05/28/2014

高木E 和 Perry Y是公司在芝加哥這單位裡唯二的兩位日裔同事；他倆不知所以然地，互不往來 (至少我跟他們共事的這麼多年，從沒見過他們對話過)， 他倆都與我相和好，見了我也都頗能嘻嘻哈哈地很好相處；他們倆最大共通處是，都長了一副日本臉、日本身高 (哈! 真糟糕，不是宣傳刻板印象啦，真是他倆的外貌如是之故，他倆身高都比恨天高的NS矮哩~)、、、不會說、寫日語的純種「美國人」，其餘大概就沒有甚麼共通點了。

高木E (高木是姓氏漢字，E是英文名的開頭字母) 對她美籍日裔的父親，曾於二戰期間，被美國政府關入集中營一事，從不提及，NS也就識象地不問；其他任何話題，高木E都可以輕鬆地與NS互相探討。與高木E談話可以是，天上人間地隨便抓些主題，就可對上半天話的很有興味；我們也常(不定期的)一起午餐共聚。

有一天，高木E把她的 lunchbox帶來，邊吃邊談中，她問:

「If you can go any place without any condition, where would you like to go?」 「Why are you asking?」 「Just asking.」

「Well, as you've known, I'd always want to go Nova Scotia with my BabyDog. Now that, Dog has gone, I don't know ...」

「Not even back to Taiwan, or go to China?」 「No, not really.」 高木E睜大眼(Ah, 高木E和NS都是亞洲人的小眼，睜得再大，也大不到哪兒去的，沒有戲劇效果，唉，可惜可惜、、、) 說「Really, no place interested?」

「Ur, I may be wanna go ... since there is no Dog's physical body to stop me, I think I'd like to cross over the ocean from the point of Nova Scotia to the other point of Northern England.」

「So, which area of Northern England you're interested at?」 「Ur, somewhere north of York and south of Scotland.」 「What makes you want go there?」 「You've heard me mentioned my experience in Michigan, E. I have always had the strong feeling that I had been there many, many years ago, ever since the first moment my feet landed on the campus, when I saw all those tall trees ... 」 NS飯都顧不得吃，喘口氣接著說 「I have a strong feeling he was from Northern England ... the pictures of him walking among the hedges along the edge of the hills and carriage rides under the beautiful tall trees have been flashed so clearly on my mind over these years. I have wanted to find out what they meant to me, always.」

高木E晶亮的眼神，眨動著，說「Don't  you feel, sometimes, you have this strange feeling that you have been to some place that you actually never been to and done something so familiar?」

「Yes, oh yes. I do, I have been always having this kind of strange feeling since I was little.」 「The strangest example I have had is one time I was waiting a friend to go to cafeteria, on campus. I arrived at lobby earlier. I was looking around in search of my friend. Suddenly, I had the strange sense if I took a chair by a particular row of seats, on the right side where it connected to an end table, I should ... I, then, walked to the mental appointed seat and sat down, streched out my right arm without looking what were put on the end table ... at that moment my brain screamed to me 'pick-up-the-State-News,' I had been strugled not to, but my hand grabed the newspaper. My brain screamed again 'read it;' then I moved the paper in front my face and  I was so amazed to read the exact story minutes ago my brain said I would have had. This instance is beyound the definition of normal Déjà vu.」

「WOW.」 高木E搖晃著她滿頭的白髮的頭 (她其實比我年輕許多耶)，驚嘆的說「Ever since I graduated from UC I have been thru a lots of different jobs. What made me being a professional chef at one time, I couldn't really tell. But, I was the chef of one restaurat, I was asked to go to the big, walk-in freezer; I walked in, made a turn and raised my head to look, all of a sudden, what I saw nearly shocked me at that moment. I saw a door framed with the specific shape that I have been seeing all the time on my vision of Déjà vu since childhood. I realized at that moment I was destined to be a chef.」 我看高木E激動的神情，於是，放下我的「那你又為何從大廚師變為小職員」的疑問。

「Like you, Northern England is your place to go, I have always felt there's something happened on me in Cincinnati.」「I've always felt something will be happened had I gone to Cincinnati, the vision I have always seen will be solved in Cincinnati.」

「Have you been to Cincinnati?」 「No, never.」 「Why, E that is easy to over come. Cincinnatin is so close, it takes only 5 hours' drive from Chicago, why don't us go to find out what is Cincinnati so important to you?」

「Oh, no. No.」

「Come on, 高木E, Let's Go to Cincinnati.」
「No. No.」 

我不明白。我真的不明白，我願意，提供交通工具、親自駕駛，就算開到Cincinnati後，在街上亂晃也勝於在心中存疑，為什麼高木E寧可把一世的問號留存，而不接受我的建議?

Come on, 高木E, Let's Go to Cincinnati.
Oh, please, 高木E, Let's Go to Cincinnati.
Please?