despair descends. Perhaps Eriko's was only a minor kind of greatness, but her light was sorely missed.
I flopped down on my back and looked up at the dear, familiar ceiling. Right after my grandmother died, I had stared at this same ceiling many an afternoon while Yuichi and Eriko were out. I remember thinking to myself, my grandmother is dead, I've lost my last blood relation, and things can't get any worse. But now they had. Eriko been enormously important to me. In the six months spent together she had always been there for me; she spoiled me.
To the extent that I had come to understand that despair does not necessarily result in annihilation, that one can go on as usual in spite of it, I had become hardened. Was that what it means to be an adult, to live with ugly ambiguities? I didn't like it, but it made it easier to go on.
My heart was so heavy now because of just that. I watched the gloomy clouds and the orange of the sunset spreading across them in the western sky. Soon the cold night would descend and fill the hollow in my heart. I felt sleepy but said to myself, if you sleep now, you'll have bad dreams. So I got up.
After a long absence I was once again in the Tanabe kitchen. For an instant I had a vision of Eriko's smiling face, and my heart turned over. I felt an urge to get moving. It looked to me like the kitchen had not been used in quite a while. It was somewhat dirty and dark. I began to clean. I scrubbed the sink with scouring powder, wiped off the burners, washed the dishes, sharpened the knives. I washed and bleached all the dish towels, and while watching them go round and round in the dryer I realized that I had become calmer. Why do I love everything that has to do with kitchens so much? It's strange. Perhaps because to me a kitchen represents some distant longing engraved on my soul. As I stood there, I seemed to be making a new start; something was coming back.