I have seen it

Though the thoughts of initial desire and panicked infatuation have drifted away, I still see many of the signs of my love for it.

The feelings have changed over time and my relationship to this country has grown and faded in differing ways. It has aged like a wine. It matured and developed into an equally distant and uniquely irreplaceable part of me.

I fell in love with the people, the peace of the rice fields and the soft smell of smoke from a fire burning somewhere. I still hear the sounds of summer, the calming embrace of fall and the silence of a winter day. I still love the early morning before sunrise where the entire world is just beginning to stir to life.

Small details have replaced the imagination I had when first moving here or from trying to get here. I have become a part of it, despite a certain remoteness to much that is happening.

I find on the ground a lone coin or a child’s shoe and find some joy in it. Even the routine has become a comfort.

I can give parts of myself or more to help in small ways the sense of something that exists here. I am happy to, it is necessary to. It’s been said that kindness requires much less effort than anger, and I have grown to feel that more and more.

So while my connection to Japan has shifted from wildness to a calm path, I can still see it.