Sense of Agency

Today was National Sports Day, a Japanese holiday celebrating moving your body with skill and endurance. I celebrated by sleeping particularly late, past 8:30, after falling asleep at my desk last night for a good several hours.

Kenzo was still feverish and not doing great this morning, so I told Osamu we're headin' out. I got ready as fast as could be and Osamu played with toys and annoyed Kenzo until at last he got his socks on and mask pocketed. 

At some point I need to get a sidecar for my motorcycle. Osamu would make a great sidecar buddy.

We started off our adventure at Matsumoto Kiyoshi, where papa took his time carefully choosing a new toothbrush. Then it was off to Costco to battle with the three-day-weekend crowds of Japanese people who behave badly possibly because the American-ness of the place rubs off on them. Osamu is the best partner for these adventures. He's always up for anything, he mostly doesn't complain, he's the center of attention because he's four, and his running commentary is so good I feel ashamed I'm not recording it.

I bought a pack of sausages. I'm the only the guy who goes to Costco and buys one thing. Osamu was amazed by the checkout conveyor belt. He was playing with those grocery separator bars and as I watched him I was thinking to myself about how American those things are (supermarkets here don't have conveyor belts) and how Osamu and Kenzo are going to have a childhood so different from mine. Osamu was asking me what those things are and I told him they're swords so they're dangerous and not to be touched. I'm a bad papa sometimes. 

Eri messaged me and said Kenzo went downstairs to the living room because it was quiet with papa and Osamu gone. I took that to mean we should take our time. So we did lunch.

This guy has been out to lunch two days in a row.

I had some ideas about where to go for lunch. Marugen Ramen, Tapio, even Cannery Row was in my mind for goodness sake. But Osamu is developing a sense of agency. I am observing his healthy sense of entitlement emerging. Not the "self-entitlement" that has been so discussed in the media over the last decade with regard to millenials. I promote the entitlement of my boys in the sense that if they have an idea, a suggestion, a need, a want, they should say it without shame. The caveat is that even if you exercise your personal entitlement and share what you think or need, you should not expect that the world will respond or give you what you asked for.

While mama and the boys napped, I walked. Today was a long one. I stopped for a break on a bench by the Izumi Ward Office and observed an old guy awkwardly operate the public water fountain and a mother chase after her two-year-old daughter.

I arrived home two hours later, pretty sweaty. Mama and Osamu were outside doing bicycle practice, so I took over while Eri went in and fixed supper.