Hangin' around

Did I mention Josh is gone again? To yet another foreign country, on a ship, again? Yeah. This time around he should be gone less than two weeks, which means he should be home soon, which is very, very good.

In the meantime, I'm cooking a lot of things that he doesn't like much, like coconut curry and soup and whole wheat banana cake. Okay, that last one he would like, but not the other two. I've been seeing some friends, one of whom is moving back to the States this week, and volunteering at the Red Cross.

That's about a third of my time. The rest of it is spent on DVDs of The West Wing - thanks, Joe! How come that was such a good show? And why don't we have more like it? Are there more like it and I'm missing them by living overseas with no satellite? Oh my gosh, this is a good show.

So I'm off to it. Season two at the moment and the President is considering reelection. What a glamorous life I lead.

February wayback #1: Asheville

After much hand-wringing and stress over flying space available, I actually arrived in South Carolina after just one attempt, on February fifth, after about thirty hours of travel. I spent most of that first week relaxing and recovering with my parents and the dogs (and the cats, both of whom are crazy and one of whom lulled me into a false sense of security before attacking my wrist. NO POST FOR THE CATS.) The first day that we were all home and I felt up to anything, we decided to drive to Asheville, North Carolina for lunch and window shopping.

Except that it wasn't window shopping because I bought a million things, but whatever. Since it turns out I'm a giant baby who gets nauseous even on perfectly straight roads, much less windy mountainy ones, I drove. I drove and managed to almost get hit by a car, run into a guardrail, and drive on the wrong side of the street.

Did I mention I was a little discombobulated last month?

Everyone survived and I came back with some really great finds. Once I figure out where they go in my house I'll have pictures, but for now let me just say that there's a tree of life bedspread in the closet, a weeping buddha statuette on my dresser and some outstanding Nepalese Lumbini incense burning in the entryway.

Oh, and we did get that lunch, even though my parents' favorite spot was closed. We found a place with Turkish food, YUM. Falafel is one of those things that I just can't get right, even with Bertha, but this place did not disappoint.I drove home too, without incident mostly, and we returned after dark to some disapproving puppies and one very sweet crazy cat, and then the other one. I don't miss the other one.

Entertainment in South Carolina

I'm sorry I didn't write more while I was visiting my parents in South Carolina. These first six months in Japan have been very trying, on so many levels: feeling so foreign, not working, missing my friends and family and of course struggling with miscarriages. I hadn't realized how badly I needed a time out, and by golly, I took it.

So what did we do for entertainment? A lot, really - we took a day trip to Asheville, cooked elaborate meals and baked fancy desserts, visited Dad's work and had friends over for girls' day. Mom and I made and bought jewelry (woohoo!), mixed custom aromatherapy fragrances for ourselves and others, and knitted up a storm.

But most of all, we cuddled the puppies.Can you blame us?! See, a couple years ago my folks moved from their Florida Keys stilt house to an utterly charming farmhouse in upstate South Carolina. The house, unlike most of the McMansions in the surrounding area, sits on three acres of land: land which, I mentioned to them when I visited, simply begged for a dog. So one night in 2006 we watched a dog show and heard a description of the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. This dog weighs less than twenty pounds, was bred as a companion and bedmate for royalty, and is generally thought to have the most agreeable disposition of any pure breed. Oh, and they need one walk a day and lots of hugs, and that's it.

The stars aligned. My parents The Cat People fell in love with the breed (after, shall we say, some gentle prodding from me), found a reputable breeder in the area, and procured their first-ever dog, Rudy. Here's his baby picture:I know. I KNOW. He's still that cute. And less than a year later, they decided he needed a baby brother, Nemo, the blenheim. Then their breeder called one day to tell them that she had a five year old mama dog who was ready to retire, so Madison came into the picture.
Zero to three dogs in two years - mwahahahaha! My little plan is working!

So there you have it, folks: a month of R&R and good old care for the soul, wrapped up in sixty pounds of sweet puppy. How could anyone resist?

Kurihama Day Tripper

So Operation Tidy House? Lasted one day, and is maybe 10% done. Turns out I'd rather spend time cooking and hanging out with Josh than cleaning up. Oh, and hacking up a lung has consumed a fair bit of my time as well - I've got a superfun case of Welcome Home Bronchitis, or something.

Before the debilitating coughing started, Josh and I got to enjoy our first weekend together. On Saturday I found a monument to Commodore Matthew Perry's 19th century landing in Japan - the Black Ships show of force that precipitated Japan opening trade with the United States. Josh learned a bit about Perry in Newport, where Perry's Japanese successes are still celebrated with an annual Black Ships festival. Neither of us realized that his historic landing was so close to our house - just three train stops away.

The walk to Kurihama harbor was a little longer than I would've liked, but it was a cool, dry day and we both needed to get out together. Finding the monument was really simple, and I am pleased to say that we were the only non-Japanese there that day. It's kind of gratifying to find a tourist spot with no other foreign tourists. There's a beach there, a bunch of dive schools, and then this big monument facing the water.
That's a map of Commodore Perry's route around the world - makes my flight to Japan seem pretty wimpy! As I said, though, it was a long walk, and we were pretty wiped out. Luckily, benches!And this is Japan, so the landscaping was beautiful, sparse, and immaculate.
Now we've seen that little piece of history from both sides of the world. Crazy, huh?

We took a different route back to the train station and passed a gorgeously decorated Shinto shrine. I wish I knew more about Shinto, and I'd like to learn before we leave here. For now it was enough to see the decorations, and the first sakura - the iconic Japanese cherry blossoms - of the year!
I can't wait for more of the trees in Yokosuka to pop open with sakura. The effect is unreal.

We were hungry on the way home, and Josh's coworker Nina had told him about a conveyor belt sushi place near our house. We walked there from the train and, hallelujah, it was so delicious! And reasonably priced! And WALKING DISTANCE FROM OUR HOUSE - we'll be spending a lot of time at this place, let me tell you. The fact that it was packed with Japanese patrons (and again, no other foreigners) was high praise for the food. I had my first California Roll since I left the States, and it was pretty good! I'm so happy to be home.

Travel and home

Oh, it's so nice to be back. I had the easiest travel in history, folks: a long enough layover to eat and blog, very little turbulence in flight, decent food, helpful attendants and considerate seatmates. I arrived in Tokyo at 2:40 pm - that's on the runway - and was through customs, with luggage, across the airport and ON the BUS at 3:20. Unreal.

Now I'm back and Operation Tidy Home has begun. Wish me luck - and let me know in comments what you'd like to hear about from my trip.

Transit

O'Hare airport, concourse C, on a Tuesday morning isn't as busy as I'd expected. My gate is made up of a few American tourists, some obviously military family members (like me), and a bunch of Japanese tourists and businesspeople waiting to go home. Their faces make me smile - now that I know what it's like to go home to your country, your culture, your people, I love seeing that anticipation in others' faces.

Myself, I am happy to be returning to Japan. Well, more precisely, I am happy to be returning to my husband. Marriage is so strange, so much more powerful than I expected. Particularly marriage overseas, including unemployment for one half of the couple. I rely on Mr. TakesTokyo much more than I did when we were both working. I didn't expect that...I should have, I suppose, but I thought he would rely more on me, not the other way around. I am finding now that after a wonderful, relaxing, fun-filled month with my parents, I am excited to head home to Josh and our life together.

It's not exactly a brilliant revelation, is it? That I love my husband and want to be with him after a long, forced separation? But after a very rough start to 2009 in our Japanese life, my excitement to return is a very pleasant surprise.

There is another reason for my happiness, besides Josh: I decided not to fly space available home. That's right, after three years of business travel on my own, I the fearless traveler chickened out and paid four figures for a real plane ticket. Space A is much scarier than I expected, and I'm a little embarrassed to admit it. Military wives fly Space A all the time, with babies and family crises and no friends in Seattle. I have no babies to wrangle, no crises to contend with, and heroic friends in all the major West Coast ports. But the thought of flying to Seattle to impose on my friends' hospitality and small apartment, with no cell phone and no guarantee of ever flying out for free, was just too much for me. So with excellent advice from my mother and Josh's support, I heated up Ye Olde Credit Card and bought the Maximum Economy Uber Cheap (kinda) ride home.

And I immediately felt better. I mean physically: I had had an upset stomach and near-constant anxiety about unsure travel until I clicked "purchase" for that flight. Even the 17 degree black ice at 4:00 this morning, as Dad drove me to the airport, was better than the way I'd been feeling about Space A.

So here I am, feeling fine and ready to face 13 hours of knitting and movies and catching up on the podcasts I ignored while spending long, luxurious days with my mom. I have so many stories to share, and pictures of their cute puppy dogs, and even snow on the ground in South Carolina.

I'm back, folks. Thanks for hanging around.

Heads up!

Bad blogger on the move!

I've been very naughty, nearly two weeks incommunicado. Now that I'm on my way back to Tokyo (which still needs taking), let's start fresh.

Fingers crossed for a safe journey, if you please.