You

It is one of those times when there is no sunset, just a mist. You stare at the sea and the line of the horizon is gone. You are in front of an abstract canvas, too close, with just one colour: grey. There is height and there is width, but no depth. The mountains, gone. The harbour, gone. You think if you had a boat to sail, your fate would be that of Truman in The Truman Show: you'd hit the edge of the stage. Things get more theatrical when you turn around. Empty buildings. No wind. Purposeless traffic lights. There's something intriguing about two-dimensional landscapes. Japanese people used to stare at them in hanging scrolls, seated at floor level, just like us now.

You know I always want to hear what's happening in the stories you read. You say life is throwing storms at the protagonist, he can't catch a breath before the next wave swallows him. He thinks life is a chain of misfortunes, a punishment for his sins. I tell you what I think: 'One has to be really egocentric to feel that way.' 'And one is,' you say. 'And one is,' I say. You close the book and put it in your pocket. We stare.

Gaman is a Japanese word. It means 'enduring the seemingly unbearable with patience and dignity'. That's what Wikipedia says. As if life were an all-weather storm  you were invited to witness. As if it weren't about you at all, as if there were not much of a 'you' really. As if you were not just a witness but part of the weather as well. And you go with it, you accept it. Like the land accepts the rain or the plumb accepts gravity. Like the sand accepts the waves, with patience and dignity. 

They say there is a will in humans. You say there is just humans. Not a will, just weather. There are no sins, just weather. Nothing to forgive, just weather. Mist, sun, wind, thunder, rain, heat. Our attempt to blame the storm is fruitless. Our attempt to tame the storm, laughable. Mist, sun, wind, thunder, rain, heat. Weather, weather, weather. Trust the weather. Witness the weather. There's nothing but weather. The weather exists, and is perfect and undeniable. We're the weather and the witnesses of it.

They say I am tempestuous, that I have an eye to describe the weather. But you're the one who knows how to be weather. You, you, you. Weather, weather, weather.