Sakamoto In Motion

The rain had presented itself only as a drizzle that night when Sakamoto left the restaurant. His shift had ended an hour back, but he would always hang around for a conversation with the owner accompanied by a bowl of leftover ramen broth and vegetables. He would listen to the owner talk about the day’s operations and plans for the next day. Occasionally, he would share stories of his wife or children with Sakamoto who besides lending a keen ear, would offer reassuring perspectives too, albeit in trite expressions.

Listening without attachment yet with care was one of Sakamoto’s more endearing qualities. At the end of the night, the owner would hand him a package for dinner and remind him to seek some companionship. ‘A man may seem busy within a family, but it is within that pursuit of perfection, does his soul recover from the exertions of the day,’ he would say, or sometimes only, ‘Work hard for yourself, but work harder for a happy family.’

Sakamoto’s thoughts drifted to his past life as he recollected the musings of a tired restaurant owner about family life. People say many things to themselves. In fact, the most a person talks with is with oneself. It is within those conversations that people either awaken or convince themselves of a truth. It is extremely hard to determine which is the right conclusion at the time. However, to Sakamoto it seemed that the owner of Ino’s Ramen had convinced himself of a truth that he wasn’t completely persuaded by.

The continuation of this experience had been weighing on Sakamoto. He had learnt the skills of the trade in the food business. Routine more than skill was the way of life for a chef and his sous chef in a small eatery. Two people could run the establishment when the guests were limited to barely thirty or forty every night, and mostly regulars. The menu was lean, but the quality was top notch. Not a single day in the past two years had gone by when the routine had been broken. Sakamoto was most at awe of the consistency of the owner’s discipline in life. If asked, he was sure that was ultimately the quality that he had learnt in the past two years.

As the drizzle turned faster and within a span of a few minutes transformed into a downpour, Sakamoto stopped. He halted on the pavement about fifteen minutes still to his home. The food would get stone cold by the time he got home in this rain, he thought. Drenched in the rain, he was convinced that he would be unwell on the next day too. Disrupting the routine was out of the question, however, flu-like symptoms in a restaurant would be a strict prohibition.

Two years, he told himself, were sufficient to understand the nature of a place, a person, and a profession. Ever since had relinquished his past life, he had followed a practice. He had never overstayed either a welcome or the rain. When he would sense the clear skies start to fill up with the next season’s clouds, he would move.

Getting caught in the rain was a sign that his time was now up. He had overstayed his story. He saw headlights in the distance and stood with his right hand raised toward the growing luminosity.

To be greeted by the views of green hilly forests in the distance and expanding farmlands flashing by the windows of a speeding bus on a highway is one of the beauties of life in the twenty first century. The smell of last night’s rain had left a lingering sense of belonging in the hearts of those who yearned to leave a life behind and walk into a new one. The cool breeze that waltzed in through the open windows touched the travellers with a sense of hope and reinforced a belief that it was worth it to move, either temporarily or to a new phase. A state of motion has always been a motivation for the progress of humankind. Sakamoto felt a familiar sensation of letting go. It was only the third time in his life so far. The first time was when one day he had got up from his dining table after breakfast, said goodbye to his ex-wife who had been visiting, picked up a single packed suitcase by the door and walked out. He had wanted to turn back, but he hadn’t. The second time when he had resigned from the public library in Kanagawa and come to work in the restaurant. He would never look back; of that he was certain.

However, strangely he felt restless. He had never walked out of place where he felt he belonged. He looked at his watch, an old Seiko automatic, a relic of a life that he had once envisioned. He imagined the face of the owner who would have arrived by now to the restaurant and found that Sakamoto had not arrived. He would consider that the routine had been broken. Sakamoto could not bear the thought. He decided he would call from a payphone once they reached the next town.

As usual, he had not enquired the destination to the conductor. He would get down at the next town and explore possible occupations to involve himself into. Such was the choice that he had made. An unreliable narrator, he had told himself, is the key to telling the story of one’s life. He accepted that the way of his life would be inconvenient for others. He accepted that he was not on the path for heroism of any kind. He accepted that the only pursuit of his journey was the discovery of life itself, an idea beyond the understanding of the self.

The hills kept rolling by and the cool breeze carried in it a moistness that was the lingering conversation of last night’s rains. His face was wet and in that thrill he mused. The conductor had awoken by now and came and shut the window saying, ‘You’ll catch a very good cold.’ However, cladded in his drenched clothes, the fever had already enervated Sakamoto. He sat, half slopped in the seat hoping the next town would arrive soon, and thought, ‘All is inevitable, including tiredness, recovery, death, and life.’    

Through the promise of civilization, clean dry clothes, a hot meal, a bed, and a new life, Sakamoto rode on, smilingly holding on to this continuation we call living.