The Missing Piece

Day 79: Saturday, May 28, 2011

This morning I woke up to crazy sounds… I thought my next door neighbors were crushing a big load of cans to be recycled, but it kept going and going. Regardless of my morning erection, I opened my window to see what was going on, and saw a house down the street being torn down. Immediately I imagined how terribly noisy it would be throughout the summer… I lied back down, but the constant sound of destruction didn’t help bring sleep. I walked over to my office on the other side of the house hoping the noise would be softer over there, but it was still pretty bad.

I took a shit then showered. In the shower, I started thinking about what to write about regarding what had happened yesterday... Afterwards I quickly dried myself off because I didn’t want to forget anything, but while I was looking in the mirror, I noticed that the big whitehead on my nose was partially sticking out, so I decided to pull it out finally (I had been waiting for the past two weeks to do so because I was afraid that if I did it too early, a big crevice-of-a-pore would exist on my nose, which would be just as bad as a enormous white head... and from experience, if you pulled them out when they were too deep, that could also lead to a crazy pussy zit because you had upset the gland below). After I gloriously pulled it out, basically there was a huge hole in my nose like I had predicted, so I got a block of ice and wrapped it up in tissue paper to cool it because I had heard that would supposedly make the pore a little smaller. Eventually I remembered the urgency of writing down my thoughts in the shower, but I was stuck in front of the mirror icing my nose because of vanity. I then walked over to the kitchen and opened my notebook to try to do both things at once, but couldn’t because my pocket notebook wouldn’t stay open unless I used both hands, so I gave up and went back to the bathroom mirror, and then I thought about how writing about my whitehead experience might be interesting for some people, so I put down my ice, and went back to my notebook to write about that instead (and as I was writing this, I noticed I had toilet paper stuck to the side of my finger again, but continued on regardless). After I was done, I went upstairs and saw Willy asleep in my room, which was a total treat for her. Normally she is not allowed inside because she loves to scratch my tatami floor, but since she looked so cute sleeping, I didn’t have the heart to wake her.

The Deep Sleeper

After doing the daily post of T.B., I needed to take a break. Willy was back on my futon wet from being outside in the rain. I laid down next to her… She got up then settled back down again next to my pillow. My mind began to wander… I thought about the girl from yesterday and how cute she was (and I believe that was then my hand went down into my pants)… and since my face was pressed into the back of Willy’s fur, I thought about how the girl was saying that she was normally allergic to cats except Willy for some reason when she came over last night… and then I thought about my first two cats, Hobbes and Nyquil, from my childhood… and how when I first got them from the pound, I was so allergic to them the first night, my eyes were red and swollen and itchy and I couldn’t breathe. My mom said we would have to return them, but I begged her not to and after a few days, I got used to their fur and eventually became immune. While Willy’s purring hummed in my face… and while the sound of the rain from outside sounded so nice from inside my room… and how comfortable I was at home with my hand draped over my cat and my other wrapped around my warm penis, I thought about the time when- a few years back after Nyquil had died- Hobbes (my favorite cat) had gotten stomach cancer… My parents told me they had finally let him inside so he could live his remaining days in comfort (because after they moved to their fancy new place, they wouldn’t let the cats inside anymore because they would pee everywhere and devalue the house…) and I imagined Hobbes lying on the sofa in the living room white and skinny as a ghost… panting and dying… and I thought how sad and ironic it was that he could only be comfortable when he was actually not… and Willy’s purring continued to hum… hum with my face pressed in her fur… and then I got up and wrote about that as well.

In the afternoon, I finished up my portfolio for a photo competition in Japan… On my way out of the house to go to Kinkos to do some printing, I checked to see if Willy was still in my room. She wasn’t, so I closed my door. While I was putting on my shoes, I heard Willy moaning upstairs… Ian went up to check while I said goodbye and left. Suddenly from the veranda, I heard Ian yell, “Pat, you have to come here,” in a serious voice, which was unusual... I opened the door and ran upstairs with my shoes still on. There was Ian, Yuki, and Willy standing around a dead rat placed right underneath my desk...



...We were all half-grossed out and excited. Ian kept saying how we had to pet Willy and tell her we that we were so happy to get such a nice gift... (maybe it was because I had let her sleep in my room?)... and then Yuki and I left it to Ian to pick it up and throw it away, but before that, I took a pic with my cell phone and sent it to the girl from yesterday. Ian said that I was romantic.



At Kinkos, I realized I still had to do some major revisions to my book design because it wasn’t very good. When I got home, I worked on it some more and then took a TV break. After my show was over, it was about 8:00… I decided to text the girl again (maybe it was the 5th text of the day) and asked her if she wanted to see what I had printed at Kinkos because she had expressed interest the night before. Anyways after I sent it, I began to worry that I was writing her too much and too fast, which is often the case when you like someone new.

An hour later, I was hungry… It was still raining out, so I decided to go somewhere to eat alone since she never replied back. While I was walking down the street, I decided to not be so lazy like I was planning on, and then went to the supermarket instead to load up on food.

When I got home, Willy was hungry too, so I fed her before I began cooking. I washed the rice (for one) and then put in the rice cooker and pressed the button. I sat down to take a break and relax, and then I heard my phone vibrate meaning I had gotten a message. It was from the girl, but I knew what to expect, which would be “I’m sorry, but I’m busy,” so I put off looking at it for a while, but then finally gave in... She said that she was currently in Shinjuku at the moment, but wants to come over. My heart began to beat heavily, and then I texted her back to see if she had already eaten yet because I was willing to give up cooking if she hadn’t. While I waited for her reply, I looked in the mirror and notice I had another big whitehead sticking out on the side of my nose. It was a juicy one. I got my tweezers and pulled it out, which felt good. When she replied back, she said she hadn’t eaten yet, so I told her to let me know when she would arrive at our station and I would go pick her up for dinner. While I brushed my teeth again feeling giddy, I kept trying to remind myself not to depend on other people for happiness…

For dinner, we ate pasta near the station and then walked to my house. I taught her how to say rain in Chinese because so far every time we had met was in the rain. She told me it was currently tsuyu (the rainy season) and that it would probably rain for two months straight. At the convenience store, I pulled out a can of beer from the fridge while she was still deciding on what to get… and then she finally pulled out the same kind- but the tall-boy version, which left me feeling a bit emasculated.

At home, we talked and listened to music. We didn’t mention the prints that I had made today at Kinkos because it was just my and maybe her excuse to meet. Browsing through my shelf, I found a book that she probably already knew, but decided to show her anyways, which was the kid’s book by Shel Silverstein called “The Missing Piece” that I had bought last winter when I went home to the States. The story of “The Missing Piece” was about a circle, who was missing a piece (or a slice), and went on adventures all over the world to find the right one, but when it eventually did find it, after the initial excitement and happiness was over, the circle realized that it enjoyed its life better when it was alone and incomplete. We read it together a few times… once the normal way, the second time through the point of view of a kid, and the third time we took out the original children’s text and replaced it with our own adult one. Basically when we did the adult version, we broke the story down to the fact that he enjoyed being single and having lots of one-night stands… but the point was obvious- no matter how you viewed it- which was: “You don’t necessarily need someone to be happy,” which was a weird coincidence because that was what I was trying to tell myself hours before… but, even so, reading it in print didn’t help at all because all I wanted to do right then was sit closer to her.

At 2:00, I walked her home because she had to work the next day. It was raining hard, but felt good... When we got to her place, she pointed to her window, which I thought was a good sign. I asked if I could see her apartment for a minute and like a rubber band snapping back, she said, “No, let’s call it a night,” so I automatically replied back just as fast, “Okay, it’s dirty, right? Another time then...” and then quickly said goodbye, turned around without looking back, and walked off embarrassed, wondering if she thought that I wanted something more than I had said (which was kind of true) or that she snapped back because her place was actually really dirty...

On the way back, I saw Yuki in the distance walking home really fast and checking over her shoulder like she was scared… When I finally caught up with her at our front gate, Yuki looked surprised at first and then relieved to see that it was me. I apologized because I had my hood on and was wearing dark clothes... I knew I must have looked like a creep.