冬越しってこんなに大変だったん？！！

アーミッシュおじさんのところに越してきて、６ヶ月目、いよいよハードルが超高い冬越しが始まる。なぜ「超高い」のかというと、今までもハードルは高かったが、それにも増して高いという意味だ。今まではといえば、例えばこういう感じ。

入居してすぐに雨漏り（５ヶ月間治らなかった）、騒音、キッチンシンクの水道の水の温度や量の調整ができない、両手でお皿を洗えない、シンクから出るパイプがとても細いダメ、詰まりやすい、トイレは水がもったいないので頻繁に流さないでと言われるし、シャワーの熱いお湯は出る量が限られているため、ポータブルなお風呂を用意しても水がたまらない（よって、お風呂なし）、ガスレンジはキャンプで使うようなミニコンロにミニプロパンをつけた状態でクッキング（よって、手の込んだ料理は無理）、冷蔵庫は小さいのを貸してくれたが、結局もう少し大きいのを自分で買う羽目に（普通アメリカの家具付きアパートを借りた場合、キッチンの大きな電化製品は全部付いている）、下でおじさんが頻繁にする洗濯のかなりきつい化学薬品入りの洗剤の匂いが上の私のスタジオに満喫（私が化学薬品なしの船内をホームメード）、スタジオは一面がガラス張りで近所の家がすぐそこなので、カーテンを作って吊るしていたら（ちなみにスタジオで吊るしたカーテンは全部で２０枚ほど。それほどここのおじさんは、オープンなガラス張りが大好き）、「太陽が入って来ないから暖かくないよ。田舎は都会と違って、近所の人が人の家を覗き込むことはないよ！」と厳しく諭され、しかもそのうちの一つは三角で、「三角の窓がなかなか見つからないんだよねー」と、その部分だけ開けっぱなし（鳥や蜂やハエがじゃんじゃん自由に出入り。閉めてというと、本当に鳥が入って来なくていいのかと聞かれた！）、荒ゴミは近所のおじさんの友達の飼っている豚に持っていったりよその畑の堆肥の中に入れたりと策を考えた苦難の挙句、庭に穴を掘って入れるもプロセスせずにすぐ一杯になり、「野菜、植えてもいいよ」と言われるもこのおじさん、実は自分で野菜を育てる人ではなく、前にお世話になっていたホームステダー（自給自足生活を営んでいる人）のところから持ってきた苗や植物は枯れてしまい、。。。などなど。おじさんの「住んでもいいよ、スペース貸してあげるよ。」の意味がこういうことだったとは！何度も、「もう無理！家賃払ってるのに水も使えないしお風呂にも入れない、料理も満足にできない！」と思ったが、そのうちに、あーそうなんだ、彼の「住むところを提供する」コンセプトは、私の知っている環境での「アパートを貸す」とはだいぶん違うんだなとわかってきた。「アパートを貸す」のではなく、「住むところを今から徐々に作るから、住めるようになったら家賃を払って。」なので、「住めるように」は完璧に住む環境が整っているというわけではない。いわゆる「骨組み」だけだ。時間をかけてじっくり完成させていくその途上のスペースに住まわせてもらっているというわけだ。なるほどね！とほんの少し納得。それにしても、これで家賃７万は高くない？

そして、冬はまた全く別問題だ。

ペンシルバニアのこのあたりは冬が非常に厳しいため、（日本で言うと北海道でまだ雪も降っていない頃から雪が降り、11月から氷点下、最後の霜は大体5月の終わり）冬だけ暖かいところに住む人が少なくない。フロリダやアリゾナなど、暖かい場所にもう一つ住居を持っていて、そこに住むと言うのが普通のようだ。ここのアーミッシュおじさんも冬は決まってコスタリカやニカラグアの別荘に住んでいる。でも、私にはそういう家も予算もないので、ここペンシルバニアにいるしかない。そういうわけで、アーミッシュおじさん、今までずっと夏仕様で使ってきた自分の家の一つ（いくつも持っている）を冬仕様に準備してくれたのだ。断熱材を入れて、毛布やクッションで穴をカバーして、空気が入ってくる隙間を防ぎ、あとはプロパンを二階に引いて、ストーブと繋げると言う作業。私の借りているスタジオと寝室は続いていて、どちらにもプロパンストーブを入れてくれた。

と、ここまでは良かったのだが、ある日、屋根から水滴が。。。しかも一箇所ではなく、雨も降っていないのに多数の箇所に水滴が落ちてくるのだ。また雨漏り？でも雨降ってないのにねー。。。と思う思わぬうちにピタパタと水滴は落ちてくる。慌てておじさんを呼ぶと、彼は扇風機を持って現れた。「これ、どうしてかわかる？屋根じゃないよ。」とニンマリ笑うおじさん。スタジオのストーブを夜消してしまうと、部屋が寒くなる、次の日にストーブをつけると、部屋が暖まり、冷たい空気が水になって落ちてくる、屋根に断熱材が入ってないからと説明してくれた。えー！と言うことは、夜中ストーブをつけていないといけないと言うこと？！！！ここいらでは、ストーブの使用量によっては、月に暖房費が５、６万かかることも珍しくない。その費用を節約するために、私はスタジオの暖房をできるだけ切るようにしていた。夜は特に、誰も使ってないし。それが、このピタパタ落ちてくる水滴を作り出していると言うのだ。あれ？でもおじさん確か、暖房費節約したかったら、寝室だけつけとけば良いよって言ってなかったっけ？じゃあどうすればいいんですか？「これがペンシルベニアの性（さが）でねえー。あんたも悪いことは言わないから、冬にコスタリカやニカラグアにきた方がいいよ。もう家賃払ってるからタダで家に住んで良いよ。暖房費払うぐらいだったら、南米に悠に２−３か月住めるよ。」とおじさん。見ていると、扇風機で暖かい空気を上から下に回してみようと、早速ハシゴを持ち出してきて、扇風機を設置。１時間後、だいぶん部屋が温まってきた。でも、この扇風機、音がうるさいんですけど。。これ、どのぐらいつけとけば良いの？予期せぬときに、水がピタパタ落ちてくるのも困るけど、扇風機付けっ放しも困るよ。お客さんも来るんだし。さあ、これ、どうやって解決するのでしょうか？

日本の空は何故こんなにも低いのだろう？

日本の空は何故こんなにも低いのだろう？ずっとここに住んでいると、そうも感じないかもしれないが、アメリカの壮大な田舎に住んでいるせいか、日本の空がとても低く感じる。地面が空を自分の方に引っ張っているみたい。あまりに低くて押しつぶされそうだ。手を伸ばせば届きそうな空に覆われた空間は密で複雑で、そこに住む人々は､いかに限られた空間を使うかを常に考えている。低い空の下に家が立ち並び、森がそびえ、建物がひしめきあい、田んぼが広がる。東京のような都会はもとより、田舎でさえも、凝縮感を覚えるのだ。山や森、川や家、人や道や建物や車といった全ての要素が、まるでパズルのようにきちんとはまっていて、相互関係を確立しているその様子は、驚くばかりだ。そして、空間は言葉と呼応する。4年間のブランクの後、日本を訪問していたときよく耳にした言葉は、「寄り添う」と「思いやる」。二つとも日本では、とても大事なコンセプトだが、実はどちらも英語に訳しにくい。「寄り添う」ー　‘stay beside’? ‘「思いやる」ー　‘think/feel for another’? 英語だとはっきりするのが、これらの言葉は、自分以外の誰かに働きかけることを示唆しているということだ。でも、日本語の「思いやる」や「寄り添う」行為では、自分と相手との境界線が曖昧になる。そこには自分も自分以外をも含む大きな共同体の存在が感じられる。この共同体の中では、「迷惑をかけず」「助け合う」美徳が重んじられ、それは、暗黙の中、言葉だけでなく、空間や人間関係、生き方までも形作っていく。低い空は、こうした相互関係をしっかりと地面にアンカーさせるのに必須なのだろう。そこに現れる空間は、ウエットで心地よく、浦島太郎の竜宮城のごとく魅惑的だ。一度入るともう二度と離れたくなくなるような非常にアブナイ空間でもある。

A small brain training for the eyes

Eyes are the window through which things enter into our consciousness. In everyday life, we often use our eyes to focus, interpret, analyze, and understand what we are seeing, activating our cone cells in retina. What we use much less often is the peripheral vision, we see with the rod cells on the outer edges of the retina. These two ways of seeing are vastly different. When you meet someone, are you using the central vision? Or are you using the peripheral vision? Or both? When do you think you close up the peripheral vision, trying not to feel the person? When you encounter something overwhelming, can we keep both central and peripheral visions open? How does that change how we see and respond to the outside world?

Here is a small experiment. When you see something or someone, feel that you are seeing this object with the surface of the exposed part of your eyes. Observe your breath. Observe the tension of your eye balls.

Now let’s shift the awareness. Feel the weight of your whole eyeballs. Feel your eye socket that is filled with liquid in which eyeball float. Imagine that light is entering into these eye sockets and it travels from the back of your eyes via optic nerves, to the back of your brain, the visual field. This is where you are actually seeing. When you see an object in this way, see how the tension in your eye muscles shift. Now, start including the peripheral of this object. More and more and more. Include your body in the whole ‘seeing’ process. Feel your breath. Feel your skin. Feel your body in the environment.

When you can start entering into this encompassing consciousness, you can start seeing unseen aspects of things/people. Your vision becomes more 360 degree, more permeating, more expansive. You breathe with ease. And you can see with your whole being.

Uttering words on stage 舞台上での発語について

つい最近、演劇における「本当」ということについて考える機会があった。昔初めて大学かどこかで芝居を見た時、「嘘くさい」と思ったのを覚えている。どこがどう嘘くさかったのか思い出せないが、表現の仕方とか、体の動かし方とか、そういうものが不自然に思えたのだと思う。演技も学生のもので、おそらく下手だったのだろう。今プロの役者の演技を見て、さすがにうまいなと感心する。が、「本当か」ということになると、どうもわからない。そしてこの「本当」かどうかということは舞台上で発語するということをいかに成り立たせるかという事にかかっているようである。 どうして舞台上で発語するのは不自然で嘘くさいのだろう？日本の伝統芸能は型というものが決まっているし、古くからの形式にのっとったリアリズムではないスタイルで創られた世界に、声も体もマッチしている。これが現代演劇になってくると、新劇以降、「西洋劇、又は西洋のリアリズムをもとにした劇」をどうやって西洋人でない日本人が成り立たせるのかという課題と取っ組まざるを得ない。鬘をかぶって西洋人のように振る舞い、喋る？でも喋っている言葉は日本語。昨年日本に帰った時、こういう演劇を目撃してショックでした。

舞台上で発語するということは、結局、戯曲そのものから生まれてくるのではなく、体や空間から生まれなければ成り立たないのだろう。

Naoko's Self-Healing Practice

Coinciding with Corona Virus eruption, my body seems to be erupting as well. When the body starts getting into an unusual mode, it is telling me something. Using the FREE time opened up due to the stay-at-home state, I am forced to face my own physical condition.

DAY 1 - organizing my body

Pain/discomfort is on the R side of Pelvis as well as the lower back right above the R pelvis. This pain is on and off for the past five or six years. I lie on the floor and compare the placement of R pelvis and L pelvis. R pelvis is higher, closer to the head than the L. Consequently, my R leg feels shorter than my L leg.

I start doing Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement exercise. It is the one that I lie on one side and connect shoulder and pelvis movements. After moving R leg in a circular motion initiated from R pelvis, my R leg gets longer, meaning, my R pelvis dropped to the ground and space has been created in my hip joint as well as knee joint and ankle. It feels good! After completing the whole cycle of shoulder and hip, I feel much more grounded. Walking around, my hip has less pain.

DAY 2 - more organization, specific image of body parts, facing the ‘ignored’ body part

I still have great amount of discomfort in my R pelvis. So today, I decided to look carefully at the structure of pelvis to see where exactly my discomfort is.

As I trace my pelvis and examine which part feels tense, I notice that it is the anterior sacroiliac ligament, as well as the superior pubic ligament and the ligament that connects the great trochanter and the bottom of R iliac. The posterior SI joint on the R side also is tight. I have to admit that I have much weaker image of these areas compared to the L side. My R side in general feels smaller and tighter than the L side which is freer and larger.

I lie on the floor and feel all these parts mentioned above. I notice that when I breathe in, inside of the R side of the pelvis has much smaller movement. I roll my pelvis to R and L and notice that I DON”T WANT TO role it to R at all. I have much less intimate connection with my R pelvis.

I exhaled and inhaled my breath into the lower abdomen, making space in the R side of the pelvis. It is like entering into the unknown territory. What makes me so hesitant to enter into this area?

I continue to do the same Awareness Through Movement lesson of shoulder and pelvis from yesterday. Now when I get up, I don’t have the pain in my R hip joint.

DAY 3 Pelvis-Shoulder connection

As I examine my R pelvis further, I noticed that the pain is greater when my L shoulder is tight. I suffered adhesive capsulitis on both R and L shoulders about 10 years ago. L shoulder didn’t quite heal completely. So sometimes, it gets tight from the shoulder joint, elbow, wrist, to the 4th and 5th fingers. There is a connection between my L shoulder and R pelvis/hip joint.

I enter into my body, inside of my R pelvis and trace the line from under the superior pubic ligament, down to the R sitzbone across the body inside all the way up to the L shoulder ligament.

I move the L shoulder joint a little and it moves my R pelvis. As I continued examining this connection, I start discovering the relationship between R ribcage and L ribcage. As I continue this exploration, I feel my R hip joint and inside of R pelvis is honored, looked at, and paid attention to, and HAPPY. I stood up and felt much more rubrication inside of R pelvis.

DAY 4 Pelvis-Leg connection

Today I traced my R pelvis down all the way to my R toes. My 4th and 5th R toes are a little numb compared to the rest. I have been observing them to see where this is coming from. It is, in no doubt, related to R pelvis, but there is some distance between my foot and pelvis - there is calf, knee, and thigh before I get to the pelvis. As I continued moving two of my R toes, I noticed something. The lower part of the leg bone, Fibula, hurts. This is the place I broke in a car accident 25 years ago. Could this be the case? My body still remember the memory of that traumatic experience, I thought to myself as I continued trying to move my 4th and 5th R toes. As I lie on my bed and stretched my 5th toe far away from the rest, I felt the sensation I remembered from that time. Then all of it came back to me - how this accident and injury impacted my life then and all the complex emotions I tried to move through at that time. Certainly, not all was digested then. My body shrunk up as I was hit by a car and dumped to the ground. Only bone that broke was fibula, but because my R leg was put in a cast immediately, and I had only one leg for months. My body seemed to be operating still in that mode, especially when I have more stress than usual or when I stay in a sedentary position for some time. My body remembers that ‘confinement’, that painful helpless feeling. It stored all of it inside.

As I became in touch with my own emotions stored in my muscles, ligaments, and tendons, I felt electricity running thorough my R leg all the way through my R pelvis. R leg became much more vibrant and alive than usual. All I had to do was to GET INSIDE OF DISCOMFORT.

DAY 5 Pelvis and internal organs inside

Having studied Feldenkrais and GAPS nutritional protocol, by now I have an understanding of how skeletal structure and internal organs are connected. So I wanted to look at what is in that particular part - R pelvis and hip joint - of my body. It is about the place where small intestine connects with large intestine. It is also where appendix is. It is entirely possible that bad bacteria hang out in these ‘juncture’ like places, whcih gives me an idea of increasing probiotic food, fat, and animal protein to increase good bacteria. Some detox remedy such as detox bath with baking soda would be also good. I’ll see how these nutritional and detox remedy will affect this area of my body.

Miracle Apple: Making impossible possible

Akinori Kimura, a Japanese farmer,  succeeded in growing apples without fertilizer which had long been considered to be impossible.

He married into an apple orchard in his 20s. Working there, he had been suffering from sickness and his wife from terrible skin inflammation caused by the fertilizer. While he was pondering what to do to improve this situation, he encountered Masanobu Fukuoka's "The Natural of Farming". He decided to adapt this method to grow his apples.

Soon after he stopped giving fertilizer, his 800 apple trees got infested by harmful insects. They were so many and he picked them by hands (three full plastic bags per tree,) They lost leaves and started dying. He kept trying to find the right fertilizer chosen from food items such as soy sauce, milk, whatever he found. He lost all the money and started working for a night club. His wife managed to prepare meals using wild grass as material. His children supported him as well. However, year after year, no sign of apple. After not being able to find a solution for six years, he decided to commit suicide to take responsibility. He went up to a nearby mountain and was looking for a place to hang his rope. That's when he saw an apple tree with lots of apples shining in a distance. He wondered why this tree is growing without fertilizer in a forest. When he went closer to the tree, he found that it was not an apple tree, but he got an inspiration. He immediately checked the soil and it was soft. He intuitively realized that if he can reproduce this environment, his apples will grow without fertilizer.

He went home and grew wild grass in his orchard. Every day he intensely studied insects and succeeded in recreating the ecological environment where the harmful and beneficial insects are balanced (so there are not harmful insects that infest apples). Three years later, all his trees produced apples which don't turn yellow being exposed to oxygen or deteriorate for years.

What is health?

This is one of the best books on 'you are what you eat'. In the chapter on 'health and illness: new definitions', she talks about what health means. These conditions might sound like a common sense, but it actually take good holistic care of the whole to stay in this condition.

PHYSICAL

1. No fatigue    2. Good appetite   3. Good sleep

PSYCHOLOGICAL

4. Good memory   5. Good humor   6. Precision in thought and action

SOCIAL

7. Taking responsibility   8. Making choices

SPIRITUAL

9. Honesty   10. Gratitude   11. Humility   12. Love

From "Food and Healing" by Annemarie Colbin

Being vital

I’ve been thinking about being vital. It is not the same as the energy we feel when we are excited. When we are in high tension. But sometimes these two seem to be granted as the synonyms. As a performing artist, I experience the ‘high tension’ moments on stage. Heated, exhilarating intoxication takes over me. I love my audience. There is a charged exchange between us. My body feels ‘filled’. I feel alive, and awake. Unfortunately, these moments are short-lived. They evaporate immediately after arising, and so, to fill the void, the cycle of regenerating more of this feeling continues. Being vital seems different. It's about feeling quiet and continuous motor inside the body. Gentle and effortless. This amorphous, vibrating essence exists in all living things. If we descend into calmness to connect with it, every moment in life becomes vivid and special without seeking for excitement.

A lesson from the 'unexpected'

'Unexpected' events hold great potentials for growth regardless of our judgement of them. When I face an unexpected event, I can observe my reaction on multi-levels: my physical response to the event, psychological, emotional one, and how my brain starts to repair the damage these responses caused. I'm always astounded to see the brain's strategy to use the patterns learned in the past. And this is exactly what I think as counterproductive. When we see life on a large scale, most things don't proceed exactly as we had imagined. In fact, this is what makes life so potent. But somehow, most of us are not used to dealing with the 'unexpected'.

My child inside

I've been on a journey to reunite with my child inside me. For a long time she has been hiding from me, with her back against me. I enter into myself carefully, with a calm mind and body, leaving the whole 'thinking' behind. My left brain calms down and my right brain starts being fully activated. My body slowly starts remembering what is was like to really feel. All of a sudden, my feet sink into the earth. with each step, many different parts of my feet scream. The trees start revealing their texture and their true personalities. Without touching, I can feel what it's like to touch them. Sensation takes over me. I FEEL them. Vivid colors start entering into my eyes without my trying to look at them. I'm EXPERIENCING the color. I start seeing patterns. Everything I become contact with becomes more and more vivid. Vital energy. I dive into myself. I knock the door and call her. I extend my hand towards her and slowly start pulling my little girl out of the dark small hideout. I can almost feel it. That aliveness. That vital energy which used to make me feel that anything was possible. Continuous flow of curiosity. Inner, deeply satisfying excitement. I'm gradually reuniting with her. My girl is smiling at me. Invincible.

本当のこと

本当のことに気づく為にはたくさんの勉強が必要だ。強靭な洞察力。そして最後には自分で判断しなければならない。その自分とは何か、そこから始まるのだ。どこまで遡ればいいのか。自分と世界が本当に見えるようになるには。空っぽだと思っていたのは錯覚ではなかった。全く空っぽだったのだ。自分がそこに居ない時、幻想とランデブーするのは易しい。ああ、こういう事にずっと昔に気づいていれば無駄な時間を過ごさずにすんだだろうに。大事なことはいつも見逃す近くにところにあったのだ。いや、まだ遅くはない。遠く、深く、広く、ある時は緻密に又ある時は緩く、一瞬一瞬が最大限の可能性を持つような生き方が出来れば、表現するものも本当に少しは近づくのかもしれない。 In order to grasp the real truth, one has to have resilient and piercing insights. In the end, it is only one person who can make the final decisions - self. What is self? This is the beginning of everything. Research. How far should I go back? To high school? To kindergarten? Or back to the womb? Or even before? How can I see the relationship between myself and the world? The vast hollowness was quietly screaming  inside. When one is not really there, it is easy to rendez-vous with illusions.  The most important thing was always in the nearest place to me only to be overlooked. Perhaps it's not too late. As far as possible, as deep as possible, as vast as possible, sometimes meticulously and precisely, and other times loosely and gradually, if I can live in the way every moment is open to maximum potential, then and only then what I express might approach a bit closer to what is real.

perspectives

There are three ways to get to my workplace from my house: car, bicycle, and on foot. I try to alternate these three means to change the perspective. It is quite amazing how each means not only changes your physical relationship with the environment but also the psychological one as well. The bourgeoisie of the car makes a marked contrast with the workman's vehicle, the bicycle. This  simple device operated by man power gives you a feel of a vehicle, but in a sense, is the most restrictive of all three. On foot, the most vulnerable of all three, gives you the richest journey with most freedom. When you walk, you intimate the ground with every step. You engage with the environment through your whole body. You feel the weight of life you put on your self on the shoulders - what you put in the bag, what the thought process in doing so,  why you put so much in it (affect the energy consumption), etc. As you continue to walk, you develop and go through the whole process of 'lightening and grounding'. I can't wait to try this experiment on other pathways.