iMourn

Currently: Mourning the loss of my voicemails. Apparently when you switch from any phone to an iphone your voicemail gets completely wiped. I've had on there for years my niece calling me leaving messages for me, her sentences getting slowly more complicated as she got older, and the missed calls from my dad telling me his mom died or the time my parents calmly called letting me know my uncle had injured his head (from which he would die from a few days later). Going from dumb phone to a smarty (happened on 3-17-13) was an emotional experience, one I tried to put off for as long as I could, evading the urging of my wife, but it was nothing compared to the loss of those vmails, like I could physically feel it - it's one of those things, you know.

And I have the text messages on my phone that I've saved for years, the ones from the beginnings of when my wife (then gf) and I first started dating, to randoms - important ones but ones I don't remember because I havent looked at them for so long, to the ones where my sister texted about a fight she's having with my mom, one that's inspired my art work recently, to the ones notifying me that an old family friend suddenly died. These I actually still have on my old phone but they're encased forever in this physical body never being able to enter into the digital world again ostensibly making them useless. As my new phone was being activated I sat there completely engulfed in systematically, one-by-one, emailing to myself each of the 300 text messages so that they could have life again in their new virtual bodies, but my project was abruptly stopped as the activation when through. I got all of 30 or so messages sent - only the oldest ones. But this isn't nearly as bad as grief I feel from the lost voicemails.

I don't understand my obsession with documentation, the need to hold on to pieces of the past, and capture moments in the present, I'm convinced I'm a hoarder, of images, although I've never seen an episode from the series which has them as their subject, but you know they all have these crazy pasts like they got raped or had some traumatic relationship at some point, so it makes me wonder about myself, what ever happened to me. I just blame it on my slacker memory, I can't trust it so I'm dependent on physical evidence to trigger the thought. It might be the fumes or past substance abuse or it might not even be true, just a figment of my imagination but I won't risk it by not keeping the mementos that'll give my memory the shove it needs.

The Last Time

A few days later we decided to get lunch before she caught her train back to Baltimore. It was a Sunday, a hot day, we spent the entire day together. We went to church together in the morning then headed down the street with a friend of hers to get Japanese noodles. Afterwards we got dessert.  I wanted to talk to her but the presence of her friend made having intimate conversation difficult. So it was all small talk up to that point. Then as the three of us were walking towards Grand Central Station, we got far enough away to start to have private dialogue. I still didn’t understand completely or maybe I did. I had a few days to think about the last time. It’s not that I didn’t care, I couldn’t. I couldn’t get out the words. I missed her so much, I loved her, I’d do anything to make it work but my brain didn’t know what my heart was thinking. I had disconnected my heart from my head. The pain would have been too much to bear otherwise. I was numb. I didn’t know my thoughts. She was standing there, pleading with her sad eyes for me to say something. She said some things, but I didn’t hear. I was distracted, trying, wanting so bad to evoke emotion, to reconnect but I couldn’t. I had no response

“I’m going to go soon, this is your last chance, don't you have anything to say?” 

I wanted so bad to say something, to answer her petition but - nothing. I could only repeat over and over 

“I don’t know. I don’t know.” 

Her friend faded away unnoticed. A man came to solicit comedy show tickets 

“Can’t you see we’re having an argument here” I said to him angrily. 

He retreated apologetically. 

She pulled off my sunglasses, and looked deep into my eyes. Searching. There were tears but nothing else. Her own tears burst in to weeping then she turned and ran down the long set of stairs into the station below. I watched her go, unable to move. After a few moments I broke free from the paralysis and ran down after her but it was too late, she was gone, lost in the labyrinth of the cavernous station. I watched a train pull out and leave; I pretended that she was on that one, hoping it would give me some semblance of closure....

That was the last time I ever saw her. 

Kenneth Yoshizaki

Have you seen this man?

It was during my sophomore year in college, I remember because I was in my bedroom at the Amar Court house, when I got a phone call on my land line, the only line I had. I picked up my cordless:
"Hello?"
Short pause and then a timid voice asks, "Hi, is this David?"
"Yup, Dave speaking."
"Oh, hi this is Eric."
"I'm sorry, Eric who? I know a few Erics so..."
"Oh, yeah uh this is Eric from West High."
"What West High?" My brain starts working double time trying to recollect who this might be.....to no avail.

So the conversation continues and slowly everything starts to unveil. Eric was a freshman when I was a senior in high school. One random lunch period, I apparently walked up to him when he was sitting alone on a grassy field and struck up a conversation with him, opening with "hey, are you okay?" I honestly didn't remember any of this but it wasn't surprising to me that I would do something like that, I was gregarious then.... more for survival than anything altruistic.  And even though I couldn't recall, he did and told me the entire story without leaving out a single detail. So that was the thing; that conversation which was so insignificant to me meant something to him. That one moment impacted him enough to inspire, 2 years later, the hire of a service to track me down to the point where he could call me at my Davis house.

We kept in touch at least for a little while. I even visited him at his apartment once when I was home for one of the holidays. I remember the gate I had to get through, and his nice, young, attractive Korean mom who really loved her only son, you could just tell. We sat there in his bedroom as he was sharing about the upcoming West High talent show and the beat boxing he was going to do. I was amused as he gave me an exclusive preview of his performance, it was funny at first but dear as he continued. He wasn't half bad. That's the last interaction I remember having with him. It makes sense, given I was drunk half the time, I'm almost certain that I wanted to keep in touch but like much of the things I desired to do at that point in my life, I'm sure it fell to the way side coming in a far 235th to my first love - boozing.

And when I think back I wish that I took the opportunity to be an even bigger part of his life, maybe a big brother to a fatherless loner, guide him from afar. I've been thinking about him for a while now. Wondering whatever became of him. Last I heard he was going to UC Riverside,  he's certainly graduated by now. I've made a small impact on his life and he's made one on mine. He once sought me and now I wish to find him. I'd be willing to pay as he once did but with the advent of technology and virtual networking I'm sure it could be done without. His name was Eric Yoshizaki, but it's Kenneth in the yearbook. And he must be between 26-28 years old now. Korean/Japanese. Attended West High in Torrance class of 2000 and maybe UC Riverside.

Punch Myself in the Face

Have you ever wanted to punch yourself?
The other day, I was punching the bag with a new pair of gloves, and then I started wondering how much it would hurt if I got hit with someone wearing that particular set of gloves. So I punched myself in the face, lightly at first then I got brave and really went for it. Hurt like hell. Immediately following I was wondering why I would inflict such pain on myself as I stood for a moment seriously moaning. Mouth open moaning. But this isn't even what I'm talking about.

I'm working on a graphic novel, really a small zine for the upcoming SF zinefest in September. Something I've been wanting to do for a long time, but now that I have a deadline I think I'll actually get it done unless I just can't get past the story. See once I get the story down I'll be free to illustrate and do the imagery, but I'm stuck right now with the story. I'm just as excited with the writing but it definitely isn't my strong suite. I have a nice intro, good scenes, but no end, and no real overarching theme and there aren't details about the relationship..it just kind of starts and then ends. It's a story that's supposed to be loosely based on my life and a particular relationship but it's completely that very story to the T. I can't seem to separate myself from it enough to fictionalize any of it. The other part is I don't exactly remember all the very specific details so I'd have to go back and revisit physical documents to get those. Anytime you do that, it's a little scary. You never know what will happen. Although I'm pretty confident I've completely healed from that particular past, there are the things that still affect you even after the healing, the things that are peripheral to the relationship. There's always the unexpected, as much as you try to consider every possible thing that could happen, you never think of the one that does.

So last night I ventured to that place. I went down to the basement and dug up all the old journals, mementos, photos and letters. Then I went to my email account and searched for all the emails that were exchanged over the 6 years, so many at the beginning only a handful in the end. I sat there reading them, initially unaffected, not surprised that I wasn't. Then I got into the long break up emails the ones that described in detail why things didn't work. The ones that gave detailed descriptions of how wonderful we were as people yet not compatible. The ones that told of how sorry we were for all the pressures and wrongful expectations we placed on each other. And then the story started to unfold even further... in the details, in the snapshot of everyday life that was captured in g-chat email records. I was still trying to figure out life and my passions, I couldn't promise a future I didn't know but I wanted to so bad.

There was one chat string in particular that broke me. She started humming, in the youngest child-like way she did and I ignored that completely, instead pressing her about plane tickets, she continued humming.. punching out beautiful words to this song, I kept pressing between those words until she responded to me. Then I told her I was
If I could heal your words
leaving to eat and she inquired about the food and who I was eating
Shelter me
with and I simply said "spaghetti" and left..in the string you could
Comfort me
see additional questions and the multiple hellos? Hellos? David?
You will live
You there? and then a sad face :( . And I could hear her voice and I was
If I could show you how
cringing, helpless, unable to go back in time. All I could do was pinch
I won't desert you now
the skin on top of my forearms. I was so insensitive, so mean.
The rain can't hurt me now
Who was that guy? How dare he, how dare I. And at that moment I
This rain will wash away what's past
wanted to punch him in the face, punch myself in the face.
And you will keep me safe
And you will keep me close
I'll sleep in your embrace at last