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Duetting with Dad
As a housewarming gift, Jenny shipped me a piece of Dad’s glass art. When I unwrapped it, I wept. I am so happy to have another piece to hang in the windows here. When Dad was learning the techniques of glass painting, he copied the church windows of medieval glass masters. Here’s what he wrote…
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Nengajou jollity
Today I sent out our nengajou, the holiday cards that are delivered on January 1 in Japan. I am not 100% sure that’s going to work properly for my cards this year. I didn’t buy the special pre-franked cards the post office sells, instead drawing my designs on postcards I already had on hand. So…
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Turmeric Ink & Dye
I have a lot of turmeric from my garden so I decided to try turning it into a botanical dye, ink or paint. It is sort of delightful to have enough to experiment with and not feel bad about messing up. I am really learning. So far I’ve had three fails and a semi-success. Fail…
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Death and memories
Taking time to remember a person is how I grieve. This may not be the most classic way to process grief, but it works well for me and is influenced strongly by two books: The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier. In this book, a plague has wiped out all but one woman…
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Two fewer inoshishi
Living in the countryside is not for the faint of heart. Neither is this post; turn back if you don’t like death. After writing here yesterday that the inoshishi weren’t getting into the trap, I woke this morning to find two of them in it. And one on the outside. He sensed me, snorted loudly…
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Wildlife: inoshishi
Inoshishi are wild boars. They are agricultural pests with a price on their heads – or their tails, as the city pays for every tail you bring them. We have some that live in the hills and vales surrounding 555. Wild boars eat roots, bulbs, grubs, and worms. They get into rice fields and roll…
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The barn is next
It’s been three months since we moved into 555. Next week I have a meeting with Sasaki-san about renovating the 120 year old barn that sits next to the house. It was a dairy barn for generations, but its been out of use for decades. The floors are still dirt and mud, but there’s no…
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Turmeric Harvesting
I have a jungle of turmeric growing in my hatake garden plot. It’s all volunteers from the Kawasakis old garden. I didn’t do anything to call it forth, it just arrived in its own time. Turmeric is a beautiful broad leaf plant with exotic white flowers. Over the summer it was lush and green. When…
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The old days of design
I started my design career in 1988 doing layout for a national wholesale food collective. Most of my work was preparing grocery fliers for the member companies. I also designed ads for food manufacturers, did graphics for events, and did page layout for magazines and programs. There were two of us in the desktop publishing…
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Intuition session with Christine
I recently enjoyed an intuition session – a sort of psychic reading – with my friend Christine from Clarity with Christine. I find it useful occasionally to get perspective that’s outside self-reflection. I interpret and absorb what she describes into a deeper understanding of myself. Christine’s readings are a creative experience. As you would expect,…
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