What We See

I’ve thought for weeks about writing, only to find myself too depleted to string my ideas together. The past three months were rough and draining, so when I landed in Japan lugging around my writing materials and vague intentions of being super productive, it was all an empty promise to myself. I didn’t do a single thing. Instead, we did the touristy things and ate and walked an average of 20K steps a day, and in the evenings I enjoyed the Japanese shower and bath, which is a whole experience in and of itself. My tired limbs would melt into the bed and I’d quickly fall into a deep sleep each night, and this went on for two weeks, my sole job to explore and rest. Now, at the tail end of our jet lag back at home, I’m slowly coming out of the fog.

I’ve been in a season of ephemerality ever since my birthday in February, and thus tackling the existential crisis of knowing everything is moving past you like a fast train and where should I be? Apparently 41 was the magic number for me to feel this way. I always thought it was 40 when this mid-life shift occurs, but when 40 came and went and nothing seemed different, I thought I was in the clear. I remember being in Japan when the children were very young. Peter was tucked away in my Ergo baby carrier on my back, and the other two holding each of my hands. I noticed women with strollers and babies. That felt like yesterday. Now I have a teen and a pre-teen and my baby is 8-years-old; life looks different from this vantage point. I’m not saying I want babies and toddlers again, but there is something disconcerting about realizing, “Oh, my turn is over.” Like maybe the younger version of myself didn’t fully understand the idea of seasons, or that life is moving in one direction. Sometimes I still forget. 

A few months before Kenneth died, we plotted out the next 8 years of travel on an index card. I made a chart of the years, each of our ages, and where we would go. 2023 was the last year. He died six weeks before our trip to Europe in 2016. My sister-in-law who is now not my sister-in-law took his ticket, and thus began my traveling life without him. I had a traveling life before him, but it never occurred to me that I’d have to have one without him. Surely not until I retired. Now, I’m aware that one day there will be a traveling life without the kids. 

Ethan, my oldest child, drew a new chart for us. My heart drops when I see their ages in 2031:

Ethan 21

Eloise 18

Peter 16

I remember looking at my original list, seeing 2023, thinking it was so far away, wondering how I would survive on my own with these kids and if I would even want to.

Now I know it’s going to go so, so fast. There has been sadness. But there has been a lot of joy. I just need it to slow down. I want to enjoy the ride. To savor each drop of this life before it all dries up and I’m sitting on the other side wishing I enjoyed it just a little bit more. 

We haven’t filled out the travel chart yet. The column for destinations is still empty. We brainstormed, but I can’t bring myself to do it, because this is what I know: life twists and turns into directions I can not predict. Sure, it’s nice to have ideas. I have plenty of those. Better to let them materialize when the moment is ripe. It will happen that way with or without your consent. Otherwise, you have a chart with a dead person’s name on it and dreams that will never be yours. At least not in that version. Why not be open to variations you can not yet conceptualize?

In Japan, they have a saying: mono no aware. 

It is a way of seeing the world with a sensitivity toward beauty and of the beautiful. It is a deep awareness of impermanence. This has roots in Shintoism and Buddhism. The awareness of the brevity of beautiful encounters leads to a deep appreciation of these moments, and this in turn fuels our gratitude. 

The Japanese appreciation of cherry blossoms is a specific example. It is a season of beauty and they savor it, knowing they have it for only a short while. People flock from all over the world to see it. Someday, when I’m retired, I too would like to have the experience. But for now, in Southern California, we have our version of this beauty: the jacaranda trees. They’re late this summer because of a cold winter, but the flowers are now blooming everywhere, creating canopies of purple. The jacaranda trees litter the ground with purple blossoms,and while some people resent the mess, I think it is worth the beauty. When we go on walks, my youngest child will pick out the best ones and offer them to me in a bouquet with the sweetest intentions. But, by the time we walk home, the flowers have already begun to wilt. It is this fleeting beauty that mono no aware tries to capture. A sad realization that the special moment in front of you is fleeting. You can’t contain or extend the beauty; it’s like trying to hold sand. Mono no aware.

We visited the Ghibli Museum. I remember watching Ponyo with our oldest child and Kenneth on DVD in our first house, long before there were any other children in our family. I remember getting rid of our obsolete dvd collection after Kenneth died, and how our kids don’t really know how to use DVDs today, and is this what it means to get old? I knew about this phenomenon, I just never thought it would happen to me.

Last month, word came out that the original “mommy blogger,” Dooce, died. She was 47. It gave me a little jolt to my consciousness, to be honest, even though she was just a stranger online. I hadn’t followed her in quite a while, but I remember reading her blog before I had my own children, watching in awe as she made money writing posts about her life from her nice house and her thin body and her cute kids and adoring husband and large following. She died by suicide, and both of her children are still teenagers. She will not see those cute kids into their adulthoods. It wasn’t a fairy tale after all. I didn’t know she had eating disorders and addictions. I barely knew she had gotten divorced, that’s how far I drifted from the mommy blog scene. I only remember once feeling admiration about her life and wondering what I could do to also achieve such perfection. I remember the feelings of inferiority watching women like her, feeling like I was doing something wrong compared to them. But I only saw the facade. In this world of social media, we don’t often get to witness the curtain pulled to the side to show us that the wizard is not really a wizard.

I learned recently that another popular mommy blogger who published a New York Times bestseller, and is known for posting pretty pictures of the fancy parties she hosts and all of the years of beautiful redecorating of her 12,000 square foot home in Naples, hadn’t paid her mortgage in two years and was facing foreclosure. The house recently sold, a fact discovered by nosy people on the internet and not something she herself has disclosed as of today. She’s still hiding behind the curtain. Her blog has become irrelevant over the years as the internet landscape has evolved, and as I researched her fall from grace in between my jet lag naps and lethargy this week, I came across someone’s commentary: there are younger and cuter mommies on the internet now with cuter kids. The world doesn’t need her. 

Ouch. 

Is this all we are— disposable?

This hurts me to think about, but in a way, if we accept this truth, then we are free to live accordingly.

Since Dooce’s death, I’ve been untangling all of this in my mind. What does it even mean to have it all? Why would I covet a 12,000 square foot house with the beautiful lanai and pool and adoring husband if it wasn’t real? You could write a book and be on the bestseller list, and next year have absolutely no prospects in sight. Still, I think it is important to reach for your dreams. To give it a chance even if you fail. But in the end, it is all about balance and perspective and knowing that Sartre was probably right, it all means nothing. 

There are Shinto shrines all over Japan. I found these fascinating. They are distinct from Buddhist temples in that you will see torii gates, which symbolize the border between the secular world and the sacred world. The gates are often red. You aren’t supposed to walk in the middle of the paths— those are for the gods. And there are many deities, although none of them are supreme and they are often tied to nature. These are known as kamis. My favorite is the Inari Okami, which is the god or goddess of rice, and their messenger is the fox. We went to a shrine in Kyoto with adorable fox statues, and of course my kid suckered me into a fox stuffed animal to join the collection of a zillion other forgotten stuffed animals we have at home. But, since I am so stricken with ephemerality, I rationalize the ridiculous purchase as my chance to watch my young child carry around a stuffed animal, and it might be the last time. And he was so cute doing it. The middle child rolls her eyes and tells me that I am wasting my money. Both of us can be right.

At these Shinto shrines, you can purchase talismans that will supposedly bring you good luck. There are different ones. My oldest, Ethan, was super into doing this. He combed over his options and spent his yen on them every opportunity he got. He even brought ones home for his friends, such as the “high marks on tests” and “good grades” for their upcoming school year. I got health and health for children. It’s a little silly, but in my season of ephemerality, thoughts of disease and aging have been plaguing my mind. I also chose success, because even in light of the fact that you could publish best sellers and still be unhappy, I still harbor hope that I will eventually make this life-long dream come true and it will bring me incredible joy. Maybe this little talisman hanging from my purse will work. Maybe it won’t, but there is something inspirational about a little hope.

It made me think about the amulets we keep in our lives, the reminders or charms to invoke or channel something that we want. The superstitions we feed because we are scared.

Today I threw away Kenneth’s natto. Natto is fermented beans. I think it’s nasty; Japanese people will eat it for breakfast over rice. The small package was at the bottom of the freezer in my garage, the last bit of him left in there. I’ve been pretty good over the years about purging my life of these reminders. But for some reason, I couldn’t throw away the natto. Maybe it was my talisman. A tiny bit of hope that if it stayed, so would he in some way. 

When I left for Japan, my garage freezer was on its last legs. When I came home from Japan, the freezer in the house stopped working too. Exhausted, I felt like my appliances were conspiring against me in my weakened state. Gosh darn it, I should have gotten the talisman for appliance health at one of the shrines. The refrigerator in the house—leftover from my father-in-law, who died 11 years ago— had to be replaced. The freezer stopped working. Last night, I clicked the purchase button online for two new refrigerators after a long day of researching in my jet lag fog (the timing impeccable for a teacher on summer vacation, AKA not getting paid). When I woke up this morning, I discovered the refrigerator passed away in the wee hours of the morning. It was like the old fridge knew a replacement was officially on its way, and now it could say good night for good. I emptied it with my boys at 3:30AM, because JET LAG, and then unplugged the old thing and gave it a tender pat. Slowly, this house is not the same house my husband grew up in as a child. It is not the house where we started our family. Slowly, it evolves into something else. I will always find that a little bit sad.  

We were driving last month and I was lecturing my kids about something or another regarding motivating themselves on the way home from the math tutoring center. I remember telling them: if you think of a red Tesla, you’ll see a red Tesla. 

Sure enough, we started seeing red Teslas everywhere. It became something to laugh about. 

But: perspective. 

What we choose to see. 

Focus. 

Mindset.

I ended my 19th teaching year feeling out of sorts. After a few years of the COVID mess and a revolving door of administration at my school, it has been hard to stay optimistic. Students have changed. Teaching has changed. The demands have exponentially increased while the resources have continued to be scarce. People are on edge. AI is taking over. We’re on the front lines of society in education, and the future doesn’t always look bright. This takes a toll on your spirit.

I’m always excited about summer, but this year felt different. I ended this year asking myself, “What are you doing? What do I even want in my life?” It is disconcerting, because I’m usually the person who has my life planned out for the next five to ten years. Also, it’s not a good place to be when you feel like “this” isn’t fully filling up your cup anymore. It likely had a lot to do with how I was feeling overall in the past several months: depleted. But maybe it was something more.

I don’t have the answers, only a resolve to explore these thoughts in the next few months, read books, and work on my mindset and boundaries. In schools, every year is full of unknowns. You can never guarantee what you’re going to get. The classroom is an ecosystem that takes on a life of its own. It is part of what makes the career interesting; it is never the same. It’s also what makes the career draining. 

I do know that like the red Teslas, what I see matters. As I felt swallowed up by the negatives toward the end of this school year, I thought about how there were so many great kids. There are great colleagues. I love creating lessons and teaching. The community has been my home. I’m not sorry I chose this profession. 

And it’s not like missiles are falling on me sinking the ship kind of draining. It’s a slow leak. The kind of unfulfillment and restlessness, the lack of challenge, lack of creative direction, lack of space to explore potential that chips away at your spirit. It’s this way in my personal life too. 

Sometimes these leaks are trickier to solve. You have to explore the invisible ways we are not being true to ourselves.

And yet, maybe this is precisely the kind of crisis that leads to a better version of oneself. More joy. More happiness. It is kind of like muscles. You need to tear muscle fibers before new protein strands grow and muscles are built. There is pain before the gain. This draining sensation isn’t a sign of weakness or failure, but it’s proof that growth is underway. A gateway to something better. Your own personal torii gate, separating this world from the sacred place you’re stepping into. Perspective.

We went to DisneySea one day during our trip to Japan. A typhoon had hit, and there was non-stop rain and high winds that could knock a person over. I had already purchased the tickets and there was no other time to go in our Tokyo schedule. 

It goes like this: resolve to have a great time with soggy socks, or go home and miss out. Those are the choices.

So we went. We bought the Disney ponchos and it forced me to put my phone away because of the constant rain, and I ended up spending quality, undistracted time with my kids. We had a great time experiencing the rides and the unique popcorn flavors, like curry, white chocolate matcha, and soy sauce and butter. We ate Toy Story alien mochi and stomped in puddles.

Later I thought about how accurate the experience was about life in general. Mono no aware. This is all coming to an end at a time we do not always get to choose or know. We might as well make the most out of it and savor the beauty in front of us. This is your chance right now. What are you going to do in the here and now? This is your golden era. NOW. 

I often get bogged down in tomorrow and next year and five years and what about this or that. Maybe I’m learning, and that’s why I can’t fill out our travel chart for the next eight years? Maybe I’m finally realizing that this is the season to focus on right now and to let the rest unfold as it will. I’ve proven that I can set goals and achieve them. I know I can persevere during hardship. But can I find peace and harmony in each day? That is my challenge to myself. 

More pictures from our Japan trip on my IG.