Time for my usual, end-of-year indulgent reflection.

So its another new year, and I’m still alive and writing, which is more than I can say about a pair of friends. The past several years has seen a lot of death around me, from library patrons to family members and to friends. I had spoken with each friend a few days to just two weeks before heart problems claimed them. One was younger than me; the other friend was just a little older than I am. I also lost a cousin this past year. Death can claim you at any time. This reminder makes the everyday grind of work frustrating. We lose an inordinate amount of our lives to the corporate grind or otherwise chasing the illusion we call money. I call money an illusion because what we call money is an invention of our minds. Even gold doesn’t have a set value. Once we get asteroid mining viable, gold will be plentiful and, based on the idea of demand and supply, will lose its value. The only truly valuable thing we have is our time because it is irredeemable and scarce. Yet time is treated as worthless or worth less than its actual value. Even $1 million a second wouldn’t compensate you for the true value of that second of your life. Once gone, your time is gone. Our idea of money is skewed when we hold it up against the reality of death.

Speaking of time, I’ve shifted my time this year to favor reading with the aim to read a book a week. I’ve failed in this, namely because I like to read beefy history books. I read the first four deluxe volumes of Berserk. Unfortunately, that’s all I can read. The public library system stopped buying them at volume 4. I’m uncertain if that’s because the demand isn’t there, or if the funding cuts libraries have seen are taking their toll. I have no plans of buying the Berserk series. Demand for libraries is down with the rise of streaming and other online video consumption. JP has also seen a decrease in readers over the past year. In part, because of changes Google and other search engines have done, because of the rise of ChatGPT and other large language model summarizing tools, and because people prefer video over reading. Of course, I suspect my choice or writing topics plays a role too. I’ve long ignored the otaku community’s interests and anime trends in favor of doing my own thing. That often means writing history articles or covering old, no-longer-popular anime.

A good example of this are my personal favorite articles from this year:

• The Life and Works of Ryōnen Gensō
• “My Japan,” A World War II Anti-Japanese Propaganda Film
• Kokuhaku, How to Confess Your Love the Japanese Way
• Why Should You Read Books?

Writing about Ryōnen Gensō, writing about an obscure US propaganda film, and writing against the decline of reading aren’t going to garner a large number of readers. But I enjoyed researching and writing about the first two, and Why Should You Read Books? was a personal indulgence as a librarian, writer, and book reader. Surprisingly, the article about kokuhaku hasn’t seen much traction despite how common the practice is in manga and anime. Granted, the centralization of the Internet means small outlets like this one fall behind the likes of Wikipedia and larger outlets. I found the kokuhaku article difficult to write because there’s so little academic research surrounding the practice. Culturally current practices often aren’t researched; they are simply taken for granted. Only after a culturally current practice disappears do academics tend to study that practice. The difficulty of the research elevated it as one of my favorite articles of the year. I’ve also slacked in the number of researched articles I’ve written. Some of this is because of the time such articles require. And, I have to admit, researched articles preform poorly compared to my more opinionated articles. While I try not to pay attention to numbers, numbers are the main metric for knowing what people find interesting. I can write two or three opinion-essays in the time it takes to research and write one researched essay. Plus, after over a decade of writing an article every week, ideas become scarce. Okay, ideas aren’t scarce. Japan has endless topics to mine for articles within its culture and history and media culture. Rather, my interest becomes difficult to find. Sometimes I come across a historical figure (the more obscure, the more interesting) but finding enough sources and content to write about that person can be difficult.

Which brings me to a question: would you like to see some shorter (500 or so words) articles about obscure historical figures, events, or oddities? Sometimes these oddities will only have a single source or, at most, a pair of sources. Granted, we all use Wikipedia which has suspect sourcing at best, so perhaps I worry too much about multiple sourcing?

The standout of the year for me was the reaction of many to my review of Berserk Deluxe Volume 1. Interestingly, after the initial surge of readers and flaming, interest in my follow-up reviews of Berserk was nonexistent. I had expected the be flamed for my unpopular opinion about Berserk. How dare I think the story is merely good! Although I thought I was prepared, the heat of some of the flames surprised me, considering I liked the story. It’s curious how people over-react to even a positive review simply because it isn’t as positive as they think the review should be. Many wrap their identity into entertainment instead of more important things like the practice of virtue. Such behavior in the defense of their favorite story only paints their favorite story in a negative light, defeating the very point of their abuse! At least, the surface point. Most of the time, such disparagement seeks to bolster a misplaced sense of importance and ego at the expense of others. While I was surprised about the heat of the flames, I found it mostly sad, and I found myself pitying the angry commenters. If they were trying to make me feel bad, they failed. Remember what I said about death at the start of this article? When death stands in your mind, your perspective shifts. Trifles like Internet trolls don’t upset you outside of feeling upset for how they waste their precious disappearing lives trying to hurt others so they can feel better. A better use of their limited life would be to do the inner work so that they feel better about themselves rather than trying to tear others down.

Perhaps I ought to write an article about that! Sadly, those who need to read such an article won’t.

So what can you expect as a reader this upcoming year? Well, I’ve had a collection of “Revisiting” anime articles sitting in queue for awhile now (some articles have been waiting for 3 years!). Most of the anime I’ve revisited date to the dawn of this blog. I’m older (but not wiser) and have a different perspective on those stories. Expect more book reviews; I hope you find those helpful. I also have articles discussing concepts of Bushido and how to apply them today. I have some more obscure historical figures, at least for the West, that I may write about.

Let me close with anime. I’m getting a bit old for many of the stories anime focuses upon. The stand-outs for the year was Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End and Oshi no Ko with their many layers and adult-focused themes. Oshi no Ko reminded me of greats like Perfect Blue. This year, I was drawn more toward slice-of-life than toward action stories. Most action anime lack the characterization and depth I want in a story, although some frilly ones like The Great Cleric had some interesting characterizations. Tomo-chan is a Girl was fun with its characters, and The Dreaming Boy is a Realist had a refreshing take on the usual romantic comedy male protagonist. More Than a Married Couple entertained me even though it fell firmly into the “will they won’t they” category. The influx of gyaru in stories (and how often they point toward gyaru fashion having no bearing on who a person is) offers commentary about judging people based on their looks. These stories offer interesting critiques against Japan’s traditionally negative view of gyaru. Here in the States, goths face similar ridicule or misunderstanding. Although this has diminished over time. Anyway, most anime I’ve watched this year was pretty forgettable. They were entertaining stories that helped me unwind after a week at work. There are some creative ideas like a sentient vending machine and a princess who gets a chance to avoid being guillotined. Anime and manga still proves itself capable of fresh, creative ideas. And this capability, along with stories like Frieren, keep me more interested in anime than in most American stories.

I pray you will have a happy, healthy, and mindful new year!