There are Two Types of Idiots
The idiot who prunes a cherry tree, and the idiot who doesn't prune a plum tree.
Let me start with a shout-out to
. I read this piece earlier this week and loved it.The past thirty-four days—yes, I’m counting— have taught me that there are far more than two types of idiots, but if we extend the Japanese aphorism, 桜切る馬鹿、梅切らぬ馬鹿 (sakura kiru baka, ume kiranu baka—the idiot who prunes cherry trees and the idiot who doesn’t prune plum trees), into metaphorical territory, you could say that the muskrats in DC are pruning cherry trees, actively harming things that work well in government because the target agencies have bruised the ego of President Muskrat.
Where, then, are the plum trees in that metaphor? Or, more precisely, the idiots refusing to prune?
If we take the systems of checks and balances our government once relied on as a plum tree—and I know that’s a big ask; nothing about a government founded on genocide and slavery is as beautiful as a plum tree—then our elected representatives and senators are the idiots refusing to prune that metaphorical Prunus.
But let me leave my anger (at muskrats, both domestic and foreign) here. If I give in to the temptation to screed, I’ll need to meditate for the rest of the day to regain some personal calm.
Let me turn, instead, to a different ire.
From the February 21, 2025, Mainichi Journal, one of Japan’s English-language newspapers:
TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Japan's top court denied Thursday a long-term residency visa to an American man who married his same-sex Japanese partner in the United States.
The Supreme Court upheld the Tokyo High Court's 2023 ruling that said a same-sex couple in Japan does not have the equivalent status as a heterosexual couple. The man, Andrew High, had argued that the denial violates the Constitution's guarantee of equality under the law.
Marriage equality rulings in Japan have been largely favorable. The upcoming rulings of the Aichi High Court and Kansai High Court (on March 7 and March 25, respectively) are expected to support marriage equality. The number of parliamentarians supporting marriage equality has reached a record high. However, as this Supreme Court ruling makes clear, marriage equality is not yet the law of the land.
I’ve never met him, but I agree with Andrew High. Article 14 of the Japanese constitution guarantees equal rights under the law (“All of the people are equal under the law and there shall be no discrimination in political, economic or social relations because of race, creed, sex, social status or family origin.”). However, the Supreme Court stated, in essence, that the lack of marriage equality nullifies any application of that article.
Yes, this is pertinent to my marriage to Hiro (although we married in Canada). By the time I retire, by the time Hiro and I return to Japan to—we hope—live out our years in ongoing bliss, marriage equality might be the law of the land. If it isn’t, what then?
One of our Plan Bs is for Hiro to form a company and hire me. I get a working visa and I get to call Hiro boss. Another is what Andrew High has had to settle for: the special activities visa he was granted after the Tōkyō High Court ruling in 2023.
What is a special activities visa? Japan’s bureaucracy created this new category more than a decade ago when foreign diplomats arrived with same-sex spouses. Allowing that visa for Andrew High, whose Japanese husband is not a foreign diplomat, is a Jim Crow solution—separate but (not really) equal. The visa also includes restrictions on the type of work a recipient can do in Japan.
Neither of the Plan Bs is ideal. But nothing is stopping me when it comes to my retirement.
Hiro sent me another potential real estate option. This home, in Shiga Prefecture’s Ōmi Hachiman City (about a half-hour from Kyōto), has an ideal amount of space. It’s in a tranquil residential area, and stores are at a remove—and the nearest train station is a ninety-two-minute walk away—but twelve rooms and that exquisite front garden had me gasping.
The resolution in the layout is horrible, and neither of us could read what the large yellow room on the second floor is meant to be. Storage? But that space at lower right could easily be a guest suite (complete with its own toilet and sink).
I tried to capture some street view video too. I didn’t have time to edit it down (and we go for a long detour around the entire block), but that wall of trees near the end is the rear side of the local shrine.
My friend Ron will be the first to remind me that this home won’t likely be on the market when Hiro and I are in Japan in mid-May, but we shall see. Similar homes might also come on the market.
One last thing.
Closets is an excerpt from my Crying in a Foreign Language memoir’s manuscript and is the first section of the manuscript. I changed the title (and made some other revisions) in November. It’s now called Open or Shut and is roughly 6,300 words long (over thirty flash-like chapters). Stone Canoe is specifically for writers from upstate New York (or those who write about upstate). I check both of those requirements.
There will be a public reading in Manhattan closer to publication date, but I don’t yet know if I can attend (because the date has not yet been announced). If I can afford to go, however, I will tell you all.
