The Girl Who Wrote Loneliness (60 page)

I was having breakfast in the lobby, flipping through the morning paper, when I felt a grain of rice catch in my throat. My photo in the paper. When will I stop getting startled at encountering my photo in unexpected places? The large print next to the photo read, “Sixteen-year-old Country Bumpkin Factory Girl Dreamed of Becoming a Writer.” I felt my cheeks flush. Worried that the front desk staff would recognize me, I pulled out the page with my photo and took it upstairs to my room. August 31, 1995.

I was out on a walk and I followed the sign to Hallym Park. Once inside, I was stunned. It was not a mere park. There were thousands of rare subtropical trees, breathing and sighing. The arboretum had been built on a desert wasteland by transporting 2,000 truckloads of soil and spending twenty years cultivating after planting the seeds of these subtropical trees. And that was not all. There was enormous scale of the surrounding caves and the trees bore splendid flowers, their colors so vivid no paint could
have produced them. My hand would reach out before I realized it, wondering, “Can they be real?” Some plants had leaves hard and sharp enough to prick your hand, a necessity, presumably, for surviving in the desert. I got my arm pricked while walking past a Mexican agave, which left a bleeding wound and I had to apply ointment when I got back. These plants made me realize how tame and prudish our indigenous plants are. At the pond where tens of carp were swimming, a tortoise was resting on a rock, craning its neck toward the sky. Or was it a turtle, not a terrapin? I always have a hard time telling them apart. I followed a guide to look around the two caves, Hyeopjae and Ssangyong. As we approached, I could sense a release of chilly air. One step inside and I felt a shiver. The guide flashed the light on a section of the cave and pointed out that there were stalagmites growing here that cannot form in lava tunnels. Stalagmites? How do they grow? The guide explained that stalagmites are precipitates formed on the ground of a cavern by rainwater that contain dissolved compounds from the thick layer of shell sand on the earth’s surface, and that they grow a centimeter every hundred years, fed by limewater dripping from the ceiling. A centimeter every hundred years? I was frightened, not amazed, by the myriad dripstones of varying sizes, revealed by the guide’s flashlight.

The guide pointed at one of them and said, “That one is twenty centimeters tall, which means it has been growing for two thousand years. The floor of the Ssangyong Cave was not just sand but shell sand. A long, long time ago, it was probably part of the sea. What processes does a seashell go through to turn into this fine sand?” The guide pointed the flashlight to the ceiling, toward what he explained was a trace that a pair of dragons left behind as they escaped the erupting lava. The flashlight exposed the elongated silhouette of two dragons. One had its head, and the other its tail, reaching out toward the light outside the cave. The movement was swift. Light seeped in only through the part of the ceiling through which the dragons had escaped. I felt a chill on my forehead, to
think dragons had once lived here. With the hot bubbling lava pouring in, how had the dragons made their escape toward the light, making what kind of sounds, bearing what kind of emotions? I was frightened by the force of nature engulfing the cave. The twisted rocks that had formed from boiling lava that quickly hardened appeared either elaborate or misshapen, and there were myriad holes on the cave’s floor, made by endless drops of limewater dripping onto the exact same spot. I was also hit by cold drops of limewater. It was the naturally formed rocks that soothed my fear somewhat. How could such shapes and silhouettes have surfaced naturally? There was one that seemed like an exact replica of the Pietà. The mother stood, full of sorrow, carrying her son. I took an instant photo in front of a rock that resembled a bent over bear, and one that was like a turtle carrying a rabbit on its back. In the image that appeared, then and there, I am wide-eyed with surprise. September 1, 1995.

Younger Sister and her husband arrived for a visit with their child. He has been in this world less than two years. He maintains about a meter’s distance from me. I want to hold him but he only wants his mom. He relents into my arms only when I am clapping or barking with a funny look or performing a funny routine singing, “Heading out to sea, going fishing.” And even then, only when his mom was next to me. I found it moving, how his instincts immediately sense her whereabouts. The baby seemed to have entrusted everything to this being called mother. Even while he’s sleeping, he calls out, “
Eomma
.” When she answers, “Yes,” from wherever she is, he goes back to sleep. But if he does not hear her respond, he immediately opens his eyes and looks around, calling, “
Eomma
. . .” And when she does not come into view, he will be wide awake, waddling toward the door and banging, crying, “
Eomma
.” A boy sobbing, his face covered with his two hands. It’s no use no matter how I try to comfort him, but when his mom comes and holds him, his sadness is over. He evens smiles with a sigh,
winking his teary black eyes. There would have been a time when I was like him. When Mom’s scent was all I believed in, when all I had to do was follow where she went, when all I needed was Mom. September 2, 1995.

I was gazing into the water and there were conches rolling around. Not one but many, so I picked one up and looked inside to find a hermit crab. I picked up another and again a crab. Hermit crabs crawling inside the shell, eating up the conch and making a home. September 3, 1995.

Younger Sister and her husband left early in the morning with their child. When he arrived, the only things he could say were choo-choo, twinkle twinkle,
Eomma
and the second syllable of
Appa
—ppa. During the three days he spent here, I whispered in his ear every chance I got as I pointed to the sea,
bada
. And finally, yesterday, he said, bba-da, stressing the first syllable. I have no way of knowing whether he was actually referring to the sea or to the tip of my finger, but as we said good-bye, he pointed to me and shouted, “
bba-da.
”

Returning alone after seeing them off at the airport, the crystalline voice that he left behind lingered in my ear—bba-da. The child’s every movement brings out enormous sympathy and affection. His soft bottom, twinkling eyes, his fingers, tiny and cute. This vulnerability seems to be the child’s method of survival. Instinctive movements that compel those who possess power to protect him. At the sculpture park, while we were captured by the impressive works of art, he ran off to the yellow butterfly on the lawn. At the museum of miniature trees, while we were lost amidst the rows of trees trimmed to perfection with scissors, he got down on the floor on his tummy to watch black ants crawling. At the beach, while we were gazing out at the distant sea, he waddled after the minnows scattering by his feet. He showed interest only in the unadorned, in what moved.

I came back to the hotel and slept all day. The stain on my sheet, of a spill that the baby made. The child’s smell left on my pillow.
Each time the sunlight stirred me awake, he appeared, over in the light, glimmering. September 5, 1995.

How fortunate that Jeju-do is part of this country. September 6, 1995.

Tomorrow is Chuseok. I was also here for the harvest holidays last year, trying to start this book. For two years in a row I am spending Chuseok on this island. September 8, 1995.

Is this a sign of growing old? Remembering that it was Chuseok, I suddenly felt lonesome to be here by myself. Around noon I went down to the lobby and ordered lunch, but the soup tasted sour, like yesterday’s leftover. I put down my spoon and came back upstairs. On television, the women who worked at the traditional rice cake house in Nakwon-dong were engaged in a Chuseok cake making contest. In their hands, the half-moon cakes took shape swiftly, taking on a glossy sheen. All day long I waited. For what? A phone call? A visit? Outside on the beach villagers were playing volleyball on the camping ground. I followed with my eyes a young man with a strong serve, rooting for him. The phone did not ring. In the late afternoon, I put on a jacket and headed out to the beach. The sea, at low tide, had revealed a thousand-meter stretch of mudflat. In the last surf of the ebbing tide, children were catching moon crabs, and a pair of foreign tourists, a man and a woman, sat on folding chairs, their backs exposed. A man stood with his feet in the water after casting his fishing rod. One of the children catching crabs, a girl, recognized me. A few days ago she was gathering clams out here with her brother and I had joined her, digging into the sand. “Look.” The girl opened the plastic bag for me to see and inside there were about ten moon crabs wiggling around. Their sand-colored shells were radiant. I’d never seen sand-colored crabs. I poked my finger inside for fun and one of them snapped its claw. I dug into the sand trying to catch one for her and I couldn’t get a single one. Over where the mudflat ended two young women were taking pictures. I gave up catching crabs and was walking down the
beach along the tide when the two women asked me to take a picture for them. I see the distant sea through the viewfinder. For a moment I forgot to press the button, enchanted by the sea inside the viewfinder, standing there with my feet in the ebbing tide. The women took back the camera from me and walked toward the other side of the mudflat. They looked at each other and laughed, like they were sharing a joke, holding hands, slapping each other on the back. Ahead of them two dogs played, covered in sand. The man standing with his feet in the water, his fishing rod cast, threw me a glance. I walked on then looked back without giving it too much thought, then realized he was glancing at me again. I walked faster, getting myself farther away from him. I’d been thinking, each time I was out on the beach, that all beings, people or animals, are more natural in the company of others. Even clams and moon crabs. Even a rock in the sea catches attention when it’s off on its own. Much more so for me, a human. As I leave the mudflat, I notice that the sun is setting but the volleyball game on the camping ground is still going on. September 9, 1995.

Autumn seems to have arrived. In the mornings and evenings, I get goose bumps on my arms. The sea wind is colder as well. I have no autumn clothes in my suitcase. Must be time to head back. September 10, 1995.

Only now I call them my friends, they who had to continue moving their fingers, all ten of them, and keep producing things, without end, their names forgotten, their efforts completely disassociated from material riches. I shall not forget the social will that they have spread in me. That they, my anonymous friends, have given birth to a piece of my inner world, just as my mother gave birth to my essential self. . . . And that I, on my part, must give birth, through my words, to their own place of dignity in this world. September 10, 1995.

Early morning, after washing a white shirt and hanging it on a clothes hanger out on the balcony to dry, I walked out to the beach. The tide, which had ebbed overnight, was coming in,
filling up from afar. I could hear the swooshing sound of the blue tide seeping in on the white mudflat. Water and sand. What other pair shares a relationship as perfect as that of seeping and scattering, between water and sand? Seeping in, then gone, in a flash.

The white sand on this beach was so fine it formed a hard, dense mass. I stood watching the tide and took off my shoes. I thought the water would be cold but it felt warm. The sand felt nice on the soles of my feet so I kept walking. My feet left imprints on the smooth sandbank. I ran toward the tide then turned around to check, and my footprints had run after me, then cut off right where I was. I sank down on the mudflat. I felt someone sitting down next to me, which for a moment distracted my vision. It would be a long time until the rising tide reached me. As I waited, I kept glancing at my side. Why did I keep feeling someone was next to me when there was nothing but sand around? The water rose. It felt soft where it touched my feet. I released my raised knees and stretched. As the tide flooded in, tickling the top of my feet, my calves, my buttocks, my waist, I wanted to call out his name. I seemed to know his name, but perhaps I didn’t. I wanted to call out his name tenderly but I also seemed to have forgotten his name. It seemed he was very close to me, and at the same time very far. This was agonizing. He was always at the other end of the line. After my consciousness was swept up by sensual desire, it would be left with solitude, so close to death, like the white mudflat behind me. Nevertheless, by feeling his existence, I was able to taste the euphoria of taking a step deeper inside of me. The tide moved on past me. He moved on past me as well. Even when I had come to a halt, unable to flow with time, just as I sat on the mudflat now, he had moved on past me, like this rising tide. Behind me, he and the tide intertwined. I looked back to find my footprints being washed away by the tide.

I walked out to the beach again at dusk. The tide was ebbing. The beach, which had been underwater all day, revealed its white bottom as the tide went out, the way it looked in the morning.
The ebb and flow were opposite phenomena, but at one point, the ebbing and the rising tides appeared the same, like identical twins. Once that moment was over, they take on clearly opposite traits, but at one moment before they head in opposite directions, they reveal the same scenery, brilliant and fleeting.

He and she, ebb and flow, hope and despair . . . life and death. Aren’t they pairs of words that are one and the same?

On the white mudflat at dusk, two children were digging clams with their mother. If you followed the ebbing tide until the end, how far could you go? I looked back and my feet had left imprints, as they had in the morning. I ran around wild on the mudflat. My footprints also ran wild, following me right behind. I ran and ran until I caught up with the ebbing tide, then stomped into the water before flopping down. The water reached my chest. The boy who was digging clams lifted himself and looked my way, probably thinking I was acting strangely. The tide went out, slowly. The water left my breasts, my waist, my buttocks, then the tops of my feet. The water left me behind all alone on the white mudflat, growing more and more distant. When the tide was far, far out, I looked back and the only thing vivid on the mudflat was my footprints. It seemed that, unlike in the morning, the tide had ebbed in order to keep my footprints intact. Yes. I had turned a deaf ear to my girlhood with my silence. It was a time when I was unable to love myself, so I had to go from fifteen straight to twenty. Whether I started walking out of my past or walked into it from the present, my footprints always came to a stop in the same place. I would go from being fifteen to twenty, or go from being twenty to fifteen. If I set out from the past, I had to ignore sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, and skip straight to twenty. If I set out from the present, I had to ignore nineteen, eighteen, seventeen, sixteen, and skip straight to fifteen. Those years always remained vacant, like naked sunlight, like the well with its bottom completely covered. For a long time, inside my mind, my girlhood had left behind no other human ties except
for family. I made an effort not to remember anyone from that time, not to remember Hui-jae
eonni
. But my consciousness would suddenly, vividly, reveal these past relations and I would behave like someone afflicted with amnesia.