March of spring flowers

Japanese apricots are coming out. White ones followed by pink ones. Daffodils are budding out. In a month or less, magnolia will be fully out. In a month, cherry blossoms will decorate the playground of the junior high school nearby here. This march of spring flowers is realized in the same manner as usual. It is still impressive to us.

I am starting to plow the soil for vegetables in the garden now. Tomatoes, potatoes, beans, eggplants and so forth. 

It is the days of living things. 

A corner toward nightmare

Our government is submitting a bill of the law against organized crime preparation. They insist it is to do with the terrorism for the Olympic game in Tokyo in 2020. There is, however, no "bill fact" to hasten legislation of this law. The appearance of this bill is a law against terrorism. Terrorism preparation could be, however, well managed with the existing laws, as criminalists say.

The aim of this bill seems to be maintenance of public order. Since Abe and LDPJ have been trying to revise the system of our country back to that before WWII, they must have thought it was a good chance to legislate for maintenance of public order. Public order means the regime of those revisionists. When the law for maintenance of public order was introduced to our country before WWII, the government insisted that it was to accuse and punish rebellious traitors. Actually, it was interpreted in an extended way, so that a lot of innocent people who seemed to have any idea against to the regime were accused based on that law.

In this context, they are going to revise our constitution in the near future. They aim at the authoritarian regime based on the cult of nationalistic Shinto. There is an ultra right group named Japan Conference on the back of those revisionists. They would deny the basic human rights and drive the people away to be only subjects under Emperor but not individualized citizens. This idea of nationalistic Shinto includes a kind of elitism which says our country is a selected one among the others owing to the unbroken imperial family line. Even though this dogma is historically a clear falsehood, those revisionists believe in it or pretend to do so for the sake of their own political power. This may lead our country and neighbors to another nightmare.

We are at a corner to that devastating future.

Continued from the previous post

Continued from the previous post. 

There have been many photos showing the garden here. Since my father moved here from Tokyo back in early '80s, he has enjoyed farming a small farm and keeping the garden as he wanted. A lot of flowers and a number of trees were growing. Some pets or even chickens were kept as well. He has spent very hard time in WWII in his young days and has worked hard to raise us in Tokyo after having moved here in '50s. However, he could spend peaceful retirement with us, even though it might be a bit tough thing for him and mother to care for our children. He could make it come true to work with me as a part time clerk at my clinic for a few years. It was what he had dreamed of, I know. I am feeling a bit satisfied to be able to help him and mother live their peaceful days here.  

Arranging things my parents have left

For the past several weeks, I have been busy with a number of family affairs as well as the political situation in Japan progressing to nationalism. I have been writing articles about the latter in my Japanese blog. It doesn't mean I have forgotten about this poor blog yet. I would still keep renewing it as a kind of memorandum for me.

One thing having kept me busy was discarding things unnecessary at my parent's home and arranging things in order there. Thousands of books, tons of photos and dozens of their clothes etc. For the last few days, I have been involved in sorting out the photos for each person taken or related with. I will distribute them to each person soon.

I once thought to discard most of them. It might be a trouble for them to receive those old low quality photos, I thought. While looking them through, however, I felt they were testifying that my parents had lived their lives on the earth. If they have any value to the people related with the photos, I thought, I should send the photos to each of them. It was a fascinating idea to scan and digitalize all the photos, I thought for a while. But I had to give it up due to too many numbers of the photos.

Some of the photos from my parent's albums;

My parents with my sister on mother's lap. It was taken a year or two after the WWII when they got married and settled down at the tuberculosis sanatorium as workers. It is right at this place where we live right now. A wooden cottage is seen on the back, which was used as patients' room. Such tiny houses were scattered around this place with pine trees between them. A quiet and peaceful place for those patients who had waited for the last time without any treatment. They have had firm belief in Christianity. My parents, of course partly thanks to their young age, look hopeful and positive from this picture, despite of their poverty. It also seems to be attributable to their belief. However, with antibiotics effective for tuberculosis being invented in a few years after this photo was taken, this facility was destined to lose its reason de etre. It was the time when our family departed to Tokyo. 

This photo shows me and a good friend of mine at the college days. Somewhere in Kamakura, I can't remember. Both of us were around 20 years of age. We used to be together all the time like sweet hearts! We have talked a lot on literature, philosophy and so forth. Also grumbled a lot on our specialty, mechanical engineering. Later, he has gone to a faculty of philosophy while I have chosen the way to be an MD. It has been decades since I last met him. I should look for him by some means. 

Our family taken some 20 years ago. My parents used to celebrate certain anniversary at this time. My sister now aged 70 years has been working as a nurse while brother 63 years now has been a psychiatrist. We owe so much to my parents who have given us chances of professional education. I have never heard them complaining of that burden on them at all. Now I know what it has been for them to raise us. They are surely missed.

Again, the thought how fast time is passing comes up in my mind. These photos will be forgotten by any folks in a few decades. Of course, it is due to oblivion of ourselves by them. It is not a pessimism but a reality. We are apt to forget this fact very easily. We are just travelers on the earth for a while. It is true that the more transient our lives are on the earth, the more serious we should be at living. However, at my age, I feel I should get ready for the end of life. Filled with good fond memories of the past in my mind, those photos showed to me, I still felt that way. I am a traveler on the earth.