Where the magic happens...sorta? Kinda? (Sometimes?)

Warning: I fully embrace my nerd status in this one. If I remember correctly there's a Latin term for this...yup, found it:

Hey there, Open Book reader. Welcome back! Hope you've been having an awesome week. (Short intro this time because I'm going to talk a lot...again! ^_^”) Today, I’m going to showcase where my writing magic happens…or happened…I’ve been going through an impostor-syndrome-based dry spell now that life has gotten so wack. Behold, my writing* space – ta-da!

I know. There’s a lot going on here. Allow me to give you a tour.

First stop is what I’ve been writing on...that would be the laptop on the right. The short version of why I have two laptops is because I just got a new one and haven’t had time to transfer things yet. I also have to move things from the “official Yume laptop,” which is ancient but still precious. Maybe it’ll be worth something someday. (It’s bound to be. This thing could survive an eagle drop.)

Behind all these books I mean to finish (in the little time I do not have, ha ha) is a poster of the Studio Ghibli Museum in the middle of a small forest (or large park) in Mitaka, Tokyo. The poster shows all three floors, the exterior gardens, and even the life-sized Laputa robot on top (I have a great picture of me and my best friends from the first time I went there - we’re all hugging its legs while it looks off into the distance, unimpressed). Among other things in this part of the room, it’s my motivation to create a beautiful writing space with the same aesthetic as Miyazaki’s workspaces. I do not care how nerdy that sounds. I know I should, but...yeah...shrug.  \_(ಸ ‿ ಸ)_/¯

I’m probably going to repeat this over and over but I’m a big fan of food, and over the years I’ve grown used to crunchy things when I write. Back in the day I used to collect Kit Kat, Pocky, and Pretz boxes, but that was when they were readily available across the street from my apartment and I didn’t have to go all the way to Pacific Mall. I haven’t had Pocky in a while so I got myself this gorgeous red box for Valentine’s Day. It’s also a throwback to the first thing I ate for dinner when I first moved to Japan – I was jet-lagged, disoriented, questioning if I’d ruined my entire life, and starving but not in the mood to eat anything (and coming from me, that’s pretty serious). So while the rest of my training group partied over their Yoshinoya gyudon and beers, all I could stomach was a gorgeous box of Pocky calling my name from a 7-11 shelf. That, and a Smirnoff Ice, so I could feel like I belonged. ಥ◡ಥ”

And yes, I saw Squid Game and I loved it. I don’t even own AirPods. But I’ll find a use for these two dudes eventually.

Winter feels too cold for bubble tea, so these days I’m all about my coffee. On a special occasion, I’ll dip into my Maxim supply (or make some instant amazake, which I found at Oomomo and didn’t care how much it cost!). This mug is one of my top favourite things a student has ever given me. After years of growing up without seeing my name on gift shop items (or Coke cans ¬_¬) this mug really made my year. I also started collecting coasters after my friend Chihiro made me this one. Oscar Wilde is from my trip to Dublin. I’ve always enjoyed his writing.

I won’t get into my Tim Burton geekdom too much here, but I will point out this Nightmare Before Christmas thing: I’ve been calling it a stationery sheet, but the legit name is shitajiki, or “pencil board”. Place it under the page you’re writing on, and it won’t imprint on all the other pristine agenda pages underneath. I noticed several of my high school students in Japan had them but used them primarily to collect their purikura (“print club” or photo booth stickers”) in one place – and being the sticker sucker I am, that’s exactly what I did! (So, I actually didn’t use it for writing for…well, a while.)

(Soon you will be complete, my precious. Sooooon...)

On that note, I love and have always loved all things stationery. Especially agendas and planners. The only thing I looked forward to about school whenever September rolled around was getting an immaculate new agenda. Japan unfortunately spoiled me with their extensive selections, so it’s been hard to find good ones ever since I left. Moleskine also spoiled me with this limited Alice in Wonderland edition last year. This year I broke away and invested in Sarah Andersen, whose comics basically reflect my daily life. (I’ll talk more about how I gamify everything I do with stamps and stickers later.) Along with stationery, I’m a tin collector. I have about a dozen lunchboxes and cookie/candy tins, but the three Yatsuhashi ones I got in Kyoto are among my favourites. I accidentally squished this one on my last Japan trip, so this is the one I’m currently using as a pencil case for whenever I do my coffee shop writing…which of course, these days, is never. 눈_눈

And then there’s my シャープペンシル (mechanical pencil) collection. I know what you’re thinking but compared to the nurse who worked at my base school in Kobe, this is like a grain of sand on a beach. Every prefecture in Japan has at least one Hello Kitty design. I think Tokyo has at least 23, one for each ward. So I’m not done! (And yes, the Amanohashidate pencil is one of my favourites, so I haven’t taken it out of the package yet. Should have bought two.) The 一期一会 (“ichigo ichie”) fan is from a teacher I worked with on JET. This proverb made its way into Yume years after I received this present after randomly running into a friend in the middle of Osaka. And of course, that brief yet philosophical conversation we had made its way into Yume, too.

And in addition to all the curiosities I collect, materia is now one of them! Watch the skies for that gamification post I alluded to earlier. (And yes, it glows!)

Again, I keep almost everything my students give me. I still have a giant poster with 20-odd messages from the Grade Four students I taught during my teachers’ college practicum and a big box of cards and puzzles from my students in Japan. The hand-drawn Vegeta is from someone I taught at a conversation school in Toronto when I told him who my favourite Dragon Ball character was, and the heart is a Valentine’s Day present from a former Kindergartener. So for extra motivation, I have cards and pictures posted all around my office amidst the gyoza and gratitude notes to keep me grounded. Occasionally, I’ll rotate them. The one thing that never gets changed out is the photo of my dad. I like to think he’s watching over me from wherever he is, silently urging me to keep going because he always believed I was more than capable. It’s hard to remember that at times, but yeah, this photo helps.

Now that I’ve cleaned the place and made it all pretty for this blog post, I hope to return to it and get words down on paper or word docs again. In the meantime, I have lots of things to keep me entertained. (And all these books to finish, oh my gosh…)** Anyhoo, thank you so much for tuning in again and for reading this far. More nerd posts to come. Yeah, sorry, this won't be the last! ^_^"

*In the past few years this has become more of an “editing space” than a “writing space” per se. I hope to reclaim it as the latter by pretending to be at my various Kansai Starbucks cafes that always played amazing music. I Miss My Café and Lofi Girl have been helping immensely, so I’ll keep working on that.

**Yes, I may or may not have tsundoku, which apparently isn't as bad as it sounds. I'm also pretty confident I could power through these if I only had the time so... ¯\_(ಥ‿ಥ)_/¯