Love and Distance Pt. 2: Near and Dear

On Sunday, I was in Asuke for the final day of their Hina Matsuri (Girl's Doll Festival). Asuke is better known for fall colors, but that's beside the point. People open their houses to the public so anyone can come see the old dolls they've collected over the years, their own innovations on Dairi-sama and Hina-sama, and in some cases serve tea and snacks for a small fee. I found it interesting, though, that the setups were always in the genkan. They'd never quite let you inside.

Businesses had their own setups as well. Capitalists will be capitalists. I can't fault businesses for wanting to make money; that's what businesses do.

In one shop a man asked me a simple question: "where are you from?" in English. The man was a whitey like myself, and from the accent I assumed he was British, though to be honest I'm not really very good at placing such things. My reaction to this very moment surprises me.

I was stunned.

I stopped, paused for an awkward amount of time and said curtly, "the US," just as he turned to Colleen to ask her if I had understood what he said. I was noticably disturbed by his question; I felt, as best as I can say, an affront. He wasn't going around quizzing anyone else, just the obvious foreign type (i.e. me). The question was probably directed towards Colleen as well, but it didn't feel that way to me.

His question resembled, I suppose, one I'm used to from the Japanese: "nan no kuni?" simply "what country?"

We went to Asuke with the Kobayashis, friends of ours, and at one of those rare moments when the inpenetrable gossamer barrier of gentility falls away and I feel close to those among whom I live, someone like myself steps up to remind me of what I am: an outsider.

My English-speaking brain forgot itself. It equated proximity with friendship. We talk about love as a matter of distance, a quantitative thing. We say things like, "we're not close" or "I feel so distant from him" as if the mere quantity of separation is enough to convey the degree of ardor one feels for another. In a country where you are, in fact, physically close to everyone, distance ceases to serve as a useful metaphor for the regard in which one holds others.

Sometimes, I feel as if I carry around my person an invisible quarantine wherever I go: a personal forcefield to encapsulate the odd. It makes you wonder though... is it to protect me from the world or to protect the world from me?

I resent that man for making me think such things. I resent him for coming so close to my real fears.