Word 047
Imai-cho in Kashihara is a nationally designated Preservation District for Groups of Historic Buildings, where the townscape of the Edo period remains largely intact.
Walking slowly along the narrow lanes, lined with old merchant houses behind wooden lattice doors, the air seems to carry a different measure of time. Deep inside the earthen-floored entrances, old vessels and tools rest just as they were — objects cared for by someone's hands, passed from person to person, still quietly present today.
The pace of life here moves at a speed entirely unlike what we call "convenient."
The world has become remarkably convenient.
And in that convenience, "the good old tools of a gentler time" are fading into the background.
That is exactly why, now and then, I want to remember them — and use them.
That's right. Let me write a letter to that person.
The warmth that only a letter can hold.
It doesn't have to be perfect. Let me write it from the heart.
It doesn't have to be polished. It's all right to take your time. That time, too, becomes part of the letter.