Finding My Voice（4） The Path We Walked【3】
Our new home was also a town close to the sea. But even though it was a seaside town, it felt quite different from the place we had lived before. That previous sea had always possessed a deep, ultramarine color, rough and churning, with an atmosphere that seemed to reject people. Yet the sea in this new town lay gently alongside the lives of its people. This seaside town had a long history; there were many who had lived there for generations, and the town possessed the steady, enduring life of ordinary people. I would buy vegetables at the old-fashioned shopping street and purchase plates at a small local department store. My husband went off to work early every morning and returned by evening. I, as before, felt a sense of boredom.
Today, there is an atmosphere that criticizes full-time housewives. However, back when I was in my twenties, the prevailing air was that a woman would quit her job upon marriage and settle into domestic life. I hadn't taken the idea of "working outside the home to earn money" very seriously. Since our new home was a two-hour drive from my workplace, continuing my job would have been practically difficult anyway. Without thinking much, I quit, and though the thought of trying to work crossed my mind, I never made the decision to do so. It could be said that I was simply coasting, without giving any real thought to the social climate that expected women to live off a husband's earnings upon marriage.
Yet at the same time, the actual society around me enforced an unwritten rule that married women belonged at home. For example, one of my friends had continued working after marriage, but when she became pregnant, her company subjected her to various forms of harassment. Eventually, when she had to take leave due to threatened miscarriage, she was forced to let go of her job piece by piece. Another time, a talkative friend told me about a workplace romance at her office. At that workplace, she said, it became a topic of gossip: why should the exceptionally capable woman be the one to quit, while the less capable husband remained at the company?
I told my husband that I wanted to work. I had been walking through the town and spotted a part-time job posting at a local delicatessen, preparing and selling prepared foods. I brought it up to him again. But my husband said: since I had all that time, why not just spend it doing things I enjoyed? I sensed in his words an underlying pressure to keep me from working. I truly understood his intent. Yet to that realization, I gave my own self a "no." Looking back now, I think I should have simply taken my resume to the shop, gone through the interview, and decided to work on my own terms. After all, there was no reason why I should have locked myself away at home or wandered the streets aimlessly by myself. Besides, my husband had handed down an edict: "While we're living here, we are not having children; let's just enjoy our life as a couple." Truth be told, I wanted children right away. But there was an atmosphere about my husband that made it impossible to voice that desire. Whenever I tried to express a wish, he would brush it aside vaguely or pretend not to hear.
After coming to this town, I began to notice changes in my physical condition. I would wake up almost every morning with a slight fever. It hovered around 37 degrees Celsius—not nearly severe enough to call a serious symptom, but still, I went to see a doctor. The doctor asked me if I was pregnant. I answered no. Since my husband had declared that we weren't having children, such a thing was out of the question.
The cause of my physical malaise remained unclear. And when the low-grade fever finally subsided, it was followed by a series of days with stomach trouble. I developed irritable bowel syndrome. Even then, I never seriously stopped to wonder why I had fallen ill with such a condition. I continued to bake bread at home. I would walk down to the shore and spend long, solitary hours on the sandy beach.
My husband was writing academic papers for his work. Stressed by this, his emotions would run high, and he would occasionally hurl harsh words at me. Furthermore, there were times when he would be late coming home without giving me any notice. I repeatedly called his PHS (the mobile phone-like communication devices of that era). Still, he never returned my calls. It wasn't as if his workplace prohibited phone usage; he certainly could have answered.
One night, even as the hour grew late, my husband neither called nor came home. I grew worried about him. I stepped out of the house and waited outside for him to return. For some reason, I felt a bottomless sense of unease. Looking back, I realize I had become completely dependent on my husband. Had I been looking at it now, I would say that back then, instead of singing out loud with my own voice, I was merely matching my steps to an irresponsible conductor—forcing myself to keep going with a hesitant, fragile voice, muttering sounds that could hardly even be called a song. I should have squarely faced the quiet anxiety and dissatisfaction echoing within that murmur. Instead, I didn't do that; I focused entirely on the irritation and contempt mixed into the tone of my husband's voice. I just wanted him not to hate me, I suppose. That is what I was thinking.
When my husband finally came home that night, he was anticlimactically cheerful. He said, "I got caught up talking with a colleague and couldn't call." He seemed completely indifferent to the fact that I had been worried to the point of tears. Even at that moment, flooded with relief that he had returned, I locked away any words of reproach. Truly, I should have been far more indignant—I should have walked out of the house in protest. But I had been brainwashed by him. Convinced that his actions and his words were the only right ones, and that my own true feelings were utterly worthless.....
Next sory:Finding My Voice（5） The Path We Walked【4】 | 記事編集 | note
First Story: Finding My Voice（１） Introduction｜Cristal
© 2026 crystal. All rights reserved. 当記事の文章・画像の無断転載・複製はお控えください。
