Thoughts on paint...

First and foremost, paint is obscenely expensive in Japan. Most things here are obscenely expensive, but the price of paint just boggles the mind.

For reasons discussed elsewhere, I've been feeling incredibly homesick since returning from the Snow Festival. Today I spent most of the day inside scrubbing my horribly disgusting bathtub. The former occupant of my lovely abode apparently smoked in the bathroom and never cleaned it. And he lived here for six years... I got one corner of it clean. After I don't even want to know how long, I only got one corner cleaned. Tomorrow I'm going back to the hyaku yen to get steel wool. If that doesn't work, it's off to Tokyu Hands for a $10 bottle of Comet.

I was trying to keep myself occupied for an hour before heading out to meet the fabulous F. for dinner in Shimokitazawa. Occupied in a way that did not involve me scrubbing and cursing everyone from the makers of the laughably shitty bathroom cleaner to the distributors of Comet to my employers for not taking care of said mess in the tub.

I started a painting about two weeks ago, which since then has been laying on a [quite old] Tampa Tribune Metro section [thanks Mom!] in the middle of my, for lack of a better word, living room. While sitting on the floor and painting the head, the words of someone who was once very important to me sprang to mind...

This person had, I'm sure inadvertently, hurt me terribly many, many years ago. After a very long absence, he unexpectedly popped back into my life. We were having dinner--a very uncomfortable dinner, for me--and drinking sangria that had more fruit than wine. I was trying to find someone to help me paint my bedroom. I didn't much care who. He just happened to be there. He asked why I needed help and I said that I didn't like to paint. I remember he looked at me strangely for a second and then said, "But you're a painter."

I had no response to that.

I think it's interesting that I've never thought of myself as a painter. Never. Not even briefly. I paint. Sometimes. But I'm not a painter. However, here was someone who not only remembered that I had painted, but also thought that I was very good at it, and, in fact, a "painter."

Sometimes, every now and again, I have the ability to see myself through other people's eyes, eyes that aren't as critical as my own. And sometimes I catch myself saying out loud, "But you're a painter." I don't believe it yet, but here's to hoping someday I will.