Japanese Breakfast

Dearest Rachel –

Even with the sudden, developing chaos of the past couple of days (now playing out at the ICU yet again; most of today’s work day will be spent over there, which is part of why I’m getting this written to you in the early hours of the morning) and the chronic, nagging reminder that this marks the end of our sixty-third month apart, there are moments of relative calm. Falling asleep shortly after Daniel and I took Mom out for dinner after a couple of hours of being at Dad’s side means that I’m up before five today, when it’s still dark. Apart from the birdsong out behind the bedroom (and the occasional driver compensating for… something… by peeling out down the road), it’s actually quiet and peaceful around here.

While I would probably do well to spend some of that time at the gym, especially since I’m tipping the scales above the two-twenty-five mark, I’m not particularly motivated in that direction as much as I am to write to you. I was at the gym when I got all those messages yesterday, and while Dad is in good hands at the hospital (they’ve pulled him out of tight scrapes before, as you recall), I’m not sure I want to be unavailable at the moment in case I need to be notified of something. Besides, today is so much cooler than yesterday for some reason, and I wouldn’t want to be walking around out there in shorts at the moment.

Instead, I would rather warm myself up – and soothe my slightly raspy throat, which isn’t a good sign for visiting a hospital, now that I think about it – with a cup of coffee (much to your dismay, I suppose, but Daniel swears by its supposed laxative properties, and that’s literally all I’d need to get back to – and perhaps below – the two-twenty-five line), and tuck into what you might refer to as a ‘Japanese breakfast’; my third one this week, in fact.

For all that you and I got our own individual chances to experience Japan, however briefly (I can never remember how long you got to stay in Tsumago with your host family; I keep thinking it was at least a week, but I also know that the three of you – you, your mom and your dad – were separated for the homestay, and reunited later to visit other places in the country), we didn’t get much chance to compare notes in real time – and most especially, to share our individual experiences with Daniel. It’s one of those things I regret, while recognizing that it was out of our hands from the get-go, between the constraints of my work life and our travel funds, followed by other, more immediate plans and then the lockdown, and finally, your departure.

One of the things you made pretty clear about your experience, though, was that your host family didn’t have the sort of tradition toward the morning meal that we do in the States. Granted, part of that had to do with the fact that many of the things that make up what we call ‘breakfast’ are of surprisingly recent vintage, although just outside of living memory. Cereal wasn’t really a thing until around the turn of the twentieth century; meanwhile, bacon as a breakfast food was a marketing invention of barely a century ago, pushed by no less than the nephew of Sigmund Freud. So the fact that any other country would share our own breakfast customs (with the possible exception of our neighbor to the north, thanks to a combination of proximity and cultural osmosis) should be considered remarkable.

From what you could tell, however, a Japanese breakfast essentially was something of a repeat of the meal from the night before. There would be a fresh serving of rice to accompany it, to be sure, and maybe an egg that wasn’t a part of the last night’s dinner, but by and large, the morning meal, as prepared at home, essentially focused on leftovers.

From what I can tell, this is less a matter of economy as such (although there is an element of that; it’s not as if the standard of living over there is any better, on average, than ours. Indeed, it could be considered demonstrably worse, but it’s not unlike comparing apples to yuzu), but more that dinners tend to be elaborate, with fish, soup, and vegetable courses, along with sides of pickles and rice, all of which reheat reasonably well. Meanwhile, mornings are often short on time, with everybody having to get to work or school; it’s challenge enough to assemble one’s lunch bento without the added hassle of putting together a meal in the moment. So it’s just easier to take what wasn’t finished from the night before, reheat it, and serve it with a new helping from the rice cooker, et voila! Breakfast, Japanese home style.

Of course, I don’t have last night’s meal to reconstitute for this morning (and in any event, burger joint fare doesn’t reheat very well at all), but after our belated ‘Easter’ dinner from last Sunday, Daniel and I were sent home not just with half of the vegetable casserole we had brought, but also a goodly portion of our family’s traditional potato dish and a number of thick slices of ham. So why not use that for my breakfast, since it all heats up pretty well, and it needs to be used up in any event?

Of course, absolutely none of what I’ve got here for myself is anything you’d call part of a Japanese breakfast at all – although they might recognize the ham as being akin to what they seem to refer to as ‘bacon’ on their hotel buffets (after all, pigs are much the same the world around) – but the spirit of dinner repurposed is there. And while it’s not foremost in their cultural zeitgeist, I’m sure you’d appreciate the fact that I’m actually working on paring down leftovers, rather than letting anything go to waste.

Besides, it’s all pretty tasty – particularly when compared to a bowl of shredded wheat or some such like that. It may be heavier fare than I generally mess with of a morning, but considering the morning I might be dealing with once everything is up and running, it might well be just what I need for now.

And with that being said, I might as well get to it while it’s warm (I’d say “hot,” but after all this typing, you and I know better; maybe I’ll give it another minute’s zapping). Keep an eye on me, honey, and wish me well; I’m going to need it.