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In episode 2 of Marie Kondo, we have a Japanese woman helping a Japanese-American family declutter their home (note: this married couple are more than borderline hoarders.) They have one whole room devoted to the wife's vast collection of Christmas decorations.
In the bedroom, there is a tottering tower of cardboard boxes, which contains the husband's vast collection of baseball cards. Also this couple has an Extremely Worried Son. And I won't even tell you about the garage.
Marie Kondo's genius is that there is NO STIGMA. None. She just smiles, smiles graciously at the wife's few words of bad Japanese, which -- when she tries to use them -- is deeply endearing. As is her collection of fifty Nutcracker Prince Xmas decorations (btw: its April.)
But off to the garage, which is often where sentimental items that are deeply meaningful are hidden under piles of old games, garden tools, and tax returns.
At one point the husband finds a box with a photo album his parents kept from the relocation camp where they were incarcerated during WWII. This is a stunning moment, even if you are not a historian. Think of the cast of characters.
Two Japanese women (Marie & translator), two Sansei, & their son, holding a photo album documenting when their family people were forced to walk away from their homes, belongings, were held in the Santa Anita Racetrack, then transferred to a concentration camp.
And I thought: THIS IS THE ANSWER. This is why they need all these things, why they can't put Christmas away. But in fact, this moment passes quickly, despite the fact that at the bottom of the mess, they find all of these lovely Japanese decorations they did not know they had.
And here's the thing about why Marie Kondo is so effective: this is a very fraught moment, but if they stayed in that place, everyone might have a terrible breakdown, so they don't, and they never mention it -- or the parents, or their pretty things, again.
I found this episode completely heartbreaking. Fortunately, I think none of the people in it did.
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