Leonid Lopez
He wasn’t really interested in anything, he told me. He had been his boss’s caddy a couple of times. Doing this, he had learned that golf may have originated in a Nordic country sometime in the 15th century. The Dutch word “kolf” means “stick”. The Romans, he also knew, had a game that involved the use of a curved stick and a ball stuffed with feathers.
Tanaka’s boss would always look at the ball in front of him as he would a disquieting future. Tanaka would nod in agreement every two of his phrases so as not to forget where he was. In a nearby field, time itself had become a ball and someone had dug up holes across his life – such that he wasn’t exactly a golf enthusiast.
He had sat at a table with Nakata, a workmate, to play “go”. There, he had learned that “go” had been born in China about 2,500 years ago. The game is already mentioned in analects of Confucius’ writings around 300 BC.
Words. High-sounding and simple, evasive and direct, mute and luminous. Tanaka would measure and weigh his words, put them away in a safe place, far from the clutches of oblivion, and would arrange them carefully, so as to deliver the phrase that was expected from him every time.
It was the first time anyone in Japan spoke to me of their insignificance with any frankness. Of course, it is a Japanese custom to avoid boasting one is good at anything, to belittle oneself before one’s interlocutor. This is an everyday habit, which has no other connotation beyond signaling that one knows how to behave properly. Tanaka, however, would express his insignificance with words, would confess he was trapped in his nullity. Maybe it was the drinks he’d had, maybe he liked me. It was impossible to tell. His face showed no emotion.
When he’d say “sumimasen Reo san” to me, I would see something akin to uncertainty and sadness in his eyes, nothing else. Then, he seemed to notice I was scrutinizing him and, as though repeating a psalm, would tell me: “I am not saying I am unhappy with my life. I’m not complaining, I’m not complaining.” I wanted to say to him that he had no reason to feel uncomfortable, that he should complain if he wanted to.
I wanted to say more to him. I don’t think he had become my friend, but, to me – I still don’t know why – he had said more than only what was expected. I wanted to tell him he struck me as a good person, that perhaps he ought to find something to do that was his and no one else’s, I don’t know, something like that.
But, politeness won out and I behaved just as a good bartender is expected to behave. I said nothing, heard him speak, poured him another drink, and said nothing again.
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