This is from Ayuko’s Newsletter 2023/07/21. One of my favorite stories, because I love time travel.

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Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. How have you been this week?

About a month ago, something happened that made me glad I watched a lot of movies from the 1950s.

Circa 2023

When I feel tired while traveling by train, I like to take a break at a bakery café inside a railroad station. That day I found a tiny place with three small tables (i.e. big enough for one person or two lovers or close friends) and three seats at the counter. They had decaf tea on the menu. The air was clean as if the ventilation system was working well.

I picked the middle table, took off my jacket and folded it inside out, arranged my belongings into the little space, and wiggled into my seat. Always a good idea to sit on both buttocks, with equal weight distribution.

The tea is too hot to touch, so I will wait. Breathe out. So good to settle.

Then I saw a lady in her 80s approaching the table next to mine. Gingerly she put down her tray. On her tray she had a couple of deep-fried sweet bean buns and a tall cup of iced latte. The buns had been rolled in black sesame seeds, which I imagined created a layer of awesome crunch. They looked delicious. What a well-balanced snack, I thought.

The latte cup had a plastic lid. The lady’s right hand was trembling as if on a musical instrument. She was struggling to catch the little tab on the lid. I asked her if she would like me to remove the lid, and she said, “How nice of you, yes, please.”

Then the lady started talking to me. Kind of frantically. (Does this happen to you too?) I was a little apprehensive, but feeling less tired by then, I figured If I didn’t feel like listening to her I could always say “If you don’t mind, I would like to read my book.” So I sipped my tea and listened.

Circa 1958

When she was twenty, she worked as a receptionist at a fancy department store in Ginza, Tokyo. She was in love. He was a customer, an older gentleman who had a kind heart and a calm demeanor. He ran a trading company nearby, and her boss at the department store knew him.

He often shows up at the department store. Just to say hi to her.

When he comes to “visit” he brings a box of sweets for all the “girls (i.e. the receptionists)” to share. He even takes the girls out to a coffee shop and treats them.

She thinks about him all the time and longs to see him. But he has a wife and children. She knows that even if she is in love with him, he can’t marry her. The first time the two of them go to a coffee shop alone, she is overjoyed. At the same time, she is in pain. She kept thinking, he has a wife and children. I can’t do this. I’m not that kind of a girl. I can’t do this. But I’m in love with him. What am I to do? And then he said,

“Would you meet my son? Would you marry my son?”

。。。。。。。

She went to a dark place for a few seconds, came back, and didn’t care anymore. Oh well, she thought, it’s not as if I had anything better to do with my life. So she went ahead and got married.

“We’ve been married 64 years.”

The lady: “You know, my father died the year before that, at 52. He was only 52 years old. That’s so young. I loved my father the most. I missed him so much, it was so hard to be home with my family when Father wasn’t there! I didn’t want to be there.

Now I think that’s why I decided to get married. I thought at least I could be near my husband’s father, but he too died two years after we got married.”

The lady: “My husband is 93 years old. All of my friends’ husbands died in their 70s, but my husband! What do you think he is doing now?”

Me: “I have no idea. What is he doing?”

The lady “He’s taking a ballroom dance lesson right now! Can you believe it? He is 93 years old!”

Me: “Oh, he must be in good health.”

The lady: “You know, when he comes home from the dance lesson, he sits at the table and waits for lunch to be served. I don’t want to cook, so I pick up a sandwich at this bakery. But I’m having lunch here because I like to eat alone. I am 85 years old! I am tired! I’m exhausted! I want to be alone.”

Me: “That sounds … exhausting.”

Being in the right place at the right time for the right person. That sounds near impossible. I can kind of relate to that.

Time Travel

Her story let me emote: the streets of Ginza in 1958, the decor of the department store, the way she and “other girls” in the department store would have demonstrated delight in a surprise gift of sweets, his speech and mannerisms, the way everyone dressed, the cigarette smell of the coffee shop where they met alone for the first time, the bittersweet loneliness of a 20-year-old “girl.”

Time travel is always possible.

[Source: public domain image ” Pedestrians in Ginza by Kawakami Sumio ” from Look and Learn: History Picture Archive , a site where you can download retro images for free]

Today’s Special

You can read the newsletters from the past year on my Substack page.

The newsletters from prior are in the subscribers’ inboxes and on my Mailchimp dashboard. I plan to post them on the blog and Substack. Mailchimp’s export function doesn’t work with Japanese characters, so I’ll do it manually, copying & pasting.