Author name: manjirosan@gmail.com

After a long, gray October in Tokyo—the wettest one I can remember—I finally returned to Shinshu. Usually, October in Japan […]

Mid-October, warm and clear after days of rain. I drive to Arai on my weekly shop, soon crossing the high

It’s October and I am sorting out logs in the woodpile—sawing them into lengths to split for the wood stove.

A perfect summer, the best I’d ever seen here, with unbroken days of blue skies and sunshine, ended abruptly. A

One of the quiet joys of rural Japan is the roadside vegetable stand. Often no more than a wooden shelf

At the edge of evening, I find the split shell clinging to a branch beside the pond. The chrysalis hangs

The summer heat has broken, but as I unload the truck outside my Tokyo apartment, the mosquitoes find me immediately.

Summer heat builds through the morning like a slow fever. By noon, the valley shimmers with rising air, and the

This year’s garden taught me more about failure than success, which might be the most valuable lesson of all. The