What do I want for Christmas? - The greatest gift in life is receiving more time

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas and I am writing this article at a McDonald’s on a national highway in Tokushima City. “Christmas Eve” by Tatsuro Yamashita is playing and the restaurant is filled with young ladies. Hmm... Not bad at all! Onagawa in Miyagi Prefecture, where I often visit recently, is known as a fisherman’s town with few female residents, so being in a place with many women makes me feel more at ease. Is this another sign that I’ve become an old man?

Well, last night, our company year-end party was held in Tokushima. At the party, one of the leaders of our Logistics Department started to give his year-end speech. I thought to myself, “Oh, this again...” but this time he said, “Rick doesn’t waste money!” “Unlike other company presidents, Rick doesn’t wear expensive watches or drive luxurious cars.” Are you kidding me?! Is that really the message for the Christmas/year-end party? What was the point? I still don’t understand what he was trying to say.

Yet, as Christmas approaches, I always think and ask myself what I want for Christmas at my age. Indeed, I don’t have many things that I want. I hate shopping, and perhaps it’s because I use things for a long time, like the same old business jacket I’ve been wearing for 45 years. I wonder if this will be in the Guinness World Record. Perhaps for this reason, when my employees give me gifts, I often receive shirts and belts lately. I am grateful for that. By the way, the Brooks Brothers shirt was a winner. Until then, I used to wear the same shirt that I had purchased discounted for 3,000 yen for many years, but when I tried on the new Brooks Brothers shirt, I was surprised. The comfort of the new shirt was totally different from the old one. When I checked later, I found that the price was indeed many times higher. Since then, I have been hooked on Brooks Brothers shirts. This is what happens when you receive a gift: You get to enjoy a little taste of luxury.

However, I think I should have something that I want to buy. First, I want a comfortable and warm pair of socks. I want them anyway because marathon training has left me with terribly cold feet. I also want a black belt. After decades of wearing the same belts, they do get worn out, but I don’t feel the need to go to buy one, so I try not to think about it. Oh right. I want the fastest, most powerful, high-capacity, ultra-compact laptop that works properly. Since I use my laptop 10 hours a day, it doesn’t even last six months. However, I use it for work and the company provides it, so that’s not even a gift.

As I thought about my wish list for my Christmas present while writing this article, I looked outside to see that it was snowing. It really feels like the holiday season. 52 years ago I had hoped everything would be perfect if I had a beautiful girlfriend with me. At the time, I managed to successfully ask a girl out on a double date together with my friend, and I still remember the four of us were at the Ginza Crossing on Christmas Eve. I wonder what my ex-girlfriend and members of the junior school tennis team are doing now. I hope this girl that I loved so much is enjoying a healthy and happy life.

Sorry, I got off track. What I ultimately want is one thing: It’s more time. I want 30 hours in a day. I need 30 hours a day because I just can’t keep up with what I want to do and what I need to do right now. This is inevitable because issues keep popping up in my company every day and my intervention is still required. I can’t quit. In addition, I am busily moving around Narita, Onagawa, Tokushima, and Kyoto, although I am supposed to be living in Tokyo. Traveling itself doesn’t bother me because I can get my work done on the go. Also, I have fallen far behind writing my articles for Historyjp.com. I think I have to finish a thousand hours worth of work. I’m sorry about that, but a lot of readers are waiting for my new entry. I have to hurry.

Fortunately, after seven years of hard work and pioneering, cleaning the island of Takegashima is almost done and the island is now spick and span, so I have had little need to go there since this past fall. This is not only saving me time, but I can now preserve my physical strength and properly maintain my health. I am relieved because I have had three surgeries on my hands and three surgeries for inguinal hernias due to injuries caused by the heavy island work, and my body has reached its maximum limit. Instead, I have recently started a new job with the Children’s Future Foundation. In connection with the local development project in Onagawa, I decided to do something for the children and I have been thinking about how to provide support with my associates. I am doing this because I feel it is my mission to go, so I have no complaints but it is also time-consuming. I am in the realm of the unknown because I don’t even know if the project will yield any results.

After all, I still dream that God will give me more time as a Christmas present! It’s a fleeting dream, but I keep hoping it will come true. Someday, Santa Claus will visit me bellowing, “Ho! Ho! Ho!” and give me a special gift from his giant gift sack. If I could open a special treasure box like the one in the Urashima Tarō story, then I would travel to another dimension where there is no concept of time and everything lasts forever. Space bends and the time axis no longer exists like Einstein’s special theory of relativity. In such a world, I dream that I will eventually finish all of my work. Merry Christmas!