Monthly Archives: January 2019
Green tea, and stories from Japan.
I have begun reading a few Japanese novels, in translation of course, and maybe I will add a nonfiction book, because Bellezza has drawn me into her Japanese Literature Challenge 12 — Yes, it’s the twelfth time she has hosted this project! I’ve never had any thought of joining in before, until this month I read a review of one novel linked from her site. It sounded intriguing, so I checked to see how many pages were in the book — I am lately tired of slogging through 500 or 800 pages in order to complete a story — and it was barely over 200 pages, whee!
Nosing around the body of relatively modern Japanese literature with an eye to length, I soon came up with a plan. The first three books are short, and then things get more difficult, so I might not do all five before the end of March. But I did already complete The Great Passage, and am definitely having fun. It was the coziest thing on a rainy day, to sit by the fire with a book, and green tea from a Japanese-inspired pot. My list:
The Great Passage by Shion Miura
Sweet Bean Paste by Durian Sukegawa
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata
Kokoro by Natsume Sōseki
The Book of Tea by Okakura Kakuzo
If the tea in the photo doesn’t look green to you, it’s because, unfortunately, the day with green tea prevented me from sleeping that night, so I switched to a more thoroughly soothing blend for the next rainy reading session. I read while waiting at the dentist, and at the doctor, and after I crawled under the blankets at night.
Now I’m in the middle of Sweet Bean Paste, which refers to a confection that I’ve never been drawn to. The idea of mixing beans and sugar puts me off, but I should probably at least try to sample it before I write a review. If I could learn to appreciate it, it sounds like a proper accompaniment for my Japanese reading — and cup of tea.
What I need to know is, if a Japanese reader can’t drink tea with caffeine, what does she drink?
A rosemary comeback, and big plans.
The first sunny day we’ve had in a week, and my plan was to work on cleaning the garage; I do not say “to clean the garage” because that sounds like I could ever finish.
But first, a walk. The creek is so high, and now running smoothly so that the sky reflects off the water, distracting from the quantity of mud still flowing below.
After breakfast I opened the overhead door of the garage to get light on my subject, and remembered that I wanted to trim the abutilon. It never stops blooming, so I can’t wait for dormancy. One bloom shone brightly yellow and caught the sun penetrating its petals.
You know how it goes in the garden – One thing leads to another, and I did a bit of tidying up the next hour. The first asparagus has emerged, and lots of California poppy plants that you can see behind one of my new wallflower bushes.
But what is THIS? A ladybug, yes, I know, but the bug is sitting on a stem of rosemary! A stem of a bush that is taking over a pittosporum bush, and already blooming, and I never saw it until today. It’s from a root left over from the gnarly plant that was there until three years ago; what a surprise that it didn’t show itself all this time, until now.
I had to cut it off for the time being, because I didn’t want to take time to dig out the root, which is what is sadly necessary.
Several of my yarrow clumps seem to have died out,
but a couple of plants are starting to bloom.
And the abutilon – the star of the show.
I eventually did get a lot done in the garage. I’m making space there for stuff that’s been stored in the house, especially in the great room upstairs, because… Announcement!: I’m starting a remodel of this big room. For almost three decades it has been used for homeschooling, large families sleeping or even living in there, Mr. Glad practicing his drums, and always, the storage of many, many things, not in a very efficient manner. We avoided doing anything to it, while we fixed more urgent areas of the house and property.
My plan is to divide it into three rooms: a Guest Room, a Sewing Room, and a full bathroom. Plans now being drawn by an architect will soon be submitted to the city for a building permit, and the contractor is standing by….
There is nothing lovely or very interesting to tell about in the garage, or in the great room. Decorating, choosing furniture, colors and such matters do not inspire me. They challenge me and find me bored and impatient, and that makes me want to escape here and write about books or saints or the moon I saw through my window last night. So things might not change too much on the blog. I’ll be seeing you around!
Two pretty new things in one day.
This short length of fence has been a crumbling mismatch for most of the nearly three decades I’ve been in this house, but it was a small enough section that it didn’t succumb to wind and decay; it was left alone, while we eventually replaced all of the other fences around the property, in three projects with three different neighbor-homeowners. Also, not much of it, or the unsightly utility yard next door, showed when my huge osmanthus bush/tree was still there.
This week, yay! Its replacement is completed, with the trusty workers fitting it in between rain storms and showers. They did get dripped on a bit even so. One of them is my garden helper Alejandro. The new fence is taller than the old, and of unfinished redwood to match all the other fences on the property.
It’s only cloudy and breezy today. I thought I would take a walk, then I thought I would read and drink tea, then I wandered out in the back garden, but only briefly, because it wasn’t welcoming, somehow…? How odd. But I was there long enough to see an iris just opened. This dwarf species has never been very impressive — until this one. Maybe one has to see them newborn, after a downpour but not having been poured upon.
Tomorrow the sun is likely to shine on the beautiful things that brighten the landscape on their own today.
Gladsome Lights 