Wishy-Washi
Welcome to my random musings about the world, on a weekly-to-occasional basis.
Where we are: We’re in Finkenberg, Austria, a tiny little village in the Ziller Valley (known as Zillertal). We came here two years ago, and absolutely fell in love with the area—it’s a cool, green, mist-shrouded, pine-scented break from the heat of European summer.
Wishy-Washi
Shhhh—don’t tell my husband this, but there’s a small pile of paper tucked into the back of my suitcase.
Japanese paper, in case you aren’t aware, is an art form in itself. Somewhere in Japan, there are entire villages devoted to making paper, known as washi paper, by hand. It’s not made out of trees like machine-made paper. It’s made from several native plants, and bits of plant fiber give the paper texture and shimmer. The front side (at least of what I’ve bought) feels different from the back side. I can’t stop rubbing bits of paper between my fingers.
Admittedly, I like paper to begin with. If I really need to think through something complicated, I find my brain works better if I can shuffle scraps of paper around. I’ve been writing on a computer since my freshman year of college, but I’ve always found that actual paper helps with the thinking part.
Plus I’m a bookworm, and being a bookworm was a very paper-dependent identity until about fifteen years ago. My Kindle is great and I wouldn’t want to be without it, but dead-tree books were my first love. So I’m partial to paper anyway, even if my spouse thinks I’m a Luddite, or a hoarder, or maybe just a shopping addict.
We were in a gallery on Hokkaido, and saw the most beautiful series of pen-and-ink drawings: a birch forest in the snow, tall black trunks on a white background—at first I thought they might be photos. They were substantial pieces, at least three feet by three feet, and when I looked closely, I realized they were not on canvas, but washi. The slightly nubbly texture of the paper looked exactly like the play of winter light on snowy ground. It was a perfect marriage of subject and material.
Washi paper has more prosaic uses as well—a menu written on medium-thick washi paper, about the weight of card-stock, looks and feels elegant , promising attention to detail and all the senses. A heavy-weight piece of washi, almost as thick as canvas, tears gently at the edge, the fibers pulling apart like shreds of cotton. With time or wear, the edges soften and slump.
The washi paper I bought for writing on is about the weight of normal note paper. I always have a sticky pad, because I often wake up in the night and want to jot things down, so it seemed reasonable to buy a small pack of beautiful washi paper—it has swooping pink roses in the corners. I knew it would give me great joy, and it does. I made a lot of (paper) lists while we were in Tokyo—grocery lists, to-do lists, lists of department stores I wanted to visit and ramen restaurants that had vegetarian options.
That first packet of paper was the gateway. Stationery stores in Tokyo are huge and popular and I kept telling myself I’d just pop in to look around, and hours later I’d look up to find I had lost the entire afternoon and bought a small packet of paper, and another, and another. They’re only ten sheets each, it won’t take up much room, right?
And then—I found the origami paper. You can buy ten sheets of two-inch squares, each with a different print. The prints were like the most gorgeous, delicate fabrics. I couldn’t help it. Could NOT stop myself, I’m not kidding.
Lee hasn’t commented on the little scraps of paper I’m carrying around and scribbling on before I fall asleep at night, but I suspect that’s only because he hasn’t seen the pile in my suitcase.
I guess I have to learn to do origami now.
Take care,
Lisa
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