The In-Between: Mother and Artist
West Japan (More or Less) Travel Notes — Part VII
A Workshop with 170 Students
During an international tour in Japan, I found myself standing before more than 170 junior high school students — reading, interpreting, and trying to remain fully present.
At the same time, just beside me, my two-year-old daughter was asking to go outside.
This is a quiet account of that tension: between attention and absence, between responsibility and care, and the fragile space where being an artist and being a mother do not always align.
*The In-Between: Mother and Artist*
*West Japan (More or Less) Travel Notes — Part VII*
Previous:
Part VI— Running for the Shinkansen with a Two-Year-Old
https://medium.com/@ekotumi/west-japan-more-or-less-travel-notes-part-ii-why-i-tour-with-my-two-year-old-3c1203be094f
The following day, we visited Fukuyama Municipal Hitotsubashi Junior High School.
There would be a reading, followed by a workshop in which the students would engage in role-playing. With the workshop included, this would be the longest program of the entire tour.
And so, inevitably, the question arose:
What would happen to Mini-Tumi?
Result: Inconclusive.
Upon arriving at the school, the first thing that moved me was the thoughtfulness of the principal.
In Japan, schools — like private homes — are strictly no-shoes environments. One removes outdoor shoes at the entrance and changes into indoor slippers.
Naturally, there were no slippers in Mini-Tumi’s size. Children this small are simply not part of the system.
I began to take off her shoes, intending to let her walk in socks.
But the principal stopped me.
“It’s cold,” he said gently. “She might catch a chill. She can keep her shoes on.”
If you were Japanese, you might understand the magnitude of this moment.
To remain in outdoor shoes while everyone else changed.
To walk, in shoes, through a place where I had always believed — without question — that doing so was absolutely forbidden.
It felt almost as though we had been invited to step into someone’s home without removing our shoes.
And at the same time, I became sharply aware of my own limitations — how readily I had defaulted to “rules are rules,” without even considering the coldness beneath my daughter’s feet.
Before asking whether I could balance being an artist and a mother,
was I, in fact, fully established as a mother at all?
The question flickered through my mind.
But there was no time to dwell on it.
Once again, the reading was about to begin.
We were guided into the gymnasium, where more than 170 students sat waiting, their eyes bright with anticipation.
As before, Mini-Tumi settled between me and the tall director and began to play.
This time, however, it was early morning.
And it was an early morning shaped by frustration — two full days without the chance to run freely outdoors.
It did not take long.
“Let’s go outside, outside,” she insisted.
At a junior high school, there is always a yard. She had already discovered it.
To Mini-Tumi, who did not know what a schoolyard was, it appeared simply as a vast park — a place where one could run without limits.
“Let’s go outside, outside,”
She kept repeating it softly.
I wanted to take her.
Even ten minutes — just ten minutes to let her run — how much joy it would have brought her.
But this was work.
A switch turned on within me.
And as an artist, I turned on.
As a mother, I turned off.
I interpreted the director’s opening remarks, conveyed Agne’s message, and the reading began.
Unable to go outside.
Unable even to be spoken to.
Mini-Tumi grew sullen.
She lay down flat on the gymnasium floor — the familiar posture of quiet resistance.
It was a pose I had often seen when she was one year old.
And yet, since turning two, she had not used it once.
Until now.
I wanted to pick her up.
I wanted to say, “I’m sorry.”
But I was reading.
My eyes remained on the script, even as she stayed within the edge of my vision.
She lay there, completely still.
As before, she did not cry.
She resisted in silence.
That had always been her way.
But this time, she was left in that posture for too long.
Eventually, even that resistance lost its force.
She got up on her own and quietly resumed playing while seated.
To have to resolve one’s own “no” at the age of two.
There is a phrase often heard these days:
“I want to be able to regulate my own emotions.”
It sounds admirable — when spoken by adults.
But a two-year-old should be allowed to cry until someone comes to comfort them.
That, too, is part of being held in the world.
A quiet sense of guilt rose within me.
And yet, my artist-self did not switch off.
At that moment, all I wanted was to deliver the story — fully — to the students in front of me.
If even the smallest fragment of something remained with them, that would be enough.
So I continued reading.
When the reading ended, a break was announced.
I picked up Mini-Tumi, who had been sitting on the floor beside me.
“Let’s go outside, outside,” she whispered again.
“Let’s go outside.”
I held her close.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
This essay is part of the series
“The In-Between: Mother and Artist.”
Previous:
Part VI — Running for the Shinkansen with a Two-Year-Old
https://medium.com/@ekotumi/west-japan-more-or-less-travel-notes-part-ii-why-i-tour-with-my-two-year-old-3c1203be094f
