EN - What Letters Project

Front cover

As I do this every year, for my almost-90-year-old grandma who lives in a mountain of Japan by herself, I made a blog book. She does not use a computer, so she does not see my blog, but I would like to share even a bit of what I am doing here on Maui and what I am thinking and feeling. So, every year I make a blog book and mail it to her. I've used several different companies so far, and this year, I used blurb.

Back cover (my grandma and I)
It says, "I love you, Grandma."

The quality of photo prints and paper were pretty good.

As you know, I write my blog entries both in English and Japanese. Starting this year (2014), I've been separating the English and Japanese entries. By doing so, I can save the number of pages when I create a book the next time. When you create a book, you would be asked to choose which entries to include in the book, soI am going to choose only the ones that are written in Japanese for my grandma. Last year, erasing the English texts in the editing mode was an overwhelming task in terms of how long it would have taken.

My experiences in India was read and seen by my grandma. I cannot help the that what I write in January would be read by her a year later since I wait to make a book until the end of December. Oh well.

After I sent the book to her, she sent me a letter. She wrote how much she appreciated it and that she was reading it every night a bit by bit, and that she was looking forward to that time. She also felt grateful that I was surrounded by so many loving people.

What sank in my heart the most and what made my eyes watery in a quick second was this sentence: "Learning how you've persevered and blossomed despite of hardships you'd gone through, I wanted to fly to you right there and right then and hold you." When I read the sentence, I felt her arms around me. Although her bony arms were skinnier and smaller than mine now, her presence was much bigger than mine.

Her love was pouring out of the paper and ink. It's true. Letters do project the writers' feelings - the stronger the more clearly.

Thank you, Grandma.