Ham Egg Pie

In Tokyo I have heroes to whom I can say hardly a word. First among these is the Bad Girl of Mister Donut in Senzoku who at fifty is thin as a reed and wears sleeveless camouflage half-shirts which showcase her navel. She is a very important role model for me. Whenever we meet at Mister Donut we grin and wave to each other like cellmates in the same exuberant asylum.

Today the illustrious Bad Girl bought me a ham egg pie, which she slid onto the table as she stopped by to pick up my point cards. I always save them for her and she exchanges them at the register for free promotional gifts, for plastic lunchboxes, day planners and rice bowls.

This exchange of pie and point cards was great fun, of course, because the people all around us looked shocked and appalled. I live for these moments of cultural levitation, when things that could never ever happen in Tokyoland go ahead and happen anyhow.

The Bad Girl strutted off and I was left with a ham egg pie.

Now, as an eater, I’m as finicky as a half-starved Labrador Retriever. Put it in front of me and I’ll woof it down.

But I loathe ham egg pie. The egg is soft-boiled, see, so that the yolk bubbles out as you chew. And it’s cold.

So I’ve got this ham egg pie in front of me. The gods are laughing so hard even a mystic trained at a weekend workshop could hear them.

Mother of the Universe, bless me to love those near to me as much as I love certain adored strangers. Because I would sooner die than hurt the feelings of the divine Bad Girl of Mister Donut in Senzoku.

I ate the hideous ham egg pie: the cold egg dribbled into my beard. I laughed and wrote notes and found that, after a long time away, life at last had returned to me.

(a version of this appears online at HITOTOKI. please visit!)