Origins: I wanted to simplify my subject matter. I’d already written Snow Camellia and a few other of that type, Carnation and whatnot, you know. I knew I was prone to flowery prose and being a bit too purple—though, admittedly, I find that’s often more a matter of taste than real critique, it’s my site I can be arrogant. The point is that I was always trying to make everything super big, and not in a natural way.

Of course what began with something small and rather quaint in Alstroemeria somehow evolved into Vapor Pressure, so in a way the effort was a failure. But that’s not so much a bad thing as much as a new blessing. Quite frankly, some of my best writing is in sections of these stories. A joke about kanji somehow became the repetitive phrase of endearment and then a sign of ones unchanging inherent nature, both as a blessing and a curse. One thing that was certain was that I needed to refine my palette. I had started to use the general tone of my mentors without really having much in way of experience with their specific school. So, an attempt was made to try and do something similar and learn from it.

I’ve learned a lot writing the Mishima stories, and something pretty nice has come from them.

Alstroemeria: Probably the most telling thing that this wasn’t supposed to end up being the beginning which it ended up being is the name itself. It’s a pretty generic flower name which I was using for all of my stories during that period. Effective, of course, because the meaning of the flower is related to the joke of the piece, so it’s not random, it’s just a name of its time. I am not educated in Japanese or Chinese, I have less than an elementary understanding of a good bit of hiragana but Kanji eludes me entirely. That said, the internet exists, and if we cross-reference enough we can even weave our way through un-truths. So, is the character for Bond really the same as Annoying? I don’t know, I’m pretty sure it is, but then recently I’ve seen the Chinese character for Annoying and it is very similar but not exactly. Either way, they at least look very similar, but slightly different, if not just the same.

I thought so at the time, and I guess to that degree I’m like Ryuuta. We both got mixed up. Even being wrong the joke pretty much works. Jokes aside, depicting meandering whimsy of a privileged young man during the mid-Taisho is fun. He’s not our hero really, he’s just the guy who likes to hear himself talk, and we have the unfortunate ability to listen.

River Eel: So, again, I tried to be a little funny. Snakeskin boots become Eel-skin boots. Then there’s the whole bit with the old man and the boy. Fancy, sure, but this probably captured the specific mood that I was trying to get in Alstroemeria a bit better than the original did. Very decadent. We meet Gendo for the first time in all of his willfulness. Not much to say about this one really. The pen started and didn’t stop until the journey was over. It’s just a story about a middle aged guy getting jealous of pre-teen boys. Not everything is super deep, eh?

Wisteria: This is actually a story I wrote much later than the following two. I wrote it just shortly after the first draft of Apoptosis was done, actually. I gave Gendo a wife for that interaction in Vapor Pressure, and I thought about him a little bit more after that. With Ryuuta’s life figured out, and a big project on the horizon for Mitsuyo, I felt a bit bad leaving the guy who put it all together out of the loop. That said, it’s a quiet and un-pretentious piece. Which is pretentious to say. But for the guy who’s always running around making deals with people, I felt it right to give him a quiet afternoon. Hell, Ryuuta’s entire character started that quiet afternoon writing calligraphy.

Snow Calico: After having written Sakura in Summer I had a better idea of the relationship between Gendo and Ryuuta, who until Snow Calico was not named Ryuuta. I was writing this when I found that stray kitten last year. The timing of that is just as painfully ironic as you would think. I had also only just given Sonochihama his first name. So, the cat is named Ryuuta, after Sonochihama. I’m a cat person, I love dogs, but since getting my Gigi I’m a cat guy. Pretty simple metaphor for Ryuuta, and maybe I’m cruel for giving Ryuuta a similar end. I do miss the little guy.

“Only the fact that I’ve known suffering, enough suffering to feel qualified to let these youths call me “Sensei” without protesting—that’s all I have, the only straw of pride I can cling to. But it’s one I’ll never let go of.”
- Osamu Dazai, One Hundred Views of Mount Fuji

Mid-April Passed By Unnoticed: Trying my best to do as much as I could with as little as possible. Research, referencing, you know, the most fun things, of course. Success? I don’t know. It’s very short, the conflict is internal though the incitement is external. That’s just how I write though. I like it a lot, because it’s another expression piece.

“I’m just the worst.” I had that phrase for a long time, partially inherited and partially self-created. A simple summary of self-hatred, a refutation of the arrogance of the self for the sake of the other. Itself a little arrogant, thinking you’re the worst and all that, and that you’re not just a quick-speaking teen girl in the aftermath of one of the greatest tragedies in mankind’s history. That sentiment, in her, is partially inherited from culture, and partially self-created from her own well of self-knowledge. Before the war women fought to wear hakama and receive higher education, during the war they were made to wear monpe and work in factories. Then, when all was said and done, Eisenhower put them in skirts. History is such a damn interesting thing.

Vapor Pressure: Controversial. To give that mysterious self-loathing girl some kind of history, to attach it greedily to a man twice her age, and then to say that this is the way of things—that such was, of course, what always was the case. It is controversial. Having written Ryuuta into a trap though, and with no clue as to the narrative start for the Spring entry of the Sakura series, I needed a young woman. Frankly, partly because of bias and partly because of ability, I’m unable to write young men with the levity that I get with young women. City Lights, for example, is a lovely college aged story. It’s harsh without being nihilistic. Self-hateful without being too self-aggrandizing. Then you have Puca, and you get the idea. I needed to know who Mitsuyo was in order to write her in Spring, so, let’s have her meet Uncle Ryu again. To explain the interaction thereafter feels weird. Will explaining it cheapen it? Or is there anything of value to cheapen? I think so, and thought so, so I wrote it the way I did. Formality until the over-emotional response brings the familiarity of youth. Mister-this, Mister-that, then Uncle. Small things like that, intentional writing. It’s not hard, but it’s not easy.

Late Tanabata: Tanabata happens in July. This story is in October. “Late Tanabata”. Mitsuyo writing in the journal. Get it? Yeah, I wanted that more than I wanted the prose about cicada’s. Actually, if we’re being honest, I wanted Stray Dog and the Railways Mystery more than the cicada’s. Hell, I watched Stray Dog as research for this story, hence why Gendo shows up with a Hawaiian shirt (“Aloha-shirts” I think they called them back then?). Super good movie, but I had to ditch the cicada prose I wrote to open the piece. That said, I went in trying to get a pretty good grasp on Mitsuyo’s feelings about her father. Mission accomplished. She’s a remarkably easy person to write for, once you get her going that is. She is actually the reason why there is so much Ryuuta stuff post-Snow Calico. To be honest Ryuuta is stagnant, and that’s a part of his character, so lighting a little fire named Kaninohara under his ass can make some fun dialogue and stories. It’s still a veranda piece, but it’s more lively than normal.

Apoptosis: Controversial, killing off your main character. Generational stuff though, and if we’re being honest, I have at least two more stories about the relationship between the two of them in the works. Thin right now, but at some point I’ll get around to fleshing them out. A whole year passes I think, between this story and Vapor Pressure, or maybe two. I forget at the moment. Anyway, Mitsuyo comes off a little young in this one, but we can just chalk that up to sentimentality. This one would be mid-1950, so she would be 19, so it depends on how you think a 19 year old would act around an uncle who spoils her. She has a very serious home life, so it’s probably compensation for that. The struggles of the young, eh? Heartbreaking stuff.