Tidying Up

Tokyo hit 36.9℃ today — a seriously hot one. Air conditioning is essential, of course, but in the late afternoon I decided to switch it off, take out the filter, and wash it. The AC is unusable until the filter dries, so I’ve come to a café nearby to work.

So today, for the first time in a while, I’m tidying up the inside of my head. This clearing-out is important work. It becomes necessary from time to time. It isn’t about resting or refreshing myself. When I have several things running in parallel, a moment comes when I want to clear my head out. Today seems to be one of those days.

Collecting information day after day, reading books, new ideas surfacing in the middle of making work — these start to pile up in my head. Simply writing them down in a notebook helps a lot, but sometimes I also sit at the keyboard and write a decent amount of text on the computer. I like that it makes priorities easier to see. And on days like this, some corner of my room is usually a mess too, so I plan to tidy that up when I get home.

Most of what was scattered in my head wasn’t the kind of thing I could resolve today, so I lined it up in a corner of my mind for now. Three things were left. First, whether or not to buy a new camera — I’ve been going back and forth. Second, going through my old photo data again; things I couldn’t see when I shot them might be visible to me now. Last, the fixes for the website I’ve just renewed. A few places I want to work on have been accumulating.

Tidying up isn’t about removing dirt. It’s maintenance — getting yourself back into a state where you can move again tomorrow. The AC filter is the same: washing it isn’t the point.

Now I’m heading out to photograph the city at night, something I started recently. Walking also helps clear my head. It’s strange, but while I’m moving, I start thinking about things without meaning to — testing hypotheses, and something like imagination starts to move.

By the time I get home, the filter should be dry.