the toilet god / トイレの神様／植村花菜

In 3rd grade, i’m not sure why, I started living with my grandma.
She lived next to my parents’ house, but I lived with Grandma instead.
I helped out every day; we even played board games.
But when i wouldn’t clean the toilet, this is what Grandma said:

“There’s a very very beautiful goddess living in the toilet
So if you clean the toilet every day, you can become beautiful just like her.”

From that day I started cleaning the toilet till it sparkled
I definitely wanted to be beautiful so I polished it every day.
When we went out shopping we ate duck soba together,
and I cried and yelled at her when she forgot to tape my favorite shows.

I started to become a little bit of an adult and Grandma and i bumped heads.
I couldn’t make a family. I didn’t belong anywhere. 　
I stayed out of the house even on weekends; I ran around with my boyfriend.
No more board games, no more duck soba.

I wonder why people hurt each other like this?
Why do we lose what’s important to us?
I left home, left my grandma who had stood by me.

Two years after coming to Tokyo, Grandma went into the hospital.
She was thin and weak when I went to see her
I said “Grandma, I’m home” like I used to before.
We talked just a little, then she told me to go home.

The next day, in the morning, she quietly fell asleep…

As if she had been waiting for me to come…

You waited for me, you who took care of me,
I who didn’t do the same.
I was never a good granddaughter — all the same you waited for me

“There’s a very very beautiful goddess living in the toilet” —
Maybe you saying that to me back then is why I’m beautiful now.

The perfect bride i was in my dreams
is today still on her own, cleaning the toilet till it sparkles…

Obaachan, obaachan, arigatou… obaachan, honma ni, arigatou