4. A Nothing-Special Diary [Driving will have to wait until next time.]

Words are always more beautiful or more fun when they are still inside your heart.

When I try to put them into words, I feel like something is off.

And the excitement I felt just a moment ago is gone.

Why is that?

During a meal with my family, my eldest daughter starts chatting away.

I played this with my friends. I did some drawing. I practiced dancing.

It is truly a story about nothing. My daughter tries her best to convey how charming her day was with disjointed words. My wife and I look at each other and smile, agreeing that she has become good at talking.

Why do we feel this way, even though her words are so stumbling?

I know how to use words much better than she does.

Yet, why are my words not exciting at all?

After the meal, while drinking, I thought about such things by myself.

Unaware of this, my daughter throws herself at me and says, 'Let's play dolls!'

'Daddy, you be Hello Kitty, Meru-chan, Anpanman, Dadandan, and Kokin-chan!'

That is too many roles. How can she ask for such an impossible task so calmly?

I suddenly wondered.

If she were someone else's child, would I be able to meet this impossible demand?

It's impossible.

I don't know what to say to make children from other families happy.
I have no attachment to them, either.

Let alone playing five roles, I probably couldn't even handle one.

But I understood it immediately.

The reason this child's words reach me is because I am facing her.

Because she trusts that her dad will do it for her, she can calmly put such an unreasonable request into words.

As for me, I never truly believe that my words will reach the other person.

Because I have doubts about conveying them, there is no joy or excitement in it.

That's what I thought.

Surely, words are just vehicles.

The driver, which is emotion, drives the vehicle of words.

Even if the driving is poor, if you try to properly face the other person, it will eventually arrive.

And the other person is waiting, too.

Even while feeling anxious about the shaky driving, they are waiting for it to arrive at their destination.

That is why my daughter's clumsy words always make me feel gentle.

And my words never have a driver.

Only the vehicle keeps running.

Even when it arrives, no one gets out.

I thought about telling my wife about this discovery.

However, my wife seemed desperate to protect the laundry from our two children, and it seemed she didn't have the luxury of waiting for my arrival.

Not now, I suppose.

Thinking that, I placed my empty glass in the sink and decided to wash the dishes instead.

Some time later, I remembered that there was something I had failed to say back then.

However, by that time, the driver seemed to have lost all motivation.

Well, I suppose things like that happen.

In the end, I never told my wife about this.

But I felt that even if I didn't take the car out, my wife probably already knew what kind of person the driver was.

I decided that I didn't need to put that feeling into words, and chose to keep it to myself.