WEEKENDS IN MOTOMACHI; JAPANESE SONGS AND PIZZA
Written in response to a comment made about this photo in my Flickr Photostream
We share many of the same memories and this makes us good friends in that the sights we saw are memories. That we now realize that change takes place and removes the realtiy of returning, we share the same thoughts about those memories being real, and memories that trigger pleasant thoughts.
Thank you very much for mentioning Motomachi, an area where a young man from far away found much joy and friendship among the people there at that time. I knew many of the shop-keepers, the owners and cooks of the small soba shops, the owners of the sake shops and small cabarets and restaurants.
There were many weekends spent in Motomachi.
Although pizza was relatively a new item, especially in Japan, we found a place where pizza was sold. So, the weekends were filled with special moments, conversation, sketching, reading haiku and American poetry, pizza and sometimes sake and sometime soft drinks.
If the night was cold, the innkeeper would bring us a small iron vessel with charcoal embers that radiated heat enough. The rooms were traditional, with tatami mats, one small and low table, and a futon. There was no Television provided, but a radio was tuned to the popular Japanese songs of the day, thus the nights were filled with melodies and haunting, romantic lyrics, love songs mostly, long gone, songs that are probably much like the USA's Golden Oldies.
Yes, I loved the Japanese music too. And no, one cannot return to the past, a fact I learned long ago. Sometimes, the joy of a special time is not meant to last, but to remain a memory of our youth to remember at a later time, to make us smile at different times of the day. If I long for youth, I simply remember such times as those spent in Motomachi.
Remembering Motomachi weekends reknews my spirit and my youth.
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