It is so unbelievably sunny today. When I walk outside, I feel the immense warmth of the sun’s rays. I bask in what feels like a million little waves of goodness. I look up and there is only a single cloud in the sky and it looks like it is impossibly relaxed, a lone drifter in a sea of placid blue. I can feel the light coming into the folds of my shirt, and on my bare ankles, right between where my beat up denim jeans meet my jet black loafers. It reminds me of something.
In Japan, there’s a concept that many of us here in the West say we subscribe to, but in reality, don’t. In fact, it’s visibly dying.
It is the art of kintsugi, the old practice of repairing ceramics after some sort of trouble finds them- whether it was a careless nudge off the table, or a passionate throw across the room to a loved one. Kintsugi emphasizes a concept of ‘perfectly imperfect’; where something is exactly how it needs to be, because of the journey that led it there. Often using lacquer or metal to repair the object, whatever led to the breaking of the ceramic is now intertwined within its new, complete shape. It’s a brilliant reminder for us to waste less and do more with what we already have.
But for myself, it was a revelation, one that could only come from something as simple as fixing a broken brown and gold mug.
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It was just one of those days. A day where it seemed like I had lost some sort of divine coin toss, where everything was the way I truly did not need it to be. A day of skill issues. It was a ‘turn it off, and turn it on again, wait that didn’t fix anything’ kind of day.
I had just missed the bus, seconds away from making it through the doors of the 45 up Union Street. On my way up the hill, begrudgingly on foot, I got an email from a recruiter that accidentally replied all saying ‘it seems like the money is the most important thing to him’ (It was.) I passed by my favourite health food store, Real Food Company, and saw that it was going to become a Bi-Rite. (Faustian, at best.) My grandpa called me over the phone and he kept referring to me by my uncle’s name. (He’s always done this, but lately it seems like he means it.) To top it all off, when I got home and poured myself a cup of earl grey, I dropped my mug.
It shattered, albeit only into a few pieces. As I looked for them, I sat on the floor for what felt like a long, long time. I looked out my window and I saw seagulls and my neighbors and a few wide, fickle clouds. Where did I even get this mug? Of course, of course- I was with her, at Fort Mason, the craft fair. Outdoors, yes! The rain had just stopped a half hour earlier and we got croissants and we walked for hours and I am so afraid to remember the rest because we were happy and it was simple and it was before the mug had shattered.
In kintsugi, it’s believed that the repaired ceramic is infinitely more beautiful than the base object it started as. The cracks are stories, the little accidents are simply a part of being something that engages in life. But… what about people? Are we the same?
Of course not. Our bones are not porcelain and our bodies aren’t clay.
But on the other hand… of course we are.
I notice the sizable, violet-hued bruise on my right arm. We were drilling takedowns in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. My sparring partner and I went back and forth, making sure we knew exactly where to put our arms, where to pivot, and how exactly to use our entire body to get the other man down to the mat. On one go, I asked him to give me as much resistance as he could- my maneuver still went through, and I dropped him to the mat like a grand piano. I landed on my right arm, hard. I went in for the (proverbial) kill and got him fully pinned. I was laughing, I was so happy to get it right.
Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is one of the many things that are my own personal lacquer; bits and pieces of my life that keep me glued together. Other, small ones include committing to my writing again, seeing my parents once a week, and signing up for a marathon later in the year.
After I myself felt a shattering last year, I yearned for someone to pick up the pieces and put me back together. But no one ever came. Until, one day, the only person who could ever take on a task as visceral and monumental as this appeared.
Of course, that person had to be me.
Perhaps the most underlying concept of kintsugi, its not-so-secret foundation, is that of personal responsibility. You broke that mug, so you have to put it back together. It’s the exact same for people, I believe. Your family, your friends, the people in your world- they can only do so much for you. If you want to put the pieces back, if you want to lacquer the edges and come back whole, it’ll have to be you who engages in the work. It’ll always have to be you.
That concept is freeing. Even more than it is freeing, it is beautiful.
I got up from sitting on the floor. I found some lacquer under the kitchen sink, and a small plastic dropper to ensure some accuracy to this whole operation. The rays of the sun still shone so bright, and were gently nudging me upstairs. With the mug and materials in hand, I traversed our creaky, narrow steps leading up to the roof. I grabbed a chair and began piecing things back together. It didn’t take a whole lot of time, but I already began feeling better about the thing. I saw how neatly the pieces came back together, how perfect the edges fit inside the frame.
It was still the same mug, but I couldn’t help but notice that it was a thousand times more striking, and infinitely more interesting. The cracks, chips, and breaks all added to its form. Without them, it’d just be another mug.
