The Day I Bought a Shimenawa

This Saturday, there will be a family gathering in Kanagawa.

We are going to celebrate my mother’s 79th birthday.

My wife and I will join the gathering, and from there, we will drive straight to Kobe.

I have a treatment event in Kobe.

Since we will be there, we are planning to stay a few days and see a little of the city.

Drive through town.

Look at the sea.

Walk through places we do not know.

It has been a while since we had that kind of time.

⸻

Originally, we were planning a slightly longer trip.

Four nights, five days.

On the way back, we were even planning to stay at a long-established ryokan somewhere around Izu.

We thought we would take our time before returning home.

But then I realized I had completely forgotten something.

July 15.

Miyanagi Day.

According to the custom of our local shrine, the new year begins on this day.

It is also the day we become ujiko, members of the shrine community.

A major event in our lives is about to begin.

And yet, despite saying that, I had forgotten the very day itself.

We hurriedly canceled the old ryokan and changed our schedule so that we would be back on the night of July 14.

That was close.

⸻

I wonder what we would have done before.

We had already booked the inn.

It was supposed to be a trip.

We might have chosen our own plans.

But this time, there was not much hesitation.

My father-in-law is here.

There is a shrine ceremony.

There is a day when we enter a new relationship as a family.

We are no longer moving only according to our own convenience.

That surprised me a little.

⸻

To put the family schedule before our own.

It sounds obvious when written like that.

But in practice, it is not always so easy.

We have our own things we want to do.

Our days off are limited.

There are places we want to visit.

Still, there are days that matter more.

We are slowly entering the flow of a family that includes my father-in-law.

Maybe that sense is beginning to grow in us.

⸻

In the middle of all this, yesterday, my father-in-law said during dinner,

“I want to buy a shimenawa.”

He had gone to a nearby home center to look for one.

But he could not find it.

So I searched online.

There it was, sold normally on Rakuten.

Even shimenawa can now be bought online.

It is a convenient age.

Still, I think my father-in-law probably wanted to see it himself and choose it himself.

I understand that.

But there is not much time before July 15.

So we ordered one that would arrive the next day.

I never imagined there would come a day in my life when I would buy a shimenawa.

On Rakuten, no less.

⸻

Maybe life is made of these small repetitions.

Something you had not thought about yesterday becomes important today.

Something you thought had nothing to do with you quietly enters the center of your life.

Canceling an old ryokan.

Ordering a shimenawa.

A little while ago, I could not have imagined it.

But now, it feels natural.

⸻

Today is different from yesterday.

Tomorrow will be different from today.

Perhaps becoming a family also lives inside these small changes of plan.

From a time when we lived only by our own rhythm,

to a time when we live with someone else.

The day has come to buy a shimenawa.

A new year is about to begin.