A skilled person would sort and organize each piece of information, fold it, and store it neatly in their own storage space.
But I'm really bad at it.
I stand there gazing at the mountain of information in front of me, thinking, "Wow, that's a lot." Then I stick my hands into the pile and try to roll it up, but it doesn't get cleared at all.
That was last Saturday.
There was a party celebrating the 70th anniversary of the club I belonged to during my university days, the Central Japan Student Broadcasting Federation.
I decided to extract a little bit from the vast amount of information that day and mumble it together.
The toast was proposed by an 86-year-old woman, a senior of ours.
"Let's take a good look at today's society from our respective positions. Let's continue to participate in society. Cheers!"
Wow, I was overwhelmed by the power of those words.
The time of my great predecessors was the dawn of the media. What is broadcasting? What role should it play in society? I guess they were the generation that talked about such things in the federation room (the room where the club was based).
As for us, our activities were anything but ideological. We played Mario Kart every night and occasionally made intro quizzes.
While I feel embarrassed, I also feel resigned to the fact that this is just our generation.
What we all have in common is that we spent our youth in that federation room. That fact is what connects us to the fine seniors before us.
Each of them has fond memories of having spent their youth there, and are happy that the place still exists today.
All of these people, at their own stages in life, have taken time from their lives to be together at this very moment.
The current students are fresh and pleasant to watch, and the professional announcers' hosting is excellent, as expected.
At the end, the club song that everyone sang together was so nostalgic that the alumni association president was so moved that he broke down in tears.
Lots of information!
The after-party was held at our restaurant, Bokumo (to be precise, it was a third party as we stopped off at another restaurant along the way).
Some of the people who were not attending the party but were from Bokumo joined us, and a total of more than 20 people packed into the small store. Everyone was excited like they were back in their school days, and we had a great time (I'm really sorry to the other customers who were expecting a quiet Bokumo).
We catch up on what's going on, look at old photos, and take turns reading the communication notebook we all used to write, called Bosoroku.
I was told this by a senior colleague whom I met for the first time in a long time.
"I've been reading Iwasu-kun's blog. You always seem to tie up all the loose ends properly."
I'm happy, but embarrassed!
But, well... I'm not writing this with the intention of bravely tying up all the loose ends.
There is a preamble, then you connect the dots of the story you want to tell. Finally, write a conclusion based on the preamble.
After writing scripts for radio for a long time, I've developed a sort of format for myself, and because it's easy to use, I reuse that format on this blog.
In the first place, it's rare that we are able to recover things so neatly.
But I appreciate you reading this crap.
The third party (or more accurately, the fourth party) that followed was also very intense. Even though it was late at night, the seniors were so energetic that I thought they were students, and the juniors were talking seriously. It was also good that I was able to tell my classmates that I was sorry at that time, to whom I wanted to apologize.
As I was being rocked in the taxi on the way home, all the faces came to mind. I realized that today must have been the BIG DAY.
It's been a week since then, and the afterglow is still lingering.
Nostalgia, happiness, surprise, hope, relief. It's a jumble of all those feelings, and it feels like I've eaten a mountain of heavy, warm food and my stomach feels a bit bloated.
Naturally, I haven't been able to digest it enough to be able to turn it into a sentence that sets up hints and brings them together. All I can do is extract parts and round them out.
However, one thing I thought about during my indigestion was...
The federation room was where we all spent our time during our student days, having a lively and noisy time.
And then there's my own bar, Bokumo, where my seniors, peers, and juniors are having fun drinking wine.
There was a moment on that day when I felt like the two spaces were connected across time.
When I was a student, I became busy with my part-time job and there was a period when I was no longer able to participate actively in club activities.
He also regrets that he left all the responsibilities to his friends who were in the same year as him and was unable to do what he was supposed to do.
Even though I am such a person, I was able to provide this opportunity. Everyone in Bokumo had such happy smiles. I felt like we were spending the same time here as we did in the federation room.
By becoming a gathering place for everyone on this 70th anniversary milestone, I feel like I have been able to make up for my sins, even if just a little.
Perhaps it could be said that after a quarter of a century, I was able to recover some of the regret I felt at the time.
Let's continue doing our best so that people will want to meet up in Iwasu again someday.
