Saying 'We can go next year,' but children won't stay the same as they are next year | Fumiya, 45

CASE 17 | Fumiya, 45

On a Saturday morning, Fumiya was looking back and forth between two screens at the edge of the dining table.

On the laptop he brought home from work was the sales plan for the next term. On his personal tablet, the prices for flights to Hokkaido and hotels were displayed.

"I'd really like to go here."

His second-year middle school daughter, Natsuki, was showing him Shiretoko in the summer. A boat looking up at cliffs from the sea. Mountains stretching beyond the mist, and if you're lucky, you can see brown bears. His fifth-grade son, Yuma, was playing a video of a train running through the Kushiro Wetland over and over again.

His wife, Aki, said while clearing the dishes.

"This might be the last year we can take a long trip as a family of four. Next year, Natsuki will be an exam student."

Fumiya replied, "I suppose so." Then he looked at the total cost of the airfare and closed the screen.

It wasn't an amount he couldn't afford. But it wasn't an amount he could spend without thinking, either.

What was bothering him more than that wasn't the travel cost itself. It was the numbers he had just seen at the office.

Orders for printed materials were down from the previous year again. A cram school that had been a major client had moved their enrollment information from paper to the web. The number of pages in local government public relations materials had decreased, and exhibition brochures had been replaced by a single QR code. He didn't think the company would disappear immediately. However, it was becoming hard to imagine a future where they could continue doing the same work with the same number of people.

Whether or not to go to Hokkaido in the summer.

The question as it appeared to his family was connected to a different question within Fumiya.

When future income becomes difficult to predict, is it okay to spend a large sum of money now?

And one more thing.

Can the time passed up due to anxiety about the future be bought back in the same form later?

He knew the way paper was disappearing by the feel of it before he saw the numbers.

Fumiya is a sales manager at a printing company with fewer than 100 employees. He joined the company after graduating from university, and this year marks his twenty-third year.

When he was young, he walked around with his bag stuffed with samples of company brochures and product catalogs. At sales meetings, he would spread out paper samples on the desk and have clients check the thickness and gloss with their fingers. On color proofing days, he would go to the factory and peer at the first printed sheet together with the client.

It was a job where things were completed.

Seeing the sight of thousands of booklets stacked up made me feel like my work was right there in front of me. When a client representative said, 'It really is different when it's on paper,' it made all those late nights of revisions feel worth it.

It wasn't that I had come to hate the work.

It was just that the situations requiring paper had definitely decreased.

The company hadn't been doing nothing, either. We started web production, proposed promotional support using customer data, and developed products that could turn a profit even in small lots. Fumiya himself had told his subordinates many times, 'We aren't selling printed materials; we are giving shape to what our clients want to convey.'

Those words weren't wrong. However, the competitors the company faced in these new areas were different from before. Web-only companies, advertising agencies, low-cost online printing services, and the in-house teams of client companies. Long-standing trust might get us through the door, but it doesn't guarantee an order.

In sales meetings, the president says, 'Let's turn change into an opportunity.'

As a section manager, Fumiya also faces the same direction.

On the other hand, when I go home, I line up the mortgage balance, the education expenses for my two children, and retirement funds in my head. My annual income is about 6.1 million yen. Aki also works four days a week at a pharmacy. Our household budget isn't in the red every month. Our savings are slowly increasing, too.

That was precisely why I was afraid to reduce those savings.

We aren't in poverty. We haven't made any big purchases, either. It's just that the company's future is harder to see than it used to be. That small cloud of uncertainty made me unable to touch money that I should have been able to use.

Anxiety didn't tell me the necessary amount

Fumiya keeps a household account book. I also made an estimate of education expenses. If Natsuki goes to a private high school, if Yuma lives alone while in college, if mortgage interest rates rise. I put each of those numbers into a table.

I thought I would feel at ease if I calculated it.

In fact, there were many things I became able to see. At the very least, I understood that one trip to Hokkaido wouldn't cause our household finances to collapse.

However, even after finishing the calculations, I couldn't press the reservation button.

That was because what Fumiya was trying to prepare for wasn't just expenses with fixed amounts.

What if the company's performance gets even worse?

What if my managerial allowance is reduced?

What if I have to change jobs?

What if my annual income drops at my next job?

Anxiety never says, 'Three million yen more is enough.' As savings increase, they bring along other dangers that one can imagine. Knowing the numbers and giving oneself permission to spend them were not the same thing.

One night, while looking at the household budget, Aki said.

'Fumiya, how much do you need to save before you feel at ease?'

'Once I have a clear outlook on education expenses, I suppose.'

'Does that mean until both of them graduate from university?'

Fumiya did not answer.

By the time Natsuki graduates from university, Fumiya will be in his mid-fifties. By then, he will be worried about retirement funds. Once the mortgage is paid off, he will think about home repairs. If he keeps linking the conditions for peace of mind to the next set of conditions, the time to spend money might never come.

Of course, it is not a matter of just spending it either.

What Fumiya was trying to protect was not the numbers in the bankbook, but his family's life. The room to remain calm even if the company changes. The room to ensure that the paths the children want to take are not narrowed by the parents' circumstances alone. The room to pause for a while if he is forced to move to a job that doesn't suit him.

Savings have the function of protecting future options that have not yet occurred.

That is why it was not something that could be easily dipped into just because of Aki's words, 'This might be the only year.'

'It might be the last time' was a bit of an exaggeration, but it was probably true.

It is not that Natsuki dislikes family trips. It is just that recently, she has started checking her plans with friends before going out. Even while traveling, she takes photos and sends them to her friends, not the family group. After dinner, there are times when she is the only one wearing earphones in the hotel room.

In the past, Fumiya would have called out to her, saying they had come all this way as a family.

Now, he tries to think that even that time is part of his daughter's journey.

Next year, Natsuki will be a student preparing for entrance exams. Once she enters high school, her club activities and plans with friends might increase. It is not decided that she will stop coming on family trips. There are families who travel as a group of four even after the children become university students or working adults.

However, it will not be the same four people.

The age when Yuma presses his face against the train window and reports everything he sees. The summer when Natsuki, moving between being an adult and a child, still stays in the same room as her parents. The period when Aki, while checking the luggage for four, is gradually expanding the scope of what she leaves to the children.

The travel destination will still be there next year. The family will likely be there, too.

Even so, this year's combination only exists this year.

Fumiya did not like the phrase 'last family trip.' It sounded like it was emphasizing an end and forcing a schedule. If he panicked every time his child grew, thinking it was now or never, life would be filled with nothing but commemorative events.

Besides, he did not think that sacrificing daily life to collect only special experiences was the same as cherishing one's family.

However, he also knew that when he said 'we can go again,' it did not mean the same opportunity was being preserved.

Putting things off does not just move a schedule into the future.

It changes the age, interests, physical condition, and even the relationships of the people going together into their future states.

Is the family alone bearing the burden of the company's anxieties?

On Monday morning, Fumiya headed to a client visit with his subordinate, Saeki. On the train, Saeki mentioned that he was getting married in the autumn.

'Are you going on a honeymoon?'

'I want to, but it looks like things will get busy once this current project is finalized. I thought it might be okay to wait until things settle down.'

Fumiya started to say, 'You should go when you can,' but stopped himself.

On what grounds was he about to say that?

Because he is young. Because they are newlyweds. Because trips become memories.

None of those are wrong. However, Saeki has his own household finances, his spouse's circumstances, and expectations for his work. The prime of life is easy for others to spot, but difficult for the person living it to decide.

When he returned from the visit, there was an internal message from the factory manager. They were going to pass on replacing one of the old printing machines. Even if it broke down, there was a possibility that there would be no repair parts available. Still, they could not foresee enough order volume to justify investing in new equipment.

Fumiya thought that decision was rational.

At the same time, he imagined what would be lost by passing on it. It would become harder to respond to short-lead-time orders, customers would leave, and it would become even harder to invest in equipment. Money not spent to protect something can sometimes narrow the possibilities of the business one wants to protect.

Company investment and family trips are not the same. Even so, they overlapped in Fumiya's mind.

There is also a cost to not spending.

That cost does not appear on an invoice. Therefore, it is easy to overlook.

Fumiya preparing for the company's uncertainties was an act of protecting his family. However, if he repeatedly postponed family plans because of those uncertainties, it could be said that he was forcing his family's time to bear the burden of the company's anxieties.

The company has not ordered Fumiya to 'stop traveling'.

The future, too, has not yet taken anything away.

While preparing for the possibility of things being taken away, Fumiya himself was closing off his current options.

To keep the trip from becoming the 'only right answer'

Fumiya made an estimate for the Hokkaido trip once more.

The initial plan was for seven days and six nights. It included visiting Shiretoko, Abashiri, and Kushiro, and staying at the hot spring inn Aki wanted to visit. Including travel expenses for the family of four, the total was higher than expected.

Faced with that number, it became a binary choice of either going or not going.

So, he reduced the trip to four nights. He changed some of the accommodations and narrowed the destinations down to Shiretoko and Kushiro. However, he kept the train ride Yuma was looking forward to and the sightseeing boat Natsuki had found.

Rather than saving money, it was a process of re-evaluating what they wanted to spend their money on.

At first, Aki said, 'I really wanted to go to the hot spring if we were going all that way.' Fumiya almost pushed his decision through again using the cost as an excuse, but instead asked, 'Which one thing would you like to add back?'

The two of them reviewed the plan and decided to stay at a slightly nicer inn on the final night. In exchange, they shortened the rental car period.

He showed the plan to Natsuki and Yuma as well.

'We can't do everything, so please choose one thing each that you really want to do.'

He didn't want to burden his children with financial anxiety. However, he thought it would be a good experience for them not just to receive a perfect trip prepared by their parents, but to choose together within limited conditions.

On the night he pressed the reservation button, Fumiya didn't feel as cheerful as he had expected.

He thought about the amount that would be deducted from his bank account and the company's plan for the next fiscal year. Just because he had decided on the trip didn't mean his anxiety had disappeared.

Rather, he had decided to spend the money while still carrying that anxiety.

It wasn't a bold decision. It wasn't a beautiful story about prioritizing time with his family above all else. He reduced the number of days, cut back on their wishes, checked their savings, and agonized over it until the very end.

But perhaps that is what it truly means to spend limited money.

If you choose one thing, another sense of security diminishes slightly. If you protect one thing, another period of time quietly passes by. It is not about finding a way to avoid losing both, but about deciding which way of losing is something you can accept.

What remains after returning home

In August, the sea off the Shiretoko Peninsula was colder than I had imagined.

On the deck of the sightseeing boat, Yuma raised his voice to be heard over the wind. Natsuki initially didn't want to leave the cabin, but she came out after hearing there was a brown bear on a distant rocky shore. Aki peered through binoculars and laughed repeatedly, asking where it was.

Fumiya took some photos. However, halfway through, he put his smartphone back in his pocket.

He didn't know if this trip would become a special memory for the family. In a few years, Natsuki might remember trips with her friends more vividly. Yuma might only remember the names of the trains, with the memory of who he rode them with becoming hazy.

There is no guarantee that the memories will be worth the money spent.

Even so, that evening, the time the four of them spent in a cramped rental car counting deer outside the window had truly happened.

Value is not something that only exists if it is preserved for the future.

Laughing with someone in the moment. Choosing plans together. Getting a little grumpy, then eating breakfast together as usual the next morning. Even if the memories fade, those moments were part of the family's time.

The week after returning from the trip, Fumiya attended a sales meeting again. The order forecasts were grim, and the president's explanation was hesitant. Nothing in reality had improved.

Fumiya hadn't started looking for the next travel destination. He intended to refrain from major expenses for a while. He also started checking job change websites from time to time. Whether he stayed at the company or moved elsewhere, he wanted to know what he was capable of doing.

It wasn't that he had stopped preparing.

He had simply repositioned this year's family within the future he was preparing for.

If you don't spend money, your options remain.

However, while you are keeping those options open, the time of the people you want to spend that time with is moving forward.

'We can go next year' is probably not a lie.

However, the ones going next year will be four people who are a year older, each with different plans and interests.

Therefore, spending money now is not necessarily the only right answer.

And passing on it this year is not necessarily a mistake.

What is needed, perhaps, is not to give a voice only to anxieties about the future. The future that hasn't happened yet, and the people who are here right now. It is about bringing both to the same table and making decisions without overlooking either's time.

Fumiya's bankbook showed a smaller balance than before the trip.

And back home, the usual weekdays returned, following the summer the four of them spent together.

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