I don’t think anyone really warned me how stressful and tiring adult life would be. Perhaps some of that might come from having unwisely turned so many of my hobbies into sources of income, but on the whole, I think most of us are unprepared for the compromises, disappointments, and general fatigue of adult living. At a certain point some time in your twenties, the natural energy with which you used to greet the day seems to dry up, with responsible living somehow no longer feeling like enough to keep you moving, and extravagances like excessive drinking leaving you flat-out exhausted. Days start to feel shorter and shorter, filled up with mundane tasks that are so reliable and unending that there’s no real sense of accomplishment in completing them. Your relationships with others begin to shift, forced to accommodate increasingly demanding personal schedules, and often maintained in spite of your actual desire to simply get more sleep. And beyond that, the future doesn’t necessarily offer any call for optimism – our planet and economy have been crumbling for all of my adult life, and it seems naive to imagine things might ever improve.

All of this isn’t to say that adulthood is a parade of perpetual misery, but I think many people would agree that adulthood can often offer far less validation than you might hope, along with a steady stream of quiet disappointments. Rilakkuma and Kaoru is painfully aware of those disappointments, and its poignant first episode catalogs its heroine Kaoru’s attempts to roll with the punches, and find at least a little beauty in the bargain.

The show certainly looks beautiful. Rilakkuma and Kaoru is brought to life through gorgeous handmade sets and delicate stop-motion animation, a series of intricate little dioramas brimming with bright pastels. Outdoor sets are framed by ornate cherry blossom embellishments, while Kaoru’s apartment is full of charming details and warmed by bright, saturated sunlight. The world itself feels soft and inviting, and our first introduction to the show’s cast centers on a teddy bear taking a nap in a sunbeam. Rilakkuma and Kaoru offsets its pointed drama with an aesthetic sensibility evocative of the best healing anime, demonstrating the natural potential of slice of life narratives aimed at fully adult audiences.

Kaoru does her best to honor the warmth and promise of the world around her, as she fastidiously prepares for her day and lectures her stuffed animal friends about the importance of impressing her new coworkers. It’s unclear whether her friends are real or imagined, symbols of her own optimism and youth, or perhaps just fantastical embellishments of a mundane life. Either way, interacting with them seems to give her purpose, in the same way a beloved pet can assure you that at least someone appreciates your company, and enjoys the sound of your voice. In a world full of disappointments, small acts of sympathy can mean a great deal, and completing chores for people you care about can carry more dignity and satisfaction than simply tending to your own affairs.

Those disappointments come rushing in when Kaoru gets to work, and learns the big news. There will be no new employees to fawn over this year, and give her work life a greater sense of community and purpose. In fact, everyone’s salaries are going down by ten percent, and employees are discouraged from stretching the company coffers by working overtime. From a world that once promised steady employment, we have arrived at a global economy that only promises disappointment, and emphasizes any position which can be exported or scattered among freelancers will be gone at the first opportunity. Though Japan’s traditional promise of lifetime employment and current stagnation are unique, the uncertainty and disappointment of Kaoru’s position is universal. How can we take pride in work that is unsatisfying, transactional, and frighteningly impermanent? We are actively encouraged to seek no meaning in work, and thus any meaning in our lives must be found in the margins.

Kaoru’s attempts to find meaning and joy in those margins are also beset by familiar adult disappointments. Kaoru’s plain and bluntly expressive eyes tell a story of quiet fatigue and resignation, as she attempts to marshal old college friends towards their traditional cherry blossom picnic. Though she’s always looked forward to these reunions, in recent years, her original group of six old friends has dwindled, as members of her group have gotten married, gone overseas, or otherwise left this moment behind. Adulthood is marked by a long series of such quiet goodbyes, as you slowly lose touch with both the people you knew and the traditions you loved in youth. When you’re young, your perspective is narrow enough for you to imagine a certain degree of permanence in your life’s conditions. As you grow older, unmoving pillars shift and crumble, and you are forced to either change yourself, or risk living in a past that everyone you once knew has since abandoned, a familiar and beloved but now empty room.

“Sounds like you’re being left behind,” Karou’s coworker bluntly declares. And it’s true, or at least feels true. Is it so wrong to try and hold on to precious things? Your friends haven’t truly betrayed you, but you still feel the betrayal, and yet can only blame yourself. As days, months, and years build up, routines that once felt comforting can begin to feel limiting, or even shameful. Can you follow this road forever, or is there a fork waiting for you as well? Have your friends discovered some secret that makes sense of adulthood, or is there something wrong with you? And why wasn’t this part ever taught in school – why does the road seem to just end here, with some cruel assumption that you’ll know what to do when the time comes? In the context of her coworkers’ statements, the cherry blossoms that at first promised hope and renewal now seem to embody impermanence, a flash of youth and color that is marvelous in motion, but quickly and irretrievably lost.

Kaoru tries not to think about it. Her behavior mirrors the sunny colors and meticulous details of the world around her, as she hums to herself, taking solace in productive labor around the house. Preparing the food for her picnic is a source of easy joy, a mechanical and familiar task that offers a sense of order and control. And there is great beauty in this world, if we simply stop and look for it. On the road to the picnic, Kaoru finds herself in a moment of brief and transcendent happiness, the anticipation of her friends’ faces blooming into a dance through the spinning cherry blossoms. So much is outside our control, but there is still sunlight, still flowers and smiles and fond friends. Not all moments will be so joyous, but some moments might be.

The cherry blossom picnic is a disaster, unfortunately. All of Kaoru’s worst fears come true, and she ends up abandoned by every single one of her friends, as they each offer an apology that feels more like a knife in the back. Sorry I can’t come, I’m too busy enjoying my fulfilling career. Sorry I can’t make it, my children provide me a purpose and joy that you will never find. Maybe next time, I’ve discovered the love that has always eluded me, and will never again be staying up to drink and commiserate with you. Surrounded by happy couples and spinning blossoms, Kaoru downs a six pack alone, and marinates in the feeling of being left behind.

Stumbling home alone, Kaoru is greeted by her fuzzy friends, who she glumly offers the packed lunch she was so proud of before. But even though she only really wants to wallow in her sadness, her friends don’t let her, pushing her up and into an impromptu cherry blossom viewing of their own. Kaoru’s strange companions thus seem to echo the loving friends of a traditional slice of life, here overtly defined as a fantasy device or coping mechanism. Her own strength and optimism personified? Maybe they’re just serving the role of a needy cat. Either way.

“I’m the only one who hasn’t changed,” she admits, while her friends munch happily on their snacks. Their delight is one of the great philosophical lessons offered by all good pets; that no matter how imposing and impossible the challenges you’re facing might be, the world is still full of tasty food and warm friends and new sights to appreciate. Reflecting on the beauty of the cherry blossoms, she muses that “this gorgeous pink only lasts for a brief moment. Normally they’re just plain, unnoticeable trees. How wonderful they are.” Things don’t have to last to be beautiful, and perhaps nothing so beautiful can truly last. Cherry blossoms are like all good things – fragments of joy in a sea of mundanity, like Kaoru’s exuberant walk to her disastrous picnic. That picnic might not have gone as planned, but disappointments cannot steal away the beauty or the joy. Maybe those moments are all we can hope for; maybe they’re enough.

Kaoru would appreciate more certainty than that, and I can’t blame her. Taking perhaps the wrong lesson from this whole fiasco, she declares that “I shall dress myself in pink and say ‘I’m here!’” And then, at last, she articulates the hope and question that seems to define adulthood in totality, the halting “perhaps then I’d be more… more… what would I be?” There ought to be more than this, more sense, more order, more established challenges and more defined rewards. Maybe dressing in pink really will make sense of it all, and offer the clarity that adulthood seems so unwilling to provide. And if it doesn’t, maybe you’ll at least look great in pink.

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