Weathered Walls, Rust and Resilience

Tales of a Kominka Life in pictures and words series introduction

Let me first fess up, I lied and I am sorry. The title of this series has changed to, “Weathered Walls, Rust and Resilience,” and more in line with the essence of of our journey. After this first post the title will become the subtitle of each subsequent post.

With that out of the way let me welcome everyone and thank you for taking precious, fleeting time out of your life. This is a quick introduction so you know what to expect in the series.

After being on substack for more than a year with a steady consistent growth of subscribers and followers simply based on the stories and poetry (new substack for that coming soon) and laugh out loud memes on notes, I finally hit on an idea that is more in line with the title of this substack—Kominka Life Japan.

I won’t go into the journey that got us here living in this wonderful 100-year old home, you can read about it here:

Kominka Life Japan

And here:

Meet Reiko & Allen

In this series, I will be posting photos of the interior and exterior of our home taken by my wife Reiko and adding vignettes inspired by the photos. We hope you will enjoy a glimpse into the home and life of two creative souls who met mid-life and walked away from our old lives in Tokyo.

What came from hours and hours of conversations while reforming our home is a shared philosophy of how we wanted to create our new life. I am sure between Reiko’s photos and my words you will get the essence of that creation.

There are so, so many words out there on substack and elsewhere to read which is why I will keep each post short and to the point, with the exception of this first introduction post.

Thank you again to all the subscribers, followers and anyone who has stumbled across Kominka Life Japan. If you find this interesting let others know about it, and if you have not already, hit that subscribe button—I’m keeping it free for now.

If you have any questions about our home, or living in Japan, feel free to comment or DM. I can say after nearly twenty years I may be able to answer your question(s). And if I cannot, Reiko surely can.

The first post in the series coming soon is, “The Genkan.” An apt title as the genkan is the front entrance of every home in Japan.