Scribbler's Cafe: 01.2007

Friday, January 19, 2007

Naked dinner

Yesterday, I dined in the nude. I ate my dinner in the spa café, completely naked save for a bright orange towel wrapped around my brow to keep my sweat from dripping into my microwaved chicken nuggets. A few other women ate with me, all with feet dangling in the warm water river that ran beneath our chairs, all with bright orange towel atop their crowns and breasts hanging free. Chicken nuggets and chopsticks. Naked bottoms flat against wooden swivel chairs. I ate my dinner with a bemused smile.

Later, I took another lap around the bath circuit. 10 minutes under the waterfall in the Atlantis room, a dip in the wine bath, a dip in the mint bath. I spent a few minutes in the rooftop Grecian bath to ponder the stars above Osaka, and far longer than necessary in the jetted massage tubs. Then finally, I rubbed myself all over with a rough salt scrub, scooped by the handful from a giant roman urn, and took a sit in the dry sauna.

I passed over all the cold water treatments completely. I've been swimming in Glacier lakes. (Remember that day… Christy, Dan and the old crew?!) I felt no need to recreate the painful experience in a spa, regardless of the sparkling temptation of the golden tub.

A year has passed since I last fell in love. One. Year. At work, I retreated to the back room to weep. But then my work was done and I rushed to the city spa to melt my body and fuse my heart cracks in all that steamy unrelenting heat. I walked home in the darkness, sauntering and singing. My joy restored.

Currently reading :
Memories of My Melancholy Whores
By Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Release date: By 25 October, 2005

Monday, January 08, 2007

Time to wake up

At the moment, Kiomye and I are dining at the florist's café. There is running water, opera music played at a perfect level, and the overwhelming scent of flowers from the floral arrangement class taking place behind the paper screen. I love this place. I've had a crush on the waiter forever. He takes Kio by her hand and leads her around the shop. She always leaves with a pink rose or two tucked into her pockets.

These have been quiet months for me. I feel as though I've withdrawn into hiding and reprise. I am looking to rest and heal. My heart has been so smashed these past two years that I just wanted to stop and be still for awhile. I haven't even been able to write my own words as much as I am too closed off for that kind of thinking and vulnerability.

My style of loving men has changed as well. I ponder commitment, but worry about yoking my raging ambitions to a calm and quiet man.

But then, raging ambitions don't seem to be much of a concern for me as of late.

This is what I do. I teach my classes with love and attention, but no great devotion or inspiration. I straighten my hair and pull on tall boots and go to the parties of all my marvelous friends. Kiomye and I spend afternoons in cafes or concrete bound animal sanctuaries. I read many good books. I am in bed by nine. I give very little thought to either my past or my future. I haven't even opened the novel files on my computer for three months.

For that I feel shame – and the horrible dread of eternal incompletion.

I have vague ideas about what I will do when I return to America (if I return), but none create sparks in me. I don't think I am lonely much, or even very lost. For a while, I think I am just less.

But ennui can not hold me for my lifetime. I have spent too much time in these doldrums. It's time to get out. Time to wake up.