RAMBLE IN BLACK AND WHITE

Sorry to jump up and down and shout all suddenly like that at this hour of the morning, but I was up till after midnight last night not watching tv but rather engaged in an increasingly antique activity known to members of my generation as “reading a book.”

As a result of that and the fact that it was dark until so late this morning, I overslept on what I suddenly realized was a work day, so when I lumbered out of bed and looked out the window I couldn’t help but jump and shout since even in the dark I could tell it had snowed, because the entire landscape was just the opposite.

All over the ground I could see this whiteness that must be snow, unless during the night there'd been a bigtime explosion at a styrofoam factory nearby which I doubted because there isn’t one and anyway I would have heard it, since dreams mean shallow sleep and as I recall I dreamed a lot last night-- I dream in color, which makes them easier to remember. I’ve heard that more people who were born before color tv dream in black and white, but if they lived here even they could tell it snowed last night and would jump and shout in the morning dark like I did.

But then again, since I grew up before color tv and read books, maybe I’m dreaming all this in black and white, and this might not be a work day, so I'll just stay asleep a bit longer and see...

THE ZERO ZONE

Ever since my corporeal ballistics demonstration a couple weeks ago, my sleep has been sketchy at best, I can maybe reach 60% depth for up to 4 hours at a time, at least in bed. Which is ok, I can function well on 5 hours sleep a night. Besides, I like the hallucinogenic quality a bit of sleeplessness gives to the day, the sharper, more psychoangular perspectives, the colors and scents, tastes and textures, though I don't like what it does to the noises, which are rife in Japan, where sonic violation is a way of life, especially around and on trains, with events announced in a kind of desperation using big bells, buzzers and other air-rippers, followed by endless fuzzy details shouted via loudspeakers as though for folks who forgot their hearing aids and nobody seems to notice the general passive quivering of commuter flesh but me, which makes this little ramble all the odder...

For me, sleep has always been a gradual thing: droopy eyelids, blurry words, nodding head, book impacting nose, all sorts of early warnings. But as this sleep deprivation has been accumulating, there's been a kind of cryptonarcoleptic buildup that my conscious mind was initially unaware of, because for the first several postinjury workdays when I boarded the train to head back home, sat down in the seat and began reading as usual, the next thing I knew I was in Takatsuki, halfway back to Kyoto. Subjective duration: less than 1 millisecond.

I've never fallen so asleep so fast. Each time it is such a shock that I can't believe it when I return to the world; I'm so surprised, that I can't fall asleep again. Each evening I board the train now, I'm determined to watch myself reach instant zero, but each time I sit there reading normally, enjoying my book, the train pulls out and the next thing I know I'm in Takatsuki. Every train-home evening. When I'm at home on other days I don't fall asleep like that, at that or any other time of day or night. I want to know how I do it.

Through these thrice-weekly attempts I hope to find out how to hit the zero zone at will, like maybe when I'm in bed and want to fall asleep, or when I'm sitting upright in my chair at my desk in the office after lunch, with my head firmly propped up by my hands and busy blue eyes painted on my eyelids. I deeply appreciate the potential of such a skill not only for myself, but for all the world; how much more peaceful would life be if everyone, especially world leaders, could spend more time at absolute zero?

If all goes well, I should be fully healed in another week or two, and no longer deprived of normal sleep, so on behalf of humanity I've got to move fast.

AN IDEA WHOSE TIME HAS-- NEVER LEFT ME, ACTUALLY...

This is not to imply in even the slightest way that I personally am grossly -- or even head-over-heels -- in favor of this proposal, despite the obvious fact of my early winter morning love embrace of thick down comforters that so tenderly hold in all this hard-earned warmth, priceless here at the icy heart of winter, when if you stick your neck out you can see your breath ask what the hell for, when every non-rabid wild animal is nowhere to be seen out in the stark icyness, but rather is cuddled wisely and warmly, in the ancient tradition of major drowsing, deep in nest and burrow throughout the land, and if you wish to insist upon insisting to me, as I lie here trying to get back to sleep, that we shirted, slacked, belted, shoed, tied, suited, coiffed and officed humans are not wild animals, just back away slowly and raise your arms in order to look as big as possible.

From here in the warm depths of blanket mountain where no job is required, I suggest that you leave me to ponder the idea over the winter - closing the door quietly on your way out - and further that you let it run through your own protracted hibernian dreams - saving greatly on food and fuel - and then in Spring, as experts in the matter we'll go outside and see if the grass is growing...

PRIMAL DIMNESS

At around dawn this morning, just as I was stirring back into to consciousness, in the quiet primal dimness of world and mind I heard some monkeys chatting upmountain in their screechy language about the state of the world and at once thought nightmarily of my just-burgeoning tomatoes and my new bean plants out there just beginning to stand on their own so as to produce my beans, and that it has been raining pretty hard for the past day or two, so the simians must be hungry and restive after being hunched up in drippy clammy treetops for so long with nothing but screeches for entertainment, and might just for the spite of it go around pulling up the new bean plants and biting the tiny green tomatoes of creatures fortunate enough to live dryly and well-fed in houses, so I decided the best thing I could do was go back to sleep and think about it later. There are times when you've just got to pull your foot up.

SOME THINGS I SAW THIS MORNING

Saw a high school girl on the train platform, alone there among all the suited older males, practicing her cheerleader moves without restraint or the slightest embarrassment. More major changes ahead for Japanese culture.

Saw a veteran commuter guy on the train who carefully positioned a folded handkerchief under his chin before allowing his head to totally loll forward and great quantities of large Zs to pour forth. A real pro.

Saw a ten-year old schoolgirl on the train staring wide-eyed at the foreign man with the long white hair. Having never seen such a thing before, she had trouble believing her eyes. She stared intently and unabashedly, therefore, until her convictions were once again in order and all in her world became normal again, including me.

At the terminus, saw the "Free Hugs!" girl again, alone this time, no takers visible, her sign now dogeared, her benevolence undimmed, a walking beam of sunshine.