by Lee Welles
“Come!” the otter said, the command sounding not so much like Ojisan, but somehow more like her mother. “I will teach you how to listen even better.”
The otter’s rump disappeared over the dune and Miho sighed. Part of her felt that this was absolutely nuts, thinking you could hear an otter talk and then following it down to the sea. But then again, this was what her family had always done—listened and followed the minds in the water.
Miho scrambled over the dune and found the otter hopping and splashing about in the white, sparkling remnants of waves that crawled their way up the beach. “I see why you humans are always flocking to my beaches—this kind of tickles!” The otter dropped and rolled a bit in the sand.
“Okay, otter. I’m here and I’m listening. But if all you are going to do is recommend vacation destinations, I’m leaving.”
“Oh my dearest, I would not waste this much energy to crunch myself up into this tight little body, only to chat with a child about the wonders of beaches! Oh no. I am here because I have heard you and I know you have heard me.
You heard me every time you went to sleep listening to the waves come to shore. You heard me when you turned your ear toward the horizon and heard the breath of the whales. You heard me when you sat on your boat and listened to the sea birds cry and call. I am Gaia. I am the whole of the earth. And, the earth is the sea, the river, and the rain.”
Miho took a moment to turn all those words over in her mind and then asked, “What do you mean, ‘the earth is the sea, and the river and the rain?’”
The otter tilted her head and looked both cute and a bit frightening at the same time. “Swim with me and I will tell you. Trust me and I will teach you. I will teach you to talk to the dolphins and understand the whales.” The otter turned and slipped its sleek body into the water with barely a ripple.
That was all Miho needed to hear. She kicked off her shoes and dove into the surf. The tide had turned and the pulse of the waves was heading back out to the deep. Miho fixed her eyes on the little round head and began to swim.
It was hard to see. The moon was only half full and the lights of Goza did not crawl too far from shore. Miho was swimming hard, but Gaia was pulling further and further ahead. Finally Miho stopped and began to tread water.
“Gaia! Hey! I can’t swim that fast!”
Gaia’s head disappeared and a moment later popped up next to Miho. “Oh! I see! I guess those long arms and legs would slow you down. Hmmm. Well!” Gaia said, her voice sharp with the certainty of decision. “Tonight, I shall simply have to swim slower. But I will have to find you some help. The water is wide and we simply can not have you puttering along like a manatee now, can we?”
“But why, Gaia?” Miho couldn’t hold back the question. “Why do I have to go fast? Why are you talking to me? Why didn’t you just talk to my mother? She would’ve listened.” Miho swallowed hard and tried not to look at the image of her mother’s dark eyes and bright smile that danced in her mind.
Gaia sighed and began to float on her back, her webbed front paws folded across her chest and otter toes poking from the water. Miho wished she had her own thick pelt to keep her warm and keep her afloat. They rose and fell over the swells.
“I am Gaia. I am the whole of the earth. However, I can no more control every part of myself than you can control the fifth cell in your pinky toe.”
Pinky toe? My pinky toe? Miho imagined her feet churning and dangling into the night sea and tried not to think of the many sea creatures that might find such a toe a tasty novelty.
Gaia continued. “Your whole life you have been listening—listening to the whales, to the waves, to the streams, and the patter of raindrops. You have made these sounds part of your own thinking and that is why I need you now. I need your help.”
“But why? Why can’t you just help yourself?”
“Could you help yourself if someone cut off your hands?”
Miho thought of her hands churning and dangling in the night sea and, again, tried not to think of those same sea creatures that would come back for her hands after they had snacked on her feet.
Gaia’s voice grew louder. “Could you help yourself if someone filled your lungs with smoke?”
Miho thought of Oji and the fact that he chose to fill his lungs with smoke, many times a day. She frowned at the thought and then wondered why Oji couldn’t help himself stop.
“You humans are doing so many things to me, things that are beginning to cripple me, hurt me. These pains are growing deeper and more widespread and to me, each of you is smaller than the fifth cell of a toe.You are more like an electron in that cell.You are so very small, but you are also part of me. If I am hurting, then you are hurting too. If I die, then you will die too.”
The waxing moon glinted off Gaia’s dark otter eyes and Miho saw that they welled with tears. Miho’s own eyes moistened. She knew the deep pain of death. And yet, underneath the idea of death was the expanding and contracting notion of being part of Gaia and Gaia being part of her.
Gaia’s voice skipped softly over the waves. “If you help me now, you help yourself too.” They bobbed in the black water as Miho considered Gaia’s words. She felt so very small in the vastness of the sea. She had felt this small before. Under the water, she rubbed the raised Hokusai-scar and reminded herself that she could be small and still be brave.
“OK. I don’t completely know what you are talking about, but my…” Miho had to swallow hard to continue. “My Dad always said that you could only really see nature if you were patient.”
“Ahh, my dear, this is true. But to be one with the water, you can’t hope to see. Eyes are no good to you; you must learn to listen. This is why I bring you out at night, so you will let go of vision and trust your ears.” Gaia turned and continued to swim slowly to the west.
She finally climbed out onto a rocky beach, shook, and sent sea water spraying in all directions. Miho wished she could shake too. She would warm up quicker. “Find a large rock, my dear, one about the size of your head,” Gaia said. Miho looked around the beach and saw a rock meeting that description. She went over and gave a grunt as she hoisted it up to hip level. “Like this?” she asked.
“Yes, now bring it into the water.”
“But Gaia, I can’t swim with a rock!”
“You don’t need to swim; you need to sink!”
Gaia was already out past the low, foaming break of waves. Miho shuffled over the stones and back into the water. The rock felt a bit lighter in the water, but she had to squeeze it to her belly to keep from dropping it. “Now,” Gaia continued, sounding very much like a schoolteacher, “take a deep breath and sit down on the bottom. Place the rock on your lap so you can sit still, and then listen.”
Miho held the rock and dropped to the bottom. The pebbles and stones on which she sat made a gravelly growl as they rolled to and fro. The waves themselves made a sort of low growl and hiss, as if they were alive.
On top of the big, obvious sounds of water and shore dancing together, Miho heard little snaps and pops. Miho knew these to be snapping shrimp, clacking their claws to stun their prey. Underneath the sound of the waves rolling the rocks was the far-off pulsing thrumming of a ship.
Miho was out of air, so she braced her feet against the rock and pushed up to the surface. Her lungs drank in sweet night air and she turned to see Gaia, floating toes up. “So?” Gaia asked, the question sounding like the pause before a storm.
“I heard the waves and the rocks and some snapping shrimp and a ship. But, I’m not sure where the ship is, the sound kinda comes from all around.”
“Again,” Gaia commanded.
“Why?”
The sharp look Gaia shot at Miho was followed by an early breaking wave that knocked Miho in the head and sent her rolling off her rock. “Again,” Gaia said, her voice so soft it seemed to only be a hint of sea spray.
This time, Miho didn’t ask why. She primed her lungs and sank again. She noted all the things she had
heard before and then opened her ears and her mind to more.
There seemed to be a very high twitter, twitter, snap! Twitter, twitter, snap! Miho sensed that further down the beach, the waves were bigger and hitting the rocks with a bit of a clap. The patter of water, rolling back off the rocks into the sea could also be heard. Now that she had been here a while, she realized what a noisy place this shoreline was!
Then it came, a sound so deep and low that it rattled her bones more than passed through her ears. A whale! It was a whale sending out a “ping!” A ping is a single boom that washes through the ocean, seeking another whale and Miho knew this sound! She again, braced her feet on the rock and popped up into the night air. “Gaia! There is a whale out there!”
“What else?” Gaia asked gently.
“Gaia, there is a whale out there! Can I see it? Will you teach me to talk to it?”
“There is more to the water than whales!” Again, the quick look that Gaia gave her was followed by a singular, early breaking wave that slapped Miho in the face and knocked her from her rock.
Miho understood. She shook the water from her ears and said, “I heard something that twittered twice and snapped once. I’m guessing that further down the beach the rocks and the waves get bigger, ‘cause I heard them too.”
“Better,” Gaia said. “Many fish signal and talk, but most people do not hear. You must learn to hear if you hope to learn the way of water. I am Gaia and I am water. You, my dear, are water too. Learn the way of water and you will learn all my secrets. You are the first; everything has come from the sea and is still connected to the sea.” And with that, Gaia rolled in her round, otter way and disappeared beneath the inky surface.
It was a long walk back to Ojisan’s, but Miho was kept busy with the many questions that sloshed to and fro in her mind. I am water? Is that like being Ama? What did she mean that I would learn her secrets? Such questions came and went like so many waves.
Inside Ojisan’s, Miho found that her uncle had rolled onto the tatami-covered floor and was now face down, breathing deeply. Miho got into dry clothes and pulled little stuffed Shinju from her backpack. She kissed her one-eyed friend and fell onto her futon. Sleep came at once, like the one big ping from the whale, and took her deep.
16
Heart of Japan
Miho was roused by the conflicting sounds of happy, chirping birds outside and low, pained groaning inside. She found Ojisan on one knee, with one hand on the table, trying to press himself up. She ran to grab his elbow and help him.
His eyes were squinted so tightly that she couldn’t see them and a sweaty smell clung to him like a fog. A low burp roiled up out of him, and Miho waved her hand to send the sour smell away from her face.
He shuffled toward the kitchen and gulped down some aspirin. He started toward his room, stopped, and turned to Miho. “We go home today.”
Miho was surprised. She thought O-bon was three days long. Surely there was more to do today. Besides, she couldn’t stand the thought of leaving this big open, airy house and going back to the tight, smelly confines of the apartment in Nagoya! Miho mustered her best Japanese and said, “Excuse me, I must have misunderstood. O-bon is only two days, yes?”
He held the wall as if the very act of being vertical was extremely difficult. He cleared his throat and said, “O-bon three days, but not necessary. Go today.”
Miho looked at the swaying, stinking uncle and sensed that he hadn’t forgotten; he just wanted to run away from Goza. He meant to go back to that hot, gray city. Who knew how long it would be before he would want to come back here; judging by the dust when they arrived, he didn’t come often.
“Ojisan,” Miho bowed briefly, as a precaution. “You look sick. We shouldn’t travel today.” Miho could just imagine what the dipping, rolling ferry ride would do to him!
“Noooo,” he growled. “Work tomorrow. Must work!”
“Tell them your new niece is here from America.” She fished for another reason. “Tell them your American niece got sick from sushi and you must stay here until she can travel.”
“You think lie okay?” His voice wavered and Miho sensed that he wanted to yell, wanted to think of her as a lying American girl.
“Ojisan.” Miho bowed a little lower this time. When she rose, she walked forward and reached out for his hand. He flinched when she took it, but his eyes finally opened fully and looked into her own. “You’re not well. How can you feel better on that ferry rolling back and forth? You might feel even worse on that rocking train.” He belched.
“You go sleep some more.” Miho still had his hand and led him toward his room. “You can visit some friends this afternoon and I will do what needs to be done to finish O-bon and…and, I’ll cook dinner! Just call your job. If you want, I can pretend to throw up in the background.”
Her Oji snorted, and then laughed out loud. Miho smiled back. This was the first time they had shared a smile. “OK. OK. I call, I sleep.” He pulled his wallet from his back pocket and poked her in the chest with it twice as he said, “You cook.”
He slapped the wallet into her hand, turned, and headed to his room. The door slid shut and Miho heard one more short laugh. She looked at the wallet and considered the possibilities. She was going to get to stay in Goza one more day! She wanted to make the most of it. Miho toyed with the idea that she could somehow convince her Oji that they should live here all the time.
But first, this is the last day of O-bon.What do I do? What do I cook? And how do I buy it; I barely speak the…And then she remembered that there was one other person she knew who could speak some English.
Miho showered and changed and slid Ojisan’s wallet in her back pocket. She slid his door open a crack, just enough to see that he was snoring softly, curled up on his side and looking almost like a child.
She thought of another thing she could do to make him happy and get him to stay in Goza. She grabbed his crumpled, empty cigarette pack off the floor, shoved it into her front pocket, and headed out into the bright, blue day.
Small, round clouds had risen from the sea and were now marching inland. Boats dotted the horizon and clusters of families already peppered the sandy beach. Miho walked down the road drinking in the tangy sea air and thinking, I want to stay, I want to stay.
She walked to the store where Mr. Tomikoro first proclaimed her “Ama.” As before, the little man was settled into a chair opposite the door, leaning forward onto the walking stick. The same woman was behind the counter, chattering away on the telephone. She glanced at Miho, then turned her back and faced the wall as if to say, “I don’t see you; therefore, I don’t have to serve you.”
Miho walked right up to the old man and bowed deeply. “Ohayo, Tomikoro-san.” He bowed his head in return. Miho dug through her mind for the right Japanese words and then gave up. She needed help and thought his English was probably better than her Japanese. “Sumimasen,” Miho said, meaning, ‘excuse me.’ “My Japanese is not very good, but I need some help today. Can you help me?”
He said, “Hai,” and pushed himself up from his chair. Miho was surprised. She hadn’t even told him what she needed help with! The woman behind the counter saw the old man rise and hung up the phone. “Chichi,” the shopkeeper began.
Miho knew that “chichi” meant “dad”—she was Mr. Tomikoro’s daughter! The two had a brief exchange of words that flew like birds over Miho’s head. His daughter shot Miho an angry look and retreated to the room behind the counter.
Miho began to explain the challenge of her situation. “You see, I never lived in Japan before. My parents…” Her thoughts and her voice stopped like they had hit a wall. How do I explain ‘Lost at Sea’? She swallowed hard, took a deep breath, and continued. “My parents…died. Well, now I have to live with my Oji, Kazuki Kiromoto. He lives in Nagoya. I don’t like Nagoya; it is noisy and hot and smells funny.”
She took another deep breath. “Anyway, I think Ojisan drank too much last night and he’s sleeping. He wante
d to leave today, but I told him to sleep and I would take care of whatever I need to do for O-bon. Except, I have no idea what you do on the third day of O-bon.”
Mr. Tomikoro looked at Miho without saying anything. A smile twitched the corners of his mouth. He pivoted around his walking stick and took small steps toward the back door that stood open next to his chair. He motioned her to follow.
Beyond the door, Miho was surprised to find a beautiful, small garden. There was a tree that looked like a maple, a little pond, and several large rocks that made you want to sit down for a spell. The back of the garden was a living wall of green bamboo. There were flat stones inlaid into the earth. Miho followed Mr. Tomikoro along this path to a single story building to the left.
Miho watched Mr. Tomikoro remove his shoes and step over the high threshold. As Miho slid her shoes off, she saw him bow low and long. When she stepped over the threshold, her breath caught.
The room had six small desks and one larger desk at the far end. At the other end, were long, low shelves. It was obviously some sort of classroom. But what stole Miho’s breath was the arrangement of items directly across from the door.
There was a space tucked back into the wall. Deep blue irises were set in vases at the bottom. From the top, there hung a long piece of paper with four jet black kanji symbols. The strokes that had made the kanji were not perfect or precise, but bold and energetic. Below them, lying sideways in a cradle of dark red wood was a sword. It was as if those kanji symbols could leap off the wall and wield that sword! Miho felt like she had entered the heart of Japan.
17
Sho-do
Mr. Tomikoro retrieved some items from the low shelves. As he walked back, he motioned for Miho to sit. He swiped the dust off the surface of her desk. He set down a dark-gray rectangular block of stone, about the size of a 16-pack of crayons; a squared-off well was carved down into the block. Next, he set a black, rectangular stick by the stone. Mr. Tomikoro then went to the front of the room, retrieved a small teapot and filled it with water from a corner sink.