On the top of the world

by Madeleine Ruh

busy boats. It's an industrial area but also a place for fishers, we can see their little boats in the morning, and their huge nets stay all day as square shapes.

  To come to our room we take a mini cable car, as in an old James Bond, or part of a video of Bill Viola.

  The landscape is so peaceful. I feel peaceful.

  Perfect pine trees like bonzai, a pier with colorful sculptures on the right with the yellow pumpkin of the Japanese artist.

  Somewhere in the middle of nowhere, concrete architecture mixed with the pure lines of nature.

  Perhaps it's a sign, and time for me to question my life.

  As my husband has a lot of work and mails to deal with, I spend time on the terrace. I've got time to look at other people.

  The master suit is occupied by a couple of German, I believe there is a Baquiat on the wall, I'm not sure. I tried to look inside the other morning, but the curtains were closed. The woman is quite attractive even if my age, around fifty, she's got an allure. They look educated if not litterates, they argued on a book they had both read yesterday at the restaurant, I like the fact that she seems independant. He's sportiv but his neck is too heavy and won't look as good as growing old if he doesn't take care. I met an odd couple in the bus : a beautiful graceful woman dressed in black, with white hair, and an old guy, sun tanned with brow spots on the face and wrinkles, and difficulties to walk, something like fifteen years of difference that were now tangible.

  A couple is a strange story if you think about it. To choose to live with the same person for years or even for ever.

  Our children are now adults, I got married with my husband twenty five years ago.

  Yesterday was a foggy day. We went to Teshima. We waited for the bus, then for the boat, then for another bus, then we walked and finally arrived on a little road, surrounded by rice fields.

  One of the young Japanese guy with a love tee-shirt and an orange jacket had forgotten to purchase his ticket, so the boat had to wait for him, he had a small bike in a big bag. He apologized to us, the thirty ones found of arts, expecting something but looking a little lost in this red ferry, far away from their home.

  We found him again in front of the final bus station, which must show that the bus is slow.

  I must say we wait a lot in Naoshima, it's part of the charm of the place, you can't be in a hurry, it doesn't work.

  So, after two hours, we finally arrived. Among the green fields, a big nest in white concrete. We approached it, joining a line as a sect procession on the concrete path.

  Welcoming us, and nearly whispering, a young woman dressed in white as a nurse requested us to take off our shoes. She looked strict, not knowing she was also very sexy in her white uniform, she advised us not to make any noise as the art element was echoing and requested us not to take any pictures. It was as if breaking the rules could have huge consequences. A few seconds my husband looked disappointed with his camera as part of the people that miss their vacations if they loose their pictures as trophees or the places they came. Slowly, we entered the concrete structure looking as a white flat mushroom. I was nearly tiptoeing.

  There were only ten people on the huge white concrete surface. Some of them looking like sleeping, laid on their back, some praying sitted on their knees, some just watching drop of waters slowly going to the middle of the architecture, in a tiny invisible hole. Another young woman also in white uniform and with long black hair was watching us. My husband laughed and said to me ushering, "It's a joke, I tought it was the entry of the museum. And that's it." As his voice was loud, the white uniform turn to him, and did a sign to remain silent and respect the ritual. He raised his shoulders to show he was thinking the rule was not relevant, obviously thinking it was a crasy day, comparing the hours to come and the little drops of water in this concrete building. How irrelevant.

  For me, it was an extraordinary experience.

  I was feeling quite for the first time in many years. Like nothing mattered really. "I'm alive or dead. I'm surrounded by so many lies.Why do we lie ? My career is not what I dreamt off when I was in my thirties. Still, I've got a job. Our children rarely call us except to ask for money for their studies. Eglantine, my daughter, has cut her long hair without asking. I like the light, the dancing roop suspended to the nest and the big hole in the ceiling. Look at the sky and the running clouds ! Tiny drops near my feet, slowly going to join another one, then with more energy accumulated fastly gliding to join the splash of water, suddenly disappearing. Over and over again, but never the same scenario each time, always reinvented. It's pure and plain of joy. I don't know why, I feel happy."

  My husband had left for half an hour when I found him at the coffee without his shoes, and drinking a green tea, as they had no Kirin beer, not to mention a fresh one. He looked at his watch asserting that the next bus was still in half an hour.

  He look exasperated. The trip was my idea. I admire Tadao Ando and his daring choices, his ability to appeal other great artists in a human adventure. I like the fact that he's an autodidact, a citizen of the world even if from Japan. Benesse House is a pure marvel for eyes and spirit. With the museums and arts projects. You feel ill at ease, at the same time you think about nature, origin, what is a human being.

  To come back to my husband, he didn't appreciate the restaurant and found their wine cart too narrow, and he didnt' accept that the wifi didn' t work in rooms at night to make guests disconnect. It took him hours to send a document to his head offices, and he was nearly screaming about the stupid managers of this hotel ruining all the rules of service. At the breakfast, he didn't like the fact that continental breakfast meant only a little piece of bread and butter and they didn't have even cereals. He hated the smell of the fish and mushrooms in the morning, and even in the kaiseki diner, he left the tofu and the rice and miso soup, saying sushi and tempura were enough to understand the Japanese culture.

  At this dinner, he was upset by the noisy group of French retired people with their full of life female guide. He said that except group of wordy Japanese women and old people obsessed by art understanding because their life was behind them, there were no people in this hotel, and no food making sens.

  Then he reminded me that tourists groups were a disaster for the planet, thinking of the one we met on the supposedly romantic cruise on the Li River near Guilin. And also that Japan was undergoing not only an economic crisis, but a demographic one, and if we didn't take care of it, soon, the worlwide population would also have one third of sixty years old and more in two thousand and thirty. In my mind, I calculated we would be part of the percentage in this future. I didn't say a word and stared at him. I was asking myself where the hell the husbands of all this growing old Japanese women could be.

  I had a clear mind, as if the peaceful atmosphere had clarify my thinking and classified my memories for helping me to move forward.

  My husband used to go every year for one week to fish with male friends in Montana, and I would never ask questions. Why ? I knew it was not only a story of fishing.

  Fortunately, in Teshima art museum, there were young hipsters from all over the world, appealed by the idealist philosophy behind the island, and trendy young couples looking as working for advertising agencies or art projects. Else I would have felt old myself, with my angry husband as a companion.

  Following what I felt as a priority now, it was obvious, I took a little cushion and another one for him, and took my cup of tea outside.

  I had to tell him.

  The view was magnificent and calm : vivid green ricefields, the little road with the shape of a snake resting under the sun, a peaceful port, the sea with boats floating far away, and the dark green mountains.

  My husband followed me, asserting that Japanese women were awfully looking after forty years, in contrast with their cute look when they were young, and laughed at Japanese men to be so small. Definitely, he was upset. I never saw him so jugmental about other human beings.

  I had the feeling on my side to
belong to the nature and the human kind, embracing the landscape as part of me, and me part of it.

  I even felt good feelings about the odd couples, the tourist groups, the strict students engaged in their arty period, or the young biker that was late.

  We were all humans, on a fragile planet, and questioning our lifes in the same way, just with our own words. What for ?

  We remained five minutes silent, looking at the sea. An image came to me. The sun playing on my leg by an opened window, he my beloved looks at me. It's a long time ago, one of our first week-ends, in Italy. "What ?" He said : "I look at a beautiful you that I fall in love with." He had bright eyes.

  Now, I should tell him now.

  "Arnaud, something happened to me fifteen years ago. I must tell you as it's a burden to me. It's a lie because I never said anything to you. I love you and I trust you. I wish us long years together and to become wiser persons, and in a way, happier."

  I told him everything, avoiding details. The young product manager with beautiful green eyes. The love affair during an Asian trip for my company. I was his boss. How he convinced me to take a picture for the next fragrance with him as a model. I was in love and I obeyed. It was a disaster. The picture was not good and I spent my budget on it, using a