the battle of the open vs closed minds

It wasn't really a battle...more like a strange juxtaposition of events, from the beginning of the day to the end.

My morning began with a stop off at the car dealership. My car had a recalled part that needed to be fixed. It wasn't reallly a big deal, I only mention it because it explains why I had to sit for a few hours in the sales office, while typing on my computer. One of the younger sales guys came over to me and started chatting (it seems business isn't so great, and customers rarely stop by during the weekdays)...I asked him things like, "What's the most fun thing to do in this town?" Turns out the answer to that is either a) go to the bars or b) go to Bingo Alley (which I had thought was a bowling alley, but apparently is a bingo palace.) Since I have pledged to myself to do a crazy new thing every week until its time to move...It looks like Bingo Palace will be on the very top of my list.

Anyhow, as we continue to talk, he asks me about what I did before I lived in Japan. I told him in my vague manner, "I worked in Hollywood." He responded by asking me what I perceived to be ignorant homophobic questions, "Is it true that Hollywood is gayer than Disneyland?" What? I don't know how to answer that? What exactly is the question? Are you for real? Then he asked about black men dating white women...again, I just stared at him...what I should have said was, "what's so wrong with that...you are talking to the product of a relationship between a white woman and an asian man."
After that he went back to the previous discussion about the Bingo Palace, and about how his family probably has 50+ bingo markers in their house (they are avid fanatics of Bingo Alley) and why one needs a minimum of 2 different colors per game.

After a while I could only shake my head at him and roll my eyes...I had work to do and this guy would not shut up.

When my car finally was finished I headed into Denver to meet up with my childhood friend P. She was visiting for week and I hadn't seen her in at least 2 years. The great thing about seeing P is that our lives have run on relatively parallel courses. We came from the same small town in the midwest. We left town to see what else was out there. We've both traveled extensively, and neither of us will probably ever return to the small town we left...at least not permanently. Seeing her is always nice because its a bit of hometown comfort without actually having to go home. We spent lunch catching up on travels, family, and her upcoming wedding. Not a bad way to spend my afternoon and i left her feeling good about all of the decisions I had recently made.

Tonight I had the fantastic opportunity to meet Rita Gelman who is the author of one of my favorite books, Tales of a Female Nomad. This is the book that inspired me to chuck it all and move to Japan. I remember feeling unsatisfied with my job in LA and I read her book and began to question, "Isn't there another way to do things?" So that is why I left...a book...a really awesome book...but quite simply someone else's story. Listening to Rita was pretty cool, she recapped some of the stories from her book. Somehow hearing the stories being told by the actual person who lived them, makes it all so much better. And I am really glad that I got to meet her and listen to her speak. She has been one of my inspirations thru the last few years, so this trully was exciting for me.

The bummer of my evening was that I had to miss out on a reading by another influential writer in my life: Alan Say. His book, The Ink Keepers Apprentice, was something that I read when I first moved to Japan and found I was completely lost by the culture. The book gave me insight into the minds of the Japanese people or at least the characters he created. Unfortunately both book talks were happening at the same time and i had to chose the writer that was a greater influence to me.