desperation – Hidemi Woods

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As a daily routine, I check my horoscope every morning on TV. Mine warned a fight. I checked my partner’s and to my surprise, it foresaw a fight, too. We had never had this similar horoscope before. It seemed impossible to avoid a fight as it was and I fell back on another horoscope on my cell phone to offset the ones on TV. I was speechless when I saw it also say that there would be a fight. Now, a fight was inevitable very likely between my partner and me.

Feeling gloomy, I was ready for it. But I still hoped I could manage to avert a fight somehow and spent the whole day studying his mood carefully and flattering him. As the day wore on, I was extremely tired from the effort not to offend him, which I wasn’t used to. In desperation, I even tried to initiate a fight because I wanted to do away with it. He showed no interest and a fight didn’t happen. It was such a nerve-wracking day. I might as well have a fight as endure a stressful day avoiding one…

Episode From Surviving in Japan / Hidemi Woods

Audiobook: The Family in Kyoto: One Japanese Girl Got Freedom by Hidemi Woods On Sale at online stores or apps. Apple Books, Google Play, Audible 43 available distributors in total.

Audiobook: Japanese Dream by Hidemi Woods On Sale at online stores or apps.

Apple Books, Google Play, Audible, 43 available distributors in total.

Back in my hospital life of my childhood, the next room to mine was a room for six boys. One of them was a five-year-old boy with leukemia. He often hung around my room and we got along well. I taught him how to fold origami. Because he was little, his mother stayed at the hospital with him. She frequently yelled at him, hit him and even kicked him. I was terrified of her. One day, my mother came to see me and went to take some tea for me from the free tea stand near my room. There, I saw her talking with the boy’s mother and learned that he had only a few months to live. His mother sounded so gentle and so sad. I understood why she treated him like that. For the first time in my life, I realized that sorrow and desperation led to unreasonable anger. Although I was only nine years old, I had never felt mortality so closely and strongly while playing with him…