#PolarBearLiteratureClub A Memorable Book
"Do you have a book that holds special memories for you?"
When someone asked me that, I couldn't answer right away.
But after a while, what came to mind was a magazine I used to read obsessively alongside picture books back when I was busy raising my children: Fukuinkan Shoten's "Haha no Tomo" (Mother's Friend).
At that time, I had left Kyoto, where I had lived for ten years, and was staying at my husband's parents' house in Kyushu. My oldest child was three, and my youngest had just turned one.
I felt as though I had been forcibly thrown into a land where I didn't know the dialect and had no acquaintances, and I was on the verge of being crushed by loneliness.
My husband found a job after a while, but he wouldn't return home until the children were fast asleep.
During the day, I was caught between my sickly mother-in-law and my taciturn, old-fashioned father-in-law,
and there were times when I felt it was difficult even to breathe out of consideration for them.
My joy was the time I spent on the futon after giving the children a bath.
We would lie down in a row, and I would have them bring me their favorite books.
Then, it was storytime.
My eldest son loved vehicles, and he was particularly fond of "Jipta the Fire Engine."
"Poof, poof—do you really think that's a fire engine?"
I would put my heart into the scene every time where Jipta, the little fire engine who is mocked by everyone but remains positive and never gives up, goes to put out a fire on the mountain.
As for my youngest,
the picture in "Kon and Aki" where Aki is wrapping a bandage around the injured Kon while waiting for the train was so cute that I wanted to hug it. The adventure until they reached the house of the grandmother who made Kon,
and the emotion of finally meeting the grandmother still remains in a corner of my heart.
My favorites were the ones also featured in textbooks,
"Suho's White Horse"
and "Mochi Mochi no Ki" (The Mochi-Mochi Tree).
I would hold back tears at the same scenes every time,
reading the books over and over again as if to tell myself, 'Yes, that's right.'
Once the children were asleep, it was my time.
It was time to open "Haha no Tomo."
For the six years until my children graduated from kindergarten (all three of them), I subscribed to "Haha no Tomo" continuously.
I donated the 150 picture books I bought during that time to the kindergarten, and "Haha no Tomo" stayed in a cardboard box in my closet for a very long time as my treasure. However, when we renovated the house, I had to let them go with tears in my eyes. I regret that I should have kept at least a few volumes.
Shinta Cho's
"Dr. Nanja Monja"
It was a strange manga, but I was hooked. Essays by Megumi Hisada and
Eiko Kadono's "Kiki's Delivery Service" also began serialization in "Haha no Tomo."
It was thanks to those picture books and "Haha no Tomo" that I was able to overcome the loneliness of living in a land where I had no friends.
When I looked up whether "Haha no Tomo" was still being published by Fukuinkan Shoten,
I found that it had ceased publication this year, in March of Reiwa 7. It is truly a pity.
I am grateful that they delivered high-quality reading material to readers for as long as seventy years.
I want to let Fukuinkan Shoten know that there was a mother in the past who was saved by this magazine.
Thank you very much.
That was my memorable book.
The End
#Essay
The fact that "Haha no Tomo" ceased publication
I didn't know until I wrote this piece. Perhaps it is fate; I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude.