I had spent about four hours trying to track down a communications problem with my mail server’s IMAP protocol service. It turned out to be a security certificate error. Of course, it was because a week ago I had been fiddling around with the settings and just now noticed the problem. I only use IMAP for email access with my PDA.

After four hours of intense troubleshooting, cursing, and brooding. I decided I needed to relax with a little anime. I had just downloaded H&CII episode 9 and was looking forward to it. I pretty much knew what I was getting into given the current direction the plot was heading in. But H&C is probably my favorite show being subbed at the moment so I couldn’t resist.

Yeah, I started to tear up with this one.…(more)…

The story may go in the direction in which Hagu regains 100% of the feeling in her hand. It may be done to make for a happy ending. I don’t see them going that way with things. In reality, an injury like Hagu’s would leave her with reduced dexterity, feeling, and in some instances lasting pain for the rest of her life.

Hagu’s insistence on not taking any pain killers in order to feel for any semblance of pain in her right hand struck a cord with me. It’s something that I would have probably done.

I didn’t see that Takemoto would be facing a “slow down.” I had though we were done with him because of the Takemoto soul searching arc in season one. He had moved so far and come to the realization that among the things he wanted, one was Hagu. However, he was plainly aware that Hagu would not return his feelings. Yet, here he is slowing down for her. At the end of episode nine we get a good bit of introspection that hints at what he will decide to do. Will he stay with Hagu or go be the responsible adult and get a job so he can stop mooching off his parents.

I empathize with Hagu because her injuries are going to have an impact on her art, and her already dwindling emotional state. Hagu seemed to practice multiple styles of painting some that were highly abstract while others far more detailed. She also practiced sculpting in wood and clay. Clay, in particular, requires the use of feeling in the fingers.

If there is only thing I rely on more than anything it’s my sense of touch and the physical dexterity in my hands. I have long thin fingers, which are good for typing. I also enjoy working with machines and building things. There is no extremely efficient method other than a keyboard when working with a computer. Simply put, I couldn’t do what I like to do without my hands.

While many popular artist have had declining health that affected their art, one of the most notable (that I know of) is Claude Monet. Monet was an impressionist painter in the 1800’s and early 1900’s. Late in his life he developed cataracts for which his vision was profoundly affected. The cataracts not only affected the clarity of his vision but the colors and hues as well. The slow degrade of perception is very evident in his paintings during his late years. Even after undergoing surgery to correct the problem, he never regained the acute sense of color that he had masterfully controlled during his earlier years. At one point he became so frustrated with his incomparability to his earlier paintings that he started to destroy some of his works.

To an artist the brush is a voice. It is a tool of expression. We are all poets in some form or another. We simply (or not so simply) have to find a voice. Imagine the feeling of suddenly realizing that your voice was gone and you had no means of getting it back.