Play Catch (from Kenshi Yonezu's diary)
I noticed it'll soon be 12 years since the time when my club, my band, and Ragnarok Online were the centers of my life, and I'm stunned by how rapidly the years have condensed. I think I've gotten better at a lot of things since then, but trying to count how many of those I'd be fine not having gotten better at would be unproductive, so I won't. I've gotten good at making excuses - faced with those sheer human weaknesses of cleaning your room when you have to work to do, of reading through yearbooks when packing for a move, I might go so far as to say that these things move you forward toward productive moments. That a middle-schooler meandering in Geffen Dungeon knocking down Poison Spores like an assembly line has, through life's twists and turns, now reached this current position feels strange, yet it also feels perfectly fitting.
I remembered there was someone on the internet who my past self considered an admirable, just-plain-cool hero like Ultraman or Kamen Rider, so I looked into what he was doing now. Though his username changed, I was able to find him with some searching. And he was still there on the internet, writing rambling things on Twitter. I had some inexplicable heartfelt and sentimental feelings, but my impression after catching a glimpse of his 2016 was that a 12-year period of blankness divided us, and it would be all too irresponsible to ask him to receive me the same way now as he had then. In a "that's just how it is" way. I often offer the thought "that's just how it is," but I think to myself how that phrasing really pushes myself out of the picture.
Through constant renewal, old cells slowly decay. I wonder when I became able to beat my father in a fight? I'm aware it's not like I alone can escape this cycle, but maybe it's because I'm aware of it that I remember and try to confirm it. The weight of time, our distance from memories. Of course I know there's no point in pursuing something irreversible, but I still drag it along. Buying a pike at a supermarket, trying to put it in a fish tank, but it shows its white belly and doesn't move an inch - and saying halfheartedly, "I guess that was wrong." I know there's part of me that's somehow unfulfilled, and I know I'll keep repeating these actions as long as I'm unfulfilled, so in regard to things I can't oppose, I think "that's just how it is."
As someone who's now a hero to someone else, and as someone who will someday slowly decay. I weigh the time I spent wastefully, measure my distance from the memories that have passed me by, and throw the feelings I've cultivated, a ball toward someone else. If there's someone who sees this ball come flying at them, I don't mind if you ignore it. But if you can, please catch it for me.