My coworker Hayato is 38. He has a wife, two kids, and a mortgage. He also has a paper napkin in his wallet. It's 22 years old. He says the most important person in his life was a lunch lady in Michigan. In 2004, Hayato was sixteen, an exchange student in a small town there. His English was bad. He had no friends. Every day at lunch, he sat at the end of a long table, alone, and watched everyone else laugh. He told me he felt invisible. Like the whole world was a party he wasn't invited to. He counted the days until he could go home. There were 211. The lunch lady was Bev. Hairnet. Reading glasses on a chain. She'd been working that line for twelve years. On his first day, she asked his name. He said "Hayato." She said, "Hi-YAH-toe! Welcome, honey." It was wrong. He never corrected her. Nobody else had asked. After that, there was always an extra cookie on his tray. Every day. Every day she said the same thing when he got to the front of the line. "There's my guy." Then, one day in October, there was writing on his napkin. Blue pen. "You're doing better than you think." He thought it was an accident. The next day, there was another one. "Nobody has it figured out. They're just louder about it." And another. "Bad days don't count against you." "You belong here. I checked." Then one day in November: "Kid in the red hoodie likes anime too. Sit by him tomorrow." Hayato almost didn't do it. He was terrified. He did it anyway. The kid in the red hoodie was named Kyle. Ten years later, Kyle flew to Tokyo and stood next to Hayato at his wedding as his best man. When Hayato went home in June, he had 117 napkins in a shoebox. He still has every one. This spring, Bev retired after 34 years. Hayato flew back to Michigan for the party. He thought it would be small. Some cake in the teachers' lounge. It was in the gym. There were four hundred people. He said it took him a few minutes to notice. Grown men and women were holding napkins. A Marine in his dress uniform. A nurse. A truck driver. A woman with three kids hanging off her. All holding old, soft, yellowed paper napkins with blue pen on them. A man next to Hayato said, "The year my mom left, Bev was the only adult in this town who knew my name." Then he took out his wallet and showed Hayato his napkin. For 34 years, she had done this for thousands of kids. Nobody told anybody. Every kid thought they were the only one. When they gave Bev the microphone, she looked out at the gym for a long time. She was crying too hard to say much. "I didn't do anything," she said. "I just learned your names." Before Hayato left, she found him in the parking lot. She pulled one more napkin out of her purse, already written on, and put it in his hand. She'd known he was coming. "You're somebody's whole day. You just haven't found out yet." That's the one in his wallet. So if you've ever thought you're just something. Just a lunch lady. Just a cashier. Just a mom. Just the guy who works nights. Somewhere, someone may be carrying your napkin. You're somebody's whole day. You just haven't found out yet.

“All About Lily Chou-Chou” The film will be screened in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Tickets now on sale! Schedule (local time): August 3 (Mon) at 9:30PM August 14 (Fri) at 9:30PM Venue: KINO Rotterdam Gouvernestraat 129-133, 3014 PM Rotterdam #HayatoIchihara# #ShugoOshinari# #YuAoi# #AyumiIto# #AllAboutLilyChouChou# #IwaiShunji#

“All About Lily Chou-Chou” The film will be screened in London, UK. Tickets now on sale! Schedule (local time): June 22 (Mon) at 8:15PM August 5 (Wed) at 8:35PM Venue: The Prince Charles Cinema 7 Leicester Pl, London, WC2H 7BY #HayatoIchihara# #ShugoOshinari# #YuAoi# #AyumiIto# #AllAboutLilyChouChou# #IwaiShunji#

Hayao Miyazaki says the problem with young anime artists is that the only thing they study is anime. The Studio Ghibli director told Roland Kelts his generation “studied French literature, we studied impressionism, we read Dostoevsky,” then created original work. If all you watch is anime, he said, “you’re just regurgitating spinning wheels.” Miyazaki later smiled and noted that old people always complain about the next generation.

Hayao Miyazaki said that love is two people inspiring each other to live. And to live doesn't just mean to be alive. Living involves finding beauty in the simple moments of being. So to inspire someone to be in awe of the simplicity of living. And I don't think I could articulate it any better than that.

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Yoshitaka Amano has won the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2026 Concept Art Awards. He is only the third Japanese artist to receive it, after Hayao Miyazaki and Katsuhiro Otomo. Amano, known for the early Final Fantasy concept art and logos, was honored at the ceremony in Pasadena on October 24. He said the award recognizes “creativity and the people who create.” He appeared the next day for a talk at LightBox Expo.