BGM: 佐野元春 - 経験の唄
Today I worked early. At lunchtime, I wrote some ideas of mine onto my memo pad as usual. Suddenly, I was possessed by the idea "why do I learn English?". TBH I have no certain purpose of plan about this. As I wrote this before, I don't learn English because it would work useful for my work (maybe my bosses think about my effort of learning English as an odd hobby as DIY or fishing). I am not interested in getting any license of languages. I have never thought to go to any countries to travel. Indeed, this expression might contain some problems but I say this. Learning English is, for me, a kind of "killing boring time". "Killing boredom". Yes, just like a Japanese novelist Shichiro Fukazawa said "Our life is just to kill boring time". Because I don't know any better way of spending time productively, or learning English would be a sublime way of changing time or easing myself like Pascal says... Or, as Shinji Miyadai, a Japanese sociologist I have been influenced by, said, it would give me a great intensity of pleasure. In a plain way, it is just pleasant. So I learn English.
I learn it because it is pleasant... some people seem to think this pleasure of learning English itself as weird. Or it would come from a bias. Learning itself must be a discipline just like we used to get in schools in our old days. But I am basically a really lazy person so I just choose funny or interesting things to do. That's all. About reading, I just want to "enjoy" reading so I read a lot. Running between books every day like Akira Asada, a Japanese philosopher, says I can stay schizoid. Not for building the heritage of knowledge every day. Even it Tanizaki or Nabokov had tried to write their masterpieces during their tough lives, I believe that I don't need to face that background issues. Eat them as my hunch suggests. Just try them. If I think it is delicious, then I keep on reading them. If it has bad taste, I stop them. Yes, it is a really unserious way of reading so it stops completing reading masterpieces a lot. It might be called as an autistic, reckless reading.
Oh my gosh, my story has lost its way. I was talking about learning English... it has many good points for us. Learning another culture makes me think my domestic culture relatively, and enables me to learn it from different points of view. I also am able to communicate many people with that language I learn. I am exactly enjoying that good points. But I never want to understand them as "understanding another, different culture" or "internationalism". I choose "If I learn English, I can start reading Nabokov's "Lolita" in an original language", "I can do girl hunting on Discord", or "I can get more friends all over the world (I never think why I want to get so many friends)". Writing this, I learned that my life is quite an "instant", "easy-going", and "readymade". Denying building something as a lifework, but just running away from anything like a schizo. I just want to play and enjoy my life...
Reading Mieko Kanai's collection of short stories, I started her "The Sea Without Shores". Meanwhile, I read Junichiro Tanizaki's collection of his love letters, and am getting an interest in his "The Makioka Sisters". But as I wrote above, I am never great because I am actually reading great Tanizaki. It's simply a way of killing boring time, or a way of enjoying my life. So it's the same as gaming, gourmet, or walking. My head has a fatal bug so I enjoy learning English and reading. That's exactly an individual character. Ah, How Tanizaki is great. Although I have never read "The Makioka Sisters", I am feeling that I can read it now because I am old enough. Is this expectation right? I have many unknown books I want to read. But I never have any interest in reading those masterpieces "completely". As Hideo Kobayashi, a Japanese legendary critic, met Rimbaud in his life without any expectation, I want to enjoy various "rendez-vous" out of blue.
