Constipation of the Brain

So I realize that disappeared from this blog for a very, very long time. What, like...two years? I had my reasons, I suppose, the most obvious being I was crazy busy, and my school stopped letting me bring my computer to school. Another was that I started dating someone, and anyone with any scruples wouldn't type their girlfriend's business all over their blog. I'm still with her, and she's pushing me to write more.

But one thing most people don't consider is what it's like not to get to use your language freely for a few years. Normally, people meet friends, do a lot of small talk, make horrible jokes... Basically you just let your mouth run. This is a wonderful thing, because it clears out your brain.

Now...imagine you had to spend the day using a set group of words and sentence patterns. No gestures, no sound effects. Just 500 words, and no sentences longer than ten words. Most likely, you'd end up diluting all your ideas and sentences to the point that you'd only be communicating 5% of what you really want to say. That means the other 95% just piles up.

Now, imagine doing that for a few years.

What happens? I'll tell you what. You learn that it's really not necessary to communicate so much. You learn that most of the things you want to say are just filler. And maybe...that is true, but writing journals and stuff honestly seems like a waste of time. But the funny part? When you do finally meet someone who you can talk to, all the build up just comes pouring out...but you don't know how to organize it or even keep it entertaining!

That's where I am now. I gotta clear out all the junk in my head so that my thoughts can flow more freely. I often find that I'll have ideas that I would have been able to flesh out into a well thought blog entry 5 years ago. Now, I just tuck them away, hoping that I'll get to use them later.

So, forgive me when these meaningless posts pop up. I'll try my best to keep it from happening too much.

J

Uncertainty and Marriage

One of the most difficult sentence patterns for students of any language to learn is the subjunctive. It's just so...cultural. The degree to which each society contemplates uncertainty decides the form, right? English doesn't really contemplate the uncertainty of the future. We Just say "will" or "will be". The nuance is in there. But the uncertainty of what could have been? Man, that's one long pattern.

I tell my students that "regret" is a good way to tell a story. "I shouldn't have ______. If I hadn't ______, I wouldn't _______." And it works! People make funny stories, every time. But invariably, one woman (and it's always a woman) says, "If I hadn't met my husband in college, I would have married a different man." And then she hangs her head while everyone else laughs. (In one case, including her own children!)

Yikes, man. Marriage. Particularly marriage in Japan. It is a loveless affair, for the most part. I was somehow raised to believe that marriage is teamwork and communication. I don't remember my parents ever teaching me that, but that's what I ended up with. Here? Marriage is like...a job. Keep up a good image. Never bring your problems home. You got stress? Go somewhere else to let it out. Need to talk? Go to your friends. Marriage is just something that everyone does. A spouse is a just someone who signed a contract with you.

Now...this is in the older generations. Problem is, the younger generations look at it and say, "Nope!" but then, as we all do, they become their parents and think, "Marriage is the responsible thing, right? Fine." The women find a rich man so she doesn't have to work, spits out a few kids for him, and then focuses entirely on the kids and house. The men find a pretty girl, are somewhat happy until the wife has kids, at which point the man's life becomes work, stress, and responsibility. Man works and drinks, woman cleans and cares. Husbands are happier living in separate cities or even other countries, and the wives are glad to have the man out of the way.

I think, "Good lord...how can they live like that?" But, it is Japan. Social responsibility outweighs individual happiness every time. Heck, individual happiness is scary to most people here. But I know my view of marriage may very well be idealistic. I'm an INFP. That's how I roll. American marriages are failing left and right. But that might be because Americans focus too much on individual happiness, to the point of making selfish, foolish decisions. Guess that's why I'm in no rush to get hitched. Who's to say I'm not as selfish as everyone else?

J

A head above the rest, too broad across the chest.

Just now, I noticed that yet another one of my ties is showing signs of wear and tear. When moments like these pop up, I always wonder, "Why don't I already have a tie to replace this one?" No, really. Why do I wait until my clothes have holes in them to get new ones?

Some might call me economical. I mean, you don't really NEED new clothes until the others wear out, right? Others might say...it's a symptom of maleness. Many of us have heard Seinfeld's bit on men's underwear, and the frightening, but true, idea of "underwear vapor". But you wanna know what I think the real reason is?

I'm too tall.

See, normal sized people (and I use that term very loosely) probably see clothes like Americans see food. They have all these options constantly within their grasp at affordable prices, so why not just grab a shirt here or there? Shoes? Yeah, you might need those. Socks? Man, those things are always disappearing. Better buy a gross. And how are you supposed to tip your hat to someone if you don't have one? Better stock up on those, for all the various tipping regulations. Clothes are readily available. They might not fit perfectly, or they might not make you look like a runway model, but they cover all the areas that need to be covered, and make you look like you know how to take care of yourself. Ya know...if you're trying.

Now me... I'm about 6'4"...6'5". Shoes off. 220 lbs. And I was blessed with the shoulders of a statue of a Greek god. Not bragging here. I've only recently kinda grown into them. Before I just looked like a giraffe in football pads. But anyway... That means I'm very tall, and rather slim with a frightening wingspan. You'd think that'd be awesome right? On paper, I sound like everything would fit me wonderfully.

Nope.

Shirts and jackets? My shoulders alone pull the seams to the point of almost ripping. Pants? Don't even get me started. Highwaters don't flatter anyone. Shorts? On a man my size? Unless we are playing basketball, it looks ridiculous. Shoes? Not so bad. Size 13s are pretty simple to find. Socks as well.

Go to a Big and Tall shop, you say? Look at the name of that store. Big AND Tall. Not "or". I've been to those places, and I'd have to gain a good 40 pounds to fit into that stuff. And unless I wanna trigger the diabetes gene just waiting for a chance, that ain't happening. And most people forget, after L, when you start tacking on Xs, to the tune of 3XL or so, you're only gaining horizontally. Not vertically. And finally, in the eyes of most clothes makers, "tall" stops about about 6'3".

So it's all custom fit stuff, which is crazy expensive.

So, what this teaches tall people is that once you find clothes, you hug them close until they are unwearable. Obvious holes, stains or odd fits. That's when you throw them away...but you really don't. You keep them to wear around the house when no one can see you, so you don't have to do yard work or cleaning in your brand new extra long jeans that it took you years to locate at a store that had only one pair left.

...and that's in America. I'm in Japan, people. Clothes my size simply do not exist. TIES in my size do not exist. I have to order everything from America. And storage? Washing? Man, I just gave up. ...not on washing. Gotta do that.

But when you find a hole or a bleached spot, it's like... It's like your refrigerator broke while you were on vacation, and all the food inside spoiled. You got some backup food, but you know...one day...you're gonna have to fork over some major cash to feel safe again.

I know that if I could, I'd probably pick up a simple new shirt every week. They way I buy other things kinda proves that. If I were shorter, I'd be a clothes person. Buuut here I am. Tall and "economical". And until the government starts giving food, clothing and transportation vouchers to tall people, I guess I'm just gonna have to roll with it.

I wonder if I can get tax credits on ties...

J

A small move...

I've decided to keep my ideas a bit more separate.

If you wanna keep reading my ideas on storytelling, please go here:

http://mythsmyth.blogspot.com/

Jamal in Japan will simply be my daily...ish observations. Enjoy!

The fears of children

I mentioned some nightmares of mine in an earlier post, and a recent development in the life of an old schoolmate of mine has forced me to revisit their origins a bit... So bear with me, people. I'm gonna take you into the mind of a 3-year-old me.

It all started with a statue. I guess my mom was trying to embrace a little African heritage when she bought the set. They were a pair of hand-carved wooden figurines - one male, and one female - about ten inches tall and painted black. They were crudely made, and as I didn't really understand human anatomy at the time, I thought they were both men. The male, the real male, wasn't all that special. I remember he had a beard, and was holding a long staff. Maybe it was a spear. But the female... I don't think I'll ever forget her face. Very angular, large lips, a narrow nose, and almost feline eyes, except that she had no irises or pupils. Just two, empty, cat-like eyes that stared straight ahead. She wore a sort of dress that left her shoulders bare. And her hair... It stood straight up, but was parted in the middle... Like a great V, or two thick horns shooting up from her head.

I suppose I was drawn to those statues, most likely because my mother put them on the bottom shelf of a sort of display case that my father built. Bottom shelves are the realm of children. Put something there, and it's like you're giving it to them. I used to pick up the statues and make them fight each other (staff/spear man always won) or use the V-woman as a villain for my Lego armies. Even then, she just creeped me out, so I tried my best not to look into those eyes.

But one day, I guess curiosity got the better of me, and I took a close look at the V-woman statue. The etch marks in the wood. The detail on the dress. Those dark, soulless eyes. They were hypnotizing. I'm not sure how long I stared into them, but I remember it took my mother calling my name to snap me out of it. I decided not to mess with the V-woman anymore, and put her back on the shelf.

That night, I went to bed without a care in the world. The realm of sleep was mysterious then. I would disappear, or cease to exist for hours at a time, and somehow come back refreshed and ready to play the next day. It's fun, actually. Well, it was back then.

Shortly after I drifted into non-existence, I found myself walking through a museum with my mother. I remember brown walls, glass cases with backlighting, and hundreds of tall, faceless strangers with droning voices. My mother held my hand as we walked, and I remember feeling...happy.

Then something caught my eye. An old suit of armor. Rusty, and dented. I dragged my mom over to it to get a closer look. Of course, I couldn't resist reaching out to touch it, but the moment my finger came within and inch of the armor, the whole thing came crashing down. It sounded like...pots and pans clanging on the ground. I leapt back, and turned to my mother to explain that it wasn't my fault, but when I saw her, it looked like she was dissolving, all the grains of her body crashing down like the armor. I almost screamed, until I realized the entire museum was doing the same thing. Crashing down...leaving nothing but darkness around me. The people were screaming. I could hear all of them, all that terror. I shut my eyes, and covered my ears--if you can't perceive it, it's not happening.

When I opened my eyes, I found myself in a ruined temple of sorts, made of gray stone. There was no roof, which meant I could see the sky. The green, turbulent sky. In the middle of the temple was another statue, made of the same stone as its surroundings. This statue was a kneeling man with his head bowed. I walked up to it and noticed that on the base of the statue was carved three letters. O. X. X.

To this day, I'm not sure why I did it, but I read those letters aloud,

"O...X...X?"

The ground began to rumble. The sky swirled. Thunder rumbled. And crack! The base of the statue split. From that split oozed a thick black liquid that slowly encircled me. I remember seeing the ooze leap, straight up into the sky. I looked up to follow it, and then...darkness. Darkness filled with a thousand screams.

I was in my bed. It was still night time. My sister was in her bed next to mine, sound asleep. I guessed I had come back to this world a little early. I rolled over onto my back, and wondered if I should wake her up and tell her what I had seen. But when I went to open my mouth, no words came out. Then I felt them. Hands. Two invisible hands grasped my wrists and pinned them to the bed. Two more gripped my ankles. I couldn't turn my head. I couldn't scream. I could barely breathe. Then I heard it. It was a rhythm... It's hard to describe, but it was deep and drumming, yet it had a melody to it. It played over and over...

The door to the bedroom creaked open, and in slipped a blurry figure, dark, with glowing greenish yellow eyes. It was smoky, but it had the form of a man. Its movements were quick...jerky. Staccato. And atop its head shot two great horns, straight up, and parted in the middle, like a great V. It shifted closer to me. The rhythm grew louder with each moment. I wanted to scream. I wanted to wake up my sister, but as far as I could tell, she was still sound asleep.

It was right next to my bed.

The rhythm was pounding.

It reached out one smoky hand.

My heart was throbbing.

It grabbed my face. There was an explosion of pain, like needles piercing every inch of my body. And with the pain came those thousand screams, and then my own, joining them in one terrible, agonizing crescendo...

And then I woke up.

I think I just stayed in my bed that night. Too terrified to go back to sleep. Too terrified to make a sound, or even test my voice. Far too terrified to go find my mother... Who would believe me? I lacked the words to even explain it.

That was just the beginning. For ten years I fought with Oxx. He struck in strange ways, each one more abstract than the last. My parents came to know his name. My sister came to hate the nights I had to sleep in her new room. I came to hate sleep all together. I was never safe from him. At a moment's notice, a good dream could turn bad. A peaceful vision could be shattered by those screams. That pain. There was no getting used to it. There was no escaping him. My prayers became hour-long pleading sessions to God, begging Him to keep me safe at night. I kept a Bible under my pillow to show my dedication. Sometimes He helped, most nights, He didn't. I died thousands of times in those ten years. First I was scared, then I was embarrassed, and finally, I was angry.

At age 13, I asked my mother to throw away that statue. And she did. And Oxx has yet to return. His echoes still exist, though. I can feel the threat of his return in all my dreams. But he never does. There is no pain. No screams. But my mind has only recently been able to dream freely. To sleep deeply.

And all this...from a statue.

You see, children's minds are amazing. To them, the world is still "soft". It's rules and laws are malleable, and wide open to interpretation. They lack prior experience from which to establish those rules. So they come up with wild ideas.

I'm thinking most people don't quite understand children's fears... Objects are more threatening...more powerful than people. They cannot be spoken to. They do not rest. They are forever looming. Staring. Even while you sleep, they are watching. Who knows what they can see? Who knows what they are hiding? Who knows if they are your friend or your enemy?

Because of this, children choose protective objects. Blankets. Teddy bears. Jackets. But this actually increases their terror... It makes perfect sense. If a blanket can protect, other objects must be able to harm.

My old schoolmate is having a similar problem with her son. To an outsider...to an adult, these things seem silly. That's understandable. A killer statue? Kinda lame. Parents smirk. Older children laugh and tease. But when fueled by the fears of a child, those nightmares just grow, and grow...

If you're lucky, your kid will grow up and find a way to deal with it. Might even give him or her a little character.

...or you might be paying for therapy.

Just sayin'.

J

There is no place I know...

For a long time, I wondered why my father and his family seemed so...determined to stamp out my more whimsical nature. If whimsical is the word I'm looking for...

They were all about practicality and work. Finding your role and sticking with it. Unusual behavior was looked down upon... However, within each relative, there was an inkling of the fantastic. An uncle who enjoyed Lord of the Rings, an aunt whose attention would drift away when she heard classical music... They were hiding something.

I think that my family was a perfect example of the truth lingering within black culture.

See, I believe that black people have stunted imaginations. This is not to say that they CAN'T imagine. It's just...they're afraid to let go. Too many decades of being forced to live in the "real world". On top of that, we've become a painfully introspective people, to the point that we can't get out of our own heads. While the entertainment world swings on its pendulum from introspective to escapism, black people remain firm on introspection, thinking that if we focus on ourselves enough, everyone else will notice.

Our fiction is usually very mundane. Our heroes are wealthy, with marital problems. Our villains are threats to family and community. Even our superheroes slug it out in the ghetto. There is no magic. There is no wonder. Not even in our churches. The wonder of Biblical stories are broken down into real world applications (this is NOT a bad thing). As such, our children grow up learning not to dream as children do, but as adults do. Not to entertain fantasies, but to buckle down, man up, and learn what role you were built to play. It's almost like the black child is...dead.

But then I look at our free spirits. Our Muses. The Musicians. Ever notice how many of them have alter egos? Fifty different names? They start off making music we can dance to. Then they start making music we should think about. And then...a select few of them fly off the known path and go for the abstract. The fantastic. And what happens? We, black folk, give them that suspicious, old church-lady look...and utter a collective, "Mm, mm, mm. Lord have mercy. Child done lost his mind."

And it is at that exact moment that white audiences truly notice them. If you hadn't noticed, most "white" entertainment is...escapist. Introspection is haaaaard for them, because they don't quite know who they are. They can't unite under one mind. They are just as lost as we are. But, man...you give them a crazy musician and they love it! And...they are the dreamers. The creators. The ambitious. In more things than just music. They have no real sense of community...but they can dream.

Black people need dreams. We have community. We focus so much on it, I fear we might break it. But we need to dream beyond wealth, fame, musical/athletic prowess. There is a whole world of pure imagination out there that the majority of us don't even entertain anymore, and honestly... That saddens me.

But we will find our way back. One myth at a time.

J

Vampires Suck

I just finished reading "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter". The book wasn't bad. Seems like a stealthy attempt to slip a slow, fact-filled history book into our instant-gratification culture, but I can't hate the guy for trying.

But while reading it, I was reminded of my strong dislike of vampires in general. They are mind-numbingly boring. Well, at least the modern version of them is. I remember the days when vampires just lured people into traps and drank their blood. It was mostly about their charm, and maybe the dangers of succumbing to lust. Their weirdest power was the ability to transform into a bat. They could be killed by a stake through the heart, and they hated sunlight, garlic, and crosses. That made them a dangerous foe, but they could be stopped.

Now, we've pretty much got blood drinking, immortal, aristocratic Saiyans running around. They have super strength and speed and have somehow managed to OUTGROW all those weaknesses that once existed. The only people that can kill them seem to be vampires themselves. Or...Abe Lincoln. Which is kinda cool, but I digress.

New vampires are simply boring. They don't have plans or schemes, they sit around and lament about their hunger and curse... They are almost all white. Ever seen an Iraqi vampire? Not me.

I--oh no... No. No, this can't be right. Okay, I'm wondering if there's a relationship between the current state of vampires and the current state of white people. Basically, vampires of today represent the divided white culture. They have all this power, and some of them see it as a means to oppress others. But, the good ones hate their power. It's a curse. They side with the normal humans and long to feel as they do. They fear the repercussions of falling in love with someone who isn't one of them. They just want to abide side by side with humanity, and they fight for the safety and rights of the poor, weak, ignorant , mortal humans...

Isn't that the exact same thing as white guilt?

Admittedly, I'm as paranoid as the next black guy, so sometimes my radar is a bit sensitive, but...I can't help but wonder... That's where stories come from, right? They are born from cultural oppression and uncertainties. Maybe these new vampires are the new white myth.

Yikes, man...

J

Bookworm

I am an information addict. No, no...maybe a book addict. There are so many books I honestly want to read, so many subjects I want to study...but if I do the math, it is simply impossible for me to read all these things in my lifetime. I'm not even a fast reader. I tend to get lost pretty quick if the author decides to toss in a few too many clauses. ...darn you, Faulkner.

But really. How to people find the time to read all these books? How do they study so much? I imagine that, before television, video games, and the great boon and bane that is the Internet came along, people just read for fun, because that really was the only thing you could do, beyond hootenannies and...catillions (sp?). So people learned languages, they read books, they obsessed over Verne and Doyle, and spoke about it with friends much like we all talk about TV shows and movies.

But what's worse, they had a LOT less information than we did! Of course people seemed smarter and more refined...because recent history didn't get in the way of studying classics! I wonder how much information is produced every minute of every day... And people expect us to know all about current events AND the past? AND literary masterpieces? Seriously?

I bet that since the Cold War, we've placed so much emphasis on connecting everything in the past to WWII, and then connecting that to right now, that kids have no hope of ever feeling like they actually know anything. There's just too much info out there.

Maybe things were better (in the short term) when information was harder to come by. You didn't question yourself so much; you just formed an opinion and rolled with it.

Those poor, poor kids who have to study the raging political tornado that was 2000-2010...and write papers on it. I just hope they never ask me for help. My answer would be so disappointing...

"Sorry, kid. I was too busy trying to catch up."

J

A friend of mine recently mentioned a new zombie romance movie called "Warm Bodies". Now...personally, I never thought I'd see the word "zombie" teamed up with the word "romance", but I guess it was the next logical step what with all the horror-romance movies coming out. From what I can gather, the zombie-man absorbs the memories of the people's brains he eats. So he kills one guy, makes a meal of it, and, via absorbed memories, proceeds to fall in love with his dinner's girlfriend.

Yeah, you read that right.

My friend then asked, "Why would anyone want to watch that?" So, I had to think about it for a minute or two. Then suddenly, I remembered I little quote I saw somewhere: "Every boy wants a good girl who will be bad just for him. Every girl wants a bad boy who will be good just for her." And there it is. The underlying truth in all these horror-romance movies.

I spoke to my sister about it, as she's much wiser than I am, and she pointed out that it's not exactly a new trend. It just used to be more...subtle. She pointed out a few stories, like Gone With the Wind and Wuthering Heights, neither of which I've ever managed to finish, but I think I know what she means. And...I gotta say. She's right.

So, that little quote seems to be true, but I'm glad they used the terms "boy" and "girl". Makes me feel like people can grow out of such silliness. But it does make for good storytelling.

The question on my mind is...should I take advantage of this shameful truth, or should I try to go against the grain, and point out what it does to men and women alike? Or perhaps both? I want people to enjoy my stories, but man...I couldn't enjoy writing something even remotely related to Twilight and all those other blood-sucking bodice-rippers...

Don't think I'll be selling my soul to that particular devil just yet.

J

Kids say the darnedest things...

Contrary to what Hollywood would have you think, kids don't usually say anything of any consequence, and the wisdom they impart on one another is usually foolishness or simply (mis)quoted from someone else, but they do tend to ask questions that bring out the best in adults... I need to remember that.

I was just reading about how it's bad to put kids in films. And...it's true, unless you write them as they are: humans in training. Having them bust out with sage-like awesomeness every five minutes is just...bad. Mostly because no kid would even know how to phrase sagely stuff.

The recent increase in super-smart youths is probably Nickelodeon's fault, and it seems to surprise people when real children just aren't as witty as their fictional counterparts. Being out here, away from the jaded American screenwriters, I hear kids ask questions that really make me think about how I present the world to them, and how I act around them.

So...I think fictional kids should drive adult characters with those embarrassing questions they tend to ask.

Or maybe that's just American kids...

Maybe this is why I don't miss people very often...

I've been creating worlds since I was a little boy. I can't really call them "worlds". They were just...situations. Scenarios. Places where magic, or wonder, sadness or joy, and sometimes even horror took place. They were all linked together, able to be traversed in a single thought, all populated by some slightly different incarnation of the people in my life. Or the toys I owned. Or the people I wanted to meet.

You might say it all stemmed from childhood innocence. Those worlds were ways for me to undo the wrongs of the world around me; I could rewrite any story I wished in my own imagination, and all would be well. The truth is that, as a boy, I felt far too much. I was hypersensitive to other people's emotions. Even fictional people. I can recall more than one occasion where a sad story, whether the ending was happy or not, would leave me depressed for hours on end, which in a child's mind is the better part of a lifetime. I even stopped watching Pinwheel, because the creators of that show always seemed to toss in some melancholy short and crush my four-year-old heart in the process. The only way to defend myself was to dive into that story, and tack on a few extra chapters. All wrongs were made right; the downtrodden were uplifted, and evil was vanquished, often by the hand of yours truly.

But it also came from fear. I was plagued by troubling nightmares in my youth; sleep became more perilous than the real world. Many nights I would have to make the long dark walk to my parents' bedroom to seek the solace of my mother's arms, and feel pangs of guilt for waking her so abruptly, and so often. (Many years later I would discover that I had inherited these dreams from my mother--a fact that neither of us can explain.) This fear and terror led me to spend many hours a day imagining heroic figures who, I guessed, could somehow break through the walls of my nightmares and save me from paralyzing terror. Sometimes it worked, usually it didn't. But that just meant I needed to focus on those heroes more. Turn them into permanent residents of my imagination. They needed to be there even when I couldn't concentrate on them. They needed stories, adventures...lives; they needed to be real. Or as real as I could muster.

So, my heroes (often altered versions of myself) were the ones who swooped in to save the day in all those rewrites. And that...was just the beginning.

Even now, as I look at the characters that populate the worlds I'm working on, I can tell that they are simply more mature, thought-out versions of those heroes who protected me from my own fear and sadness. They are fragments of myself and my past that have grown into dear, dear friends. All my worlds remain connected, like a neighborhood of warm, happy houses. I still have the nightmares, but now they seem more like wayward pets who wreak havoc on the house while the owners are away. My neighbors always laugh, and are more than happy to help me put things back together.