Leaving Japan

Japan; Love / Hate / Meh.

It seems as if I am destined to return to the USA and soon. Losing the all powerful otaku street-cred that comes from living it Tokyo is one of the few things I’ll miss about this place. In all honesty, I’d probably stay if I could (read; “could stay with a career and salary sufficient enough to maintain a specific standard). That shouldn’t bee too hard, and if I was more motivated I am sure I would have accomplished that already. Tokyo is nice, but the fact that I can once again no longer have my windows open because of the construction going on across the street (now in it’s 16th month) simply sends in too much noise and dust. ...at least it’s not 100 degrees out anymore.

About 10 years ago, I was in this exact same situation almost. Living in Japan, just finished a degree, and looking at returning to New York with an uncertain future, spending a few months of doing nothing until finally getting to work again at a company which was best described as an airplane that never left the gate, but the pilots kept announcing the cruising altitude anyway until we ran out of fuel. Leaving Japan then was the first of a long line of life-destroying mistakes lasting almost a decade. Now the reset button has been hit, and I am looking at the horrific and inescapable fact that the worst events I’ve gone through are about to be thoroughly repeated. A few years ago, I’d care about that, and it might have served as a great motivation to get out there and do whatever it took to stay, but those days were dead and gone long before coming to Japan in the first place.

So yeah, I’m kind of just on autopilot and need to snap out of it. Maybe being back in New York before the end of October (and it may be permanent), might get that to happen.