clear space
Exactly one year ago the National Art Center Tokyo was holding the exhibition こいのぼりなう！— Koinobori Now! which I enjoyed so much that I kept on to the do-it-yourself work the whole family did at the exhibition until now. Continue reading “memory archive — day 86”
In hindsight I regret getting rid of this scarf. I had kept it and worn for about nine years for a good reason after all. Looking at the image of its cross pattern now, I realise that it does remind me of Japanese traditional pattern designs; two-tone and minimalistic repetition. So even long before I knew that I’d be going to live in Japan, I was, subconsciously, drawn to the country’s design aesthetics.
Today I’d like to add two items that don’t hold much of a memory at all, rather the opposite. After all most of the clutter people live with fall under this category, I suppose. I found those on top of the bedroom cupboard, covered in dust and completely forgotten. The bag had already started to disintegrate — I only partly blame this on age. Another key reason, I feel, is the extreme conditions of Japanese climate that the bag was exposed to in our hardly heated or cooled bedroom: total dryness in winter vs a very humid and hot summer.
The denim cut-offs left me a bit speechless. No one in the family is any good with crafts, however, keeping small pieces of fabric would only make sense if you were thinking of making anything out of those. For once I can point my finger at another family member though as I am not the one who kept the cut-offs; that I really wouldn’t have even considered.
This Sunday will be Hinamatsuri or Girls’ Day, here in Japan. It takes place every year on March 3rd and is celebrated by families with young daughters, wishing for a healthy and prosperous life for them. Besides the set-up of special dolls at families’ homes there are traditonal foods and beverages that will be consumend. These days all sorts of pink, white and green sweets as well as other treats are being sold in the lead-up to the day. That made me wonder whether the above pictured box of candy that we were given once as a gift (on a different time of the year though) had originally been a Hinamatsuri product. It definitely appealed to my daughter!
If you’d like to, you can find out more about Girls’ Day here.
My daughter came home upset. She’d been at the park where she had been looking for her ski gloves she’d left there. She had found only one (a recurring theme in any household with young children, I suppose!). A bit annoyed I asked her throw the glove away which made her break out in tears. After a while she came over and asked me in a low voice whether I could take a picture of it for my blog. After this process she was happy to let go of the glove. I was amazed that my ‘memory archive’ method seems to work for children as well. This will definitely be useful again in the near future!
Thanks god the trampoline is gone! We got it from a friend who hadn’t realised that the rubber string holding the mat in place was about to tear on one side. I hadn’t realised either. We’d been keeping it in the garden for about three years, hoping that the string wouldn’t rip mid-jump one day. As with so many items that I have been disposing over the past year, the kids didn’t even mention once that the trampoline was gone. Yet another encouragement to declutter!
Happy New Year! It’s been, again, a long time since I’ve last written, making one of my new year’s resolutions the resurrection of this blog. We’ve only just come back from Europe where we spent some quality time with friends and family. Discarding our return flight boarding passes and luggage tags, which were piled up on the entrance cabinet, made me remember that I used to keep all those things as a teenager, when flying somewhere was still a novelty for me. Continue reading “memory archive — day 79”
