Happy December 25, no matter what your clock and/or a calendar says.
Important: A note to folks dealing with chronic / complex illness, otherwise shut-in or feeling alone, frustrated by “all of this”: I see you and been you. Christmases alone at Chinese restaurants, nursing coffees at Denny’s, stuck hitchhiking, blue, alone, sick, and confused &/or in Hospital #peace
Normal: And in Japan, Christmas is known as “Monday, 25th”– a normal day in which nothing special happens // although we are going to the optician [update: we did] then post office, groceries ordered and delivered, garbage goes out tonight. So we go on.
Related:
Aside: For the record (because someone always asks): no, we don’t go to KFC on Christmas. Or ever. Somehow this myth persists and I guess there are people that do this but I’ve never met them.
Funny enough, you’re only the 42nd person to ask me that this week. And the short answer is: we sure don’t and I’ve never met anyone who actually does but somehow this has become the “story” just like that in Japan everyone eats whale meat and you can buy panties from vending machines – there are probably people that do but I don’t know them. Japan has lots of weirdness but the stories that appear in the “outside media” are all about this “outrageous strange Japan that might exist but I don’t know about it”
In response to one of numerous inquiries about KFC
Next up: From now, most all the folks start to busyily prepare for New Year – which involves intense thorough house cleaning, eating plain buckwheat noodles, attempting to not choke on glutinous rice paste, and then three days of watching inane TV programs (overstimulating variety shows followed by a multi day relay marathon with tortured college students), while eating delicacies – which some might consider each a “dare you to eat this”… (I just, as it’s actually wonderfully-prepared, elegant & elevated cuisine), ergo:
While choosing through this chessboardlike box of mysterious delights – osechi – folks *pretend* to eagerly await something more spectacular than the mythos of the Santy Clause… the simultaneous delivery on early New Year’s morning of approximately 1.3 billion postcards by the diligent and exceptional Postal Service.
Most cards – generally preformatted and understated but carrying this years’ zodiac animal/creature/avatar (dragon for the record) – carry a “secret code” which corresponds with a sort of national lottery in which you look up the numbers in the newspaper to see if you’ve won like a trip to Hawaii, a car, or maybe some stamps. I won stamps once, two of them. Lucky! ¥63
And time is overrated, direction is everything, carry on in towards the cardinal of your choosing – aho!
I mean, I know no one is really worrying about this or hardly paying attention, but I have a strange obsession with documenting all the inbound mail, as well as often making videos of me simply chatting whilst putting the treats into scrapbooks – which kind of misses the point and I should just spend the time scribbling more letters.
However, i recently sent out six glorious bundles of a book which combines fine art, exquisite paper craft, time travel, astral projection, interactivity, and story of love, love, love and friendship across time, zones, islands, continents, and fictions – and I did it all without taking a snapshot of the luscious stack (which also included inscriptions featuring my new inky stamps). It’s all very exciting to me.
*And* when I went to my local post office – where I used to be a regular visitor however this year I’ve slowed down significantly for various reasons – my favourite employee was there to greet me and help me with significant excitement and enjoyment as we chose the stamps for each one plus, I showed her the well-traveled 11 month journey postcard to India, and she in return, told me about new postal regulations for sending packages to all countries which go into affect September. (Oh great… More complications :(, fortunately does not affect letters and postcards, so I’ll stick with those standards (aerogrammes seem to go missing) so you’re out of luck on international packages friendo.
However, onwards the inbound pile, there’s been so many interesting arrivals so while I am restraining myself from documenting everything and saying to self its fine just documenting a few things. Cool with you? Great. Let’s make a start:
What do Fred Rogers, Andy Warhol, Albert Einstein and the Heinz family have in common? Thanks to Tim Tulloch & family in CT for the great card packed full of stories all interlinked in the most unlikely ways.
A talisman of friendship across continents, oceans – circumstances often running parallel across astral planes. We continue to create in solidarity, collaboration (accidental or otherwise), constant creativity, cross-medium communication and unabashed affection with and from Andrew McLuhan (who has faced significant personal challenges and started/completed/attempted so many multidisciplinary projects, while keeping the legacy of his father and grandfather even more relevant… All of the above for which I have massive admiration)
2 fortunate correspondents enjoying the correspondence from Bowen Island with usual enthusiasm (hooray for ice cream on the dock!)
Ichiro *reading* this dispatch from my birthday twin in Germany, in his words was mostly about “dinosaurs, water bikes and stanely park and the number 7” Danke Astrid-san.
Arriving miraculously timed directly on my birthday, although without that specific intention, came this beautiful envelope from someone who is a semi-professional letter/card writer, stamp creator, community builder, and always includes very enjoyable paper craft in her dispatches from Austin TX (a city I used to visit so often and loved so gently)
And another exceptionally thoughtful friend who’s family faced many challenges from operations to hurricanes over the last, while you took the time to send a birthday card, which hit all the marks with luscious paper, lovely quote, and a glorious tree. Thank you to the palmy desert.
this quirky artwork arrived from a friend. I haven’t met yet (thinking about it, many of my correspondence fall into this category) who also lives in Japan and it seems to have a very interesting variety of skills from sketching to music. {It’s a really fantastic painting and remind me of another, we saw during the van Gogh exhibit in an adjacent gallery… its around here somewhere… oh here it is}
These “Fantastic” stickers were included with a very heartfelt and private typed letter, on luscious letterhead, describing an experience at a regional burning man type event, in which the writer set up a “post office” and delivered analogue communication from various camps to camps… That part doesn’t sound very personal, but anyway, here’s related stickers as a placeholder for this tender letter.
A young –I guess he’s no longer that “young” – Sri Lankan correspondent made a trip to India, I believe his first international adventure about which he was understandabl excited, and from this journey came a postcard featuring the mystic Sai Baba, whose movement/commune/corp makes the exquisite Nag Champa incense.
The same un-young fella sent another card on his return to Sri Lanka, the stamps/cancellation are included for your enjoyment in comparison. Learn more about Rasika and his postcards.
Also, no longer particularly “young” but of course, still youthful and in my eyes always a keen speaker, comes a postcard from Ireland (on a honeymoon with an exceptional decision). {Funny, all the places I’ve rambled, Ireland, and Scotland, and Norway, which are the origin points of much of my heritage are still unvisited. The good news is, those can wait as they’re relatively “easy” compared to some of the places of my rambles.} ty J&V, come visit
From another place, I have yet to visit and probably one not on the usual “tourist trap” these days – comes a lovely message from a Canadian, usually living in Vietnam but at this time in Ukraine (and soon to be in Japan). Note to self: give him a call
This fantastically well-travelled postcard, was harvested somewhere from the internets (Twitter?), but I have forgotten whom to credit so… if this is you, ‘thank you for sharing your remarkable artifact’ which seems to have leapfrog continents and hopefully eventually found a recipient (hooray for the incredible neural net work of postal services!)
My friend Katherine in Vic BC passed along this very cool “4 Sen” stamp from a bundle picked up at Smithsonian Postal Museum – I know that somehow along the way, the yen was all re-valuated as now 4 Sen (which means ¥4000) is about $40 CAD and in the old-timey movies, the money denominations seem to be all juggled up anyway, I just like the stamp. TY
One of us is very cool and nonchalant, the other is may be too excited, but, regardless, this is a fantastic postbox located on the 6th floor courtyard of a department store next to a hidden post office. I don’t understand the story behind at all but I’m always unusually excited when I have a chance to drop something in here and take the obligatory snapshot (you’ll find others with the same cheesy pose elsewhere no doubt).
Bonus!
New inky stamps and visit from a pal led to a postcard making session at a coffee shop (yes, my favourite thing to do) and, since I love trams/trolleys, combined it all with a note from a friend mailed to my own house. Doesn’t everyone do this? {the kanji characters say – from top to bottom: Tsuchida, Okayama, Japan + the postbox might well be modelled on the one above.
“Well it’s already well into #postboxsaturday in Japan, and Sri Lanka as well, so here’s a trio of snaps & boxes from around Galle & Karapitiya iirc”
A few well maintained classic pillar postboxes – the blue for international is so nice! and a sign from a “Sub Post Office” in Amballanwata near a villa where i spent some time.
Memo: As it goes, i have hundreds of snapshots of postboxes, post offices, and “postal still life” (meaning scenes of scattered pens, papers, postcards, stationery, stamps – all spread over a table while in a session) and i use these for Postcards from Gravelly Beach podcast “episode art” and made a book from many of the artifacts.
Of late, some Instagram/Twitter folks have a #postboxsaturday campaign/project rolling so i’ve used this as encouragement to start trickling out my stash. Slowly and intermittently (because i have too many projects on the go!) with minor annotations.
Memo: As it goes, i have hundreds of snapshots of postboxes, post offices, and “postal still life” (meaning scenes of scattered pens, papers, postcards, stationery, stamps – all spread over a table while in a session) and i use these for Postcards from Gravelly Beach podcast “episode art” and made a book from many of the artifacts.
Of late, some Instagram/Twitter folks have a #postboxsaturday campaign/project rolling so i’ve used this as encouragement to start trickling out my stash. Slowly and intermittently (because i have too many projects on the go!) with minor annotations.
Memo: As it goes, i have hundreds of snapshots of postboxes, post offices, and “postal still life” (meaning scenes of scattered pens, papers, postcards, stationery, stamps – all spread over a table while in a session) and i use these for Postcards from Gravelly Beach podcast “episode art” and made a book from many of the artifacts.
Of late, some Instagram/Twitter folks have a #postboxsaturday campaign/project rolling so i’ve used this as encouragement to start trickling out my stash. Slowly and intermittently (because i have too many projects on the go!) with minor annotations.
Slightly mysterious Richard Brautigan postcard, postcard from a boxer in Gifu, lovely poetry book from a generational writer in Utah with block prints and stampsA brilliant anthropologist’s book about technology for kids, a four-color-process fanzine with bleeds, a beautifully produced poetry book (i want you to make one like this), a patch for my jacket or blanket, a packet of coffee prepared in a mailable satchel
Bought all of the 70¥ stamps the post office had – every single one.
Took off the jacket and scarf and sat for a while putting on inky stamps and postal stamps and dropped first batch into the wormhole.
Each card receives seven+ special touches yet it doesn’t seem like *near enough* to express my appreciation for my friends and correspondents.
In brief: #Spoilers
Front side a photo made by an Insta film camera and decorated with dymo labels, scanned and printed – Each one a little bit different with colour distressing #punkrock.
Reverse features an original freeverse poem with various touchpoints and hallmarks from the year & intentions ahead.
A hand applied “postcard“ signification (black ink), and air mail stamp (blue ink), a tiger stamp to commemorate the year ahead (red ink).
Hand addressed with my own “quasi-calligraphy (midnight blue ink)
Glued on 70 ¥ stamp with classic Japan vibes design.
Mildly obsessive? Yeah, definitely but I want each one to be better and better.
Up’d the total count to around 150 pieces so I hope you get one, I’m trying my hardest, I really really am – Rough couple of days after a few really good weeks, so it goes so it rolls #mecfs
Grateful for Post offices, correspondence, and you.
Disguise is basically perfect, inpenetrable, no one will ever recognize me like this… So on I go #WorldsWorstSecretAgent #Postcards
“somewhere…. Beyond the sea…. thank you my faithful pen pal. happy mail today.”
But how did you ever guess that was me :)?
PS the lady at the post office (who are always amused my my dispatches) pointed out that “that’s not your wife?!” ha #truth … but is it even me? #worldsworstsecretagent
Catching up on postcards delivery for my *usual* “postcard as a service subscribers” as well as a few folks who sent extra special birthday wishes.
Yup, just more of the same: scribbling postcard to folks everywhere, dropping in the mailbox, folding laundry and washing dishes. Thank you for the usual days.
More of the recent run from the end of #Dave50 / from both the “global hats“ and “personal archeology“ series. Now that I’m 51, these are highly collectible :-)
Note: talked to the friendly wizard of the mountains of Nagano and he was unsure of who this strange character on the front of his postcard with an incoherent message on the back was from. I asked him “do you have so many people sending you scribbled over photos and inkt blah blah blah messages on postcards?“ “No, just you” he replied (paraphrasing). He asked what the postcard said, I said it was probably Something about a happy birthday.
He then told me a story about hanging out with the Dalai Lama and poet Nanao Sakai and a legendary acupuncturist >> Heard his granddaughter in the background and got the update on his garden. This is wonderful stuff about sparking conversations with postcards and what not. It’s not the message per se, it’s the medium/thoughts/intentions/action. #mcluhanesque
A few more addresses in, a few more friends remembered, few more love notes scribbled with quill and ink (really), and importantly, only the finest postal stamps selected – ranging from kimono ladies to coffee shops to fried fish.
PS you can see a bit of a postcard with the view from my window at Ayurveda Health Home in Pokhara, Nepal, thinking of this place so much with the passing of the dear magical Dr. Rishi.
Aside: Also made Nepal-esque daal and corn/squash chowder to stash in the freezer.
mixed-media art library, global diary, project dossier and whole life documentation