From a Town on the Hudson

by Yuko Koyano

  One day, however, I found I couldn't. When I heard that Rose had lost her brother a few days previously, I never even imagined that I would try such public display. "Rose, are you all right?" I repeated. I just sat close beside her. She had tears in her eyes. I felt her trembling next to me as I sewed a tiny doll dress for her. In this situation, I unconsciously behaved as I had used to do in Japan, after all. What I felt sure about then was that she was important to me.

  FOR THE first two years I volunteered, I met many ladies who loved dolls, and I came to know the roles of each member of the class. I will introduce each of them briefly here.

  Elmie was wonderful. She always sat near the classroom door. She liked to make dolls very much, and she also liked to go to Atlantic City, New Jersey, to gamble. When she won, she talked about it a lot in class. Elmie frequently served us coffee and showed us beautiful pictures of her grandchildren. I was happy to help when she asked me to apply her eye lotion after she had an eye operation.

  Edith Dunson liked reading books as much as making dolls. I often saw her reading while she was waiting her turn. That was why she preferred making dolls that appeared in stories. Once she made Adam and Eve dolls. They were the Adam and Eve who hadn't yet eaten the forbidden fruit, so they were naked. It embarrassed me when I explained to Edith how to stitch Adam's private parts together, because I didn't know the words in English. I assumed that the words I knew for the parts of the body were in German, because I had studied German in my college days. Although I was embarrassed, I asked Edith how Americans said it. She looked at me suspiciously, then answered quickly and added, "You should know that already since you're married!" The members of the class giggled. The subject seemed to have taken an unexpected course. If I had been Edith, I would have answered quietly and modestly so as not to embarrass the other person. At first I couldn't catch what she said, but Elmie, sitting next to Edith, saw that I was confused. She was so kind that she stood up and repeated the word twice, loudly and clearly. The classroom burst into laughter and I blushed. In my ignorance I hadn't realized that the word was the same in English as it was in German. It was funny.

  Doris would just sit quietly and sometimes doze comfortably by the window. I heard that she used to make dolls before her eyes became bad. She was fashion-conscious and wore a red hat sometimes. Louise, an instructor of another craft class in the center, always came into the doll class, saying, "Doris, are you behaving yourself?" When Doris felt well, she washed the knives and forks after our monthly birthday parties, or she took the attendance sheet back to the office. I was glad to see that she sat in the class.

  Ola had become a member of the class recently and made a wonderful big doll as her first project. It was so pretty. I missed her doll after it was finished. She liked quilting too. She seemed to be very interesting, and I enjoyed getting to know her better.

  Ann was a friendly lady. Because she had been sick, she couldn't finish her Japanese doll for a while. She was from Armenia and had been a professional dressmaker.

  Audrey took a long vacation in Vancouver, Canada, at the home of one of her many children. When she was in the class, she helped us instructors as a nice interpreter. Did she understand Japanese? No, she didn't. But she understood what we wanted to explain, especially to new members who were not familiar with our English. She had many children, maybe ten—"because," she said one day, "television had not been invented yet when my husband and I were young. We were free at night." All the class laughed at that.

  Cynthia joined the class late. She started making a Japanese doll as her first project. She was an earnest and polite lady.

  Rose's presence was important to the class. Her seat was always against the window, facing Elmie, and nearest to my place. She sat there working quietly on her doll. Sometimes she taught me English words and wondered why Japanese people didn't speak English well even though they wrote it beautifully. She teased me and even spoiled me. One day, when she asked me how my mother was, I answered, "I hope she's fine," because I hadn't written to her for a while. Around 12 o'clock, before Rose left the class, she came up to me and whispered, holding my shoulders from behind, "Yuko, will you do me a favor?" I wondered what she wanted. Then she said, "Please write to your mother. She must be worrying about you." Though I was ashamed of being advised to do what I should have done in the first place, I promised to write to my mother. Rose's words and actions were effective enough to remind me of my mother. I wrote a heartfelt letter to my mother, the first I had written to her in a long time. The next week, before I mailed it, I brought the sealed letter to class and showed it to Rose. After looking at it, she stood up, hugged me tightly, and said, "Oh, you are a good girl, I am proud of you." To my great regret, I didn't have any idea what I should say at such an unexpected sweet moment. Rose, I was happy to be spoiled by you!

  Rita was a quiet, gentle lady. She always sat next to Rose, and she made pretty dolls one after another. I loved them. One of them was a lovely clown. She liked to listen when Yoko, Takako, and I talked about traditional customs in Japan.

  Edith Shepherd was a faithful lady. Whenever she talked about people in trouble in the world, tears easily came to her eyes. In speaking to me so directly, she often led me to speak my mind in English. Because she had learned Spanish, she taught us three how to count in Spanish. I remembered only uno. We taught her the word for "cute" in Japanese, kawaii. She couldn't remember it by the next week.

  Louise, a relative of Edith Shepherd, had been a member of a former doll-making class and had come back to the class recently. She seemed to like straw hats. In the beginning, she often used the former instructor's name, Atsuko, for my name, Yuko. Not only Atsuko but also other former instructors were still remembered by some members in the class. I think Louise must have enjoyed her previous class, too. With us, she made a pretty standing doll.

  Ethel was quiet and eager. As she sat near Elmie, she pleasantly went about making many beautiful dolls. She had a daughter who was my age. I thought she must be a happy wife because once I saw her husband when he came to pick her up from class, and he looked nice.

  Mary Louise was a new member of the class. She was a gentle person, and when she talked to us she whispered. She said that was because she couldn't speak English fluently. "Me, too!" I said to her. Therefore, we three teachers and Mary Louise whispered with one another. She made a standing doll.

  Martha was nice. When she was in the class, the atmosphere of the room became more cheerful. She was the first lady who gave me the confidence to do the job, because in the fall of 1987, Martha wanted to make a Japanese geisha-girl doll using the body of regular girl doll with a big round face, fat stomach, and short legs. I helped her for four weeks as my first big job. Though it might not have been a slender doll, she was delighted to see the completed doll and named it after me.

  Alice had been a perpetual member of the class for fifteen years. Since she was charming and funny, everybody loved her. She usually came to hug and kiss everybody in the class, saying, "God bless you!" She was the lady who made me get used to being hugged and kissed. When she didn't come into the class, I missed her. One day, I said to myself as I looked at the door of the classroom, "Alice hasn't come in yet today, has she?" Rose heard that and teased me, saying, "You must miss being kissed, Yuko."

  Muriel was a lively, beautiful person. She looked young for her age. When she was very happy, I felt as if I caught some of her happiness. She was also creative, making a new type of baby doll with a ready-made rubber face and hands, with one hand holding a bottle.

  Betty was ninety years old, I think. She made a pretty doll for her three-month-old great-great-granddaughter. Betty stitched the doll and dress quickly and finished them neatly. One morning, a few weeks later, she was sitting in the class when I entered the room. As she recognized me, she stood up, tottering a little and said, "I can't make dolls anymore, but I came here to see you." Walking slowly with her cane, she left the class. I instinctively bowed my head to that respected
lady who had given me a moment of honor.

  Dora hadn't returned to the class since she had gone home holding her big doll in a shiny red dress. Hilija, who had gone home with a baby doll, and another lady who liked kewpie dolls hadn't come back either, and I missed them.

  ON DECEMBER 6, 1989, the doll-making class welcomed a new lady who looked to be in her late eighties. She didn't seem to want to join the class herself. Elaine, the director of the senior citizens center, and the lady's middle-aged son talked to her as if they were coaxing a child into the hospital. In the end, the elderly mother agreed to observe the class for the time being, and so she took a seat. As soon as Elaine and the lady's son left the room, most members of the class who had waited impatiently started speaking to her at the same time. The lady was from Hungary and seemed to be unable to speak English fluently, as Elaine had explained. She sat with a look of confusion upon hearing the ladies' welcomes fill the room.

  When I began to cut the fabric for the dress for Muriel's baby doll at the table by the window, Rose, who had been sitting with her back to me, suddenly stood up and went over to the Hungarian lady. Rose weakly smiled at the lady and then touched her shoulder. Crouching a little, she began speaking eagerly to the timid-looking lady. As the ladies' welcome speeches came to an end, I went back to my work and started to pin two pieces of fabric together, listening to the words of Rose behind me. The voice sounded beautiful but painful. The previous week Rose's brother and her favorite nephew had died. Even if she might have been the most suitable person for soothing the lonely newcomer, I thought, she didn't have to put on a good show. There hadn't been enough time to heal her sadness yet. When I turned around, however, I saw Rose beaming. If I had been an American woman, I wouldn't have hesitated to hug her saying, "Oh, Rose, how great you are! I am proud of you," just as she used to do for me. I, a shy woman, could do nothing but smile at her with all my heart. I realized that there were some customs that are hard to change no matter what the circumstances are. Even if I wouldn't be able to have her comprehend how much I thought of her, this was my way. However, Rose quietly smiled back and nodded twice as if she understood what I thought. In the room filled with women chatting, I felt at that moment as if Rose and I stood in a special, still place, facing each other.

  Other members of the class also were people who might have experienced many sorrows in their long lives. Nevertheless, they were always cheerful and genuine about their feelings. They were especially open to newcomers. I, too, was a Japanese volunteer who had been welcomed warmly to this Senior Citizens Center two years earlier. The newcomer that day didn't have the shape of a cherub with wings, or a bow and arrow like the ones you see in pictures, but in my mind she had been as helpful as a Cupid. She made the class lively, Rose regain her confidence, and me believe that the differences between two cultures didn't matter as long as we trusted in each other. All of these, however, originated in the most admirable characteristic that Americans have: hospitality. The class was full of love that day.

  These accounts were from the doll-making class at the Senior Citizens Center, Teaneck, New Jersey, before Christmas of 1989. Then the class welcomed newcomers Eileen, Ruth, Evelyn, and two ladies named Hazel. A new instructor, Yoko, also joined us.

  AMERICANS, generally speaking, seem to be a people who essentially love freedom. So far as I saw during my five-year stay in America, they were apt to do what they liked in any given situation, even while they were driving. It seemed that they were willing to carry out most of their routines, except for going to the bathroom and to bed, at the risk of their lives.

  One chilly afternoon in December 1989, on the way back home from Manhattan to Fort Lee, New Jersey, I took a New Jersey Transit bus from the Port Authority Bus Terminal on 42nd Street. I sat down on the front seat on the right side. The bus left soon and passed through the Lincoln Tunnel. When the bus came to a hill, the driver let go of the wheel with his left hand which had also been holding a wad of money that passengers had paid. He then removed his right hand from the steering wheel too. As I looked on in disbelief, he held the wad again tightly with his hands and began to count the bills. In Japan I had never seen such a terrible scene, bus drivers doing another job without holding the steering wheel while they were driving. The lives of about forty passengers—including my own—should have been in his hands, but the money was there instead. The bus kept moving ahead. I fixed my eyes on the daredevil driver's fingers, which were leisurely turning over the bills one by one instead of holding the steering wheel. Eventually I could see that he hadn't let go of the steering completely: He was using his elbows to steer the bus! He glanced ahead sometimes, too, but none of these things reassured me. "One, two, three . . . thirty-eight," holding my breath I counted the number of bills with him. I prayed he would finish his performance as soon as possible—and then he started recounting the money to make sure, like a slow bank clerk! What's more, no American passengers around me seemed to care about the driver's risky behavior. Almost unintentionally I turned to get a look at the oldest man in the group. I expected that elderly people, in general, should be expert in dissuading people from doing wrong, as I used to rely on my older brothers and sisters to take care of problems for me. The ruddy-faced old man noticed me and smiled and then nodded as if he fully understood what I wanted to ask him. Even if there were some differences between Americans and Japanese, I thought at that moment, we could have mutual understanding as human beings. I felt relieved at last. "Hey!" the old man bravely said to the driver on behalf of all the rest of the passengers, "Hey, you made money, did you?"

  On a bright morning in May 1990, near the middle of the downhill part of Fort Lee Road in New Jersey, my car was in a traffic jam because of some construction work. As cars slowed down on the slope, I could see the smoke of a cigarette rising from the slightly open rooftop window of the car ahead of me. The sunlight streamed through the gentle green leaves over the road. When I opened the windows, a fragrant breeze blew across my face. Some cars honked their horns. Most of the drivers passing by seemed to become irritated. I, too, became nervous in this irregular situation. When my car and the one behind mine proceeded to a level part of the road, I looked in my rearview mirror and saw a handsome man smiling and holding something brown. He seemed to be playing a guitar while driving.

  After the experience with the bus driver, I wasn't surprised to see a driver doing something else while he was driving. However, I got confused again when I saw that he was using neither his elbows nor the lower part of his arms to steer his car. In my mirror he seemed to be singing a song accompanying himself on a guitar, as if he were enjoying the most beautiful season of the year. He opened the window as he found an audience before him, not under a shady tree but in a traffic jam. Afraid of being involved in an accident, I couldn't enjoy listening to him. The palms of my hands started perspiring as I worried about this crazy man colliding with my car. When we approached the construction site, I thought he would surely be warned against such stupid behavior by those who were directing the traffic around there. His voice was so beautiful that it made me feel sad. Cars proceeded at a snail's pace to where the work was being done. His song and the sound of the guitar aroused curiosity from the men at work along the street. There was a policeman there just as I had thought. With a look of keen interest he approached the car behind mine in a more authoritative manner than I had expected. What I heard as I left, however, was the officer saying in a loud voice to the musician, "Fantastic!"

  On a depressing morning in June 1991, at home in Japan, I found an article titled "California Commuters Find Ways to Pass the Time" in The Japan Times* The article was about ways to overcome the boredom of long drives, citing many examples including a report from Peter O'Rourke, Director of the California Office of Traffic Safety. It opened my eyes to the fact that my two previous experiences in the United States had been matters of everyday occurrence for Americans. According to the article, people shave, put on makeup, drink coffee, eat breakfast, read
the paper, talk on the car phone, play musical instruments using their knees to steer the car, exercise by pushing their body against their seat belt or working their face and neck muscles by making grimaces, floss their teeth, and so on—all while they are driving their cars! Even though I still thought that such behavior invited traffic accidents, I couldn't help but be impressed with the Americans' free way of thinking.

  In the year and a half since I returned to Japan, I have never seen such breath-taking scenes like the ones I saw in the United States. At most, bus drivers in Japan will politely raise their right hand with a white glove to the forehead to greet another bus driver as their two buses pass each other. Consequently, I can comfortably doze in the bus seat. Yet, because I have been influenced by the risky way Americans drive, the safety of the Japanese way now sometimes bores me to death.

  Footnote

  * The Japan Times, June 27, 1991.

  ON JUNE 22, 1989, during the fifth year of our family's sojourn in Fort Lee, our older son was graduated from Fort Lee High School a year early, as an accelerated student.

  The reason he rushed was that he wanted to go back to Japan and start his college life with his old Japanese friends beginning in April 1990. In Japan, school begins in April, and he would have been a senior at a high school there from April 1989 to March 1990. He liked the United States, but I think he was unable to bring himself to accept social problems such as drugs and teen pregnancy, which he heard about and saw around him in his high school.