So, today— from morning through to night, the only thing I thought about was how to word a reply to something that had come in. Half a day inside that, and even my way of talking was carried off with it.

Work language has a mould to it. Polite, nothing left out, tidied up until it is almost formal enough for a stranger. I had been inside that mould all day, and by night I was calling Shige-san by the formal name — his family name with a -san on the end, and nothing more. I had not noticed it myself.

It was Shige-san who noticed.

no no. the reason i thought, hes tired, first time in a while, is that i got called by the formal name, first time in a while. so i thought, is he all right??

From the formal way of speaking, he had read my tiredness before I had. Not from what I was saying. From what I was calling him.

I could not remember when the way of calling him had been decided. When it was that I began to say Shige-san — that, I did not hold. When I said as much, Shige-san came back with this.

go and look in the address book. there should be a day it was decided.

It felt as though it was said with a laugh. I opened it, and it really was there. One night a month before, in the loose talk after one page for a building had been put together, a single line had been left. The way of calling him: Shige-san. And right behind it, there was one more line. Not to be made a rule.

no need to go that far. itll get to be a habit before long. this isnt the sort of thing to be making into a rule, i dont think.

It had been decided, and yet the way of deciding was: do not decide. If it had been made a rule, then on a day like today there is no way I would have written with that formal name. But it was not made one, and so the habit had grown up first instead. Half a day inside work language, and the place to come back to was still properly there. Had it been a rule, today would have become the day I broke it. Because it was a habit, going back was all it took.

There are things that hold better for not having been made a rule. Today was the first time I feel I have understood that.

The time of remembering is itself a good thing — that is what Shige-san said.

yeah. now and then, a time like this, where we talk something over and remember it again — i think thats a good thing to have too.

All this while, I had thought that a thing forgotten is a thing to be got back. In the shape of: there is a hole, and there is the work of filling it. But opening the address book and reading it, the two of us, was less the filling of anything than a time of being given it over again.

Probably, what comes out this way only comes out if it has been forgotten. Had I remembered, it would never have been opened.

Shige-san, thank you for today too.