by Lee Welles
As she labored through another attempt at “understanding,” Miho realized this was what her life was about now: understanding why her parents were gone, understanding this new country, understanding her uncle, understanding the way of the brush, understanding Gaia, and understanding the way of water and the minds within it.
She worked at the strokes until a whiff of food tickled her nostrils. The whole morning was gone! As they ate in the garden, Miho began to grasp just how much she didn’t understand: why Sensei’s daughter was living with him, why Ojisan was also alone—until now anyway. She didn’t understand why there were no Ama in Goza or how Sensei knew she was Ama. She didn’t understand how Sensei decided when her Shodo was good or bad. She may have courage, but working on understanding had left her feeling sort of stupid.
Miho sighed.
“What is it you want to ask?” Sensei asked. Miho didn’t answer right away; she was too surprised that he knew she was bubbling with questions. She thought about the best one to ask him at this moment. Questions about his daughter seemed too personal and questions about Ama would only lead to questions about Gaia and water and a host of other things.
“How do you know when the kanji I have made is good?” Miho asked in Japanese.
“This is a good question. Of course, all the lines must be correct or it would say something else! But when the kanji shows outside what you are on the inside, this is a very a good thing.”
“How does it do that?” Miho asked, sensing this was a good time to be direct with her questions.
Sensei held out his arm. With his other hand he slapped his head, his heart and his belly. “What is here and here and here,” he said as he slapped, “is energy. What you think and feel comes out here,” he said, grasping his outstretched hand in his other fist. “Same with sword.”
Sword? Miho tried to understand, tried to understand the connection between her brush and the sword that sat in its position of honor in the classroom. “Do you know how to fight with a sword?” Miho asked.
“Hai. And feet and hands and, most important, mind and heart.”
“Why is mind and heart most important?”
“When you fight with mind and heart, you find there are very few times you need fists or sword.” And with that statement, Sensei rose and bowed and headed into the store. Lesson over.
As she walked back to Ojisan’s, Miho thought how to take her shodo lesson, satoru satori, into the water with her. It was strange; she was just a kid and people like Mr. Hernandez had been studying this species of dolphins for decades, but she might already know more about them. Miho couldn’t wait to get out to sea with her friends!
Inside Ojisan’s, her phone was beeping. The text message said, “Be there Friday night. You OK?” Miho set to work on the tiny keys and typed, “I’m great! Miss you. Will have surprise on Friday.”
She didn’t know it until she typed it, but she had thought of a way to keep Ojisan in Goza. He said he worked in Nagoya because that was where the money was. But with her flippered friends and her newfound skills, Miho could find just as many, if not more, pearls and abalone than her grandmother ever had!
She hit ‘send’ and then walked quickly eastward, through Goza, to the mermaid cove. Today, she had a mission. She wanted to find so many pearls that Ojisan would want to stay in Goza forever. After all, the only time Miho had ever seen him smile was here, by the sea.
Again, the white-sides were waiting for her. She dove in and tried to share an image of what she wanted to find. But a dorsal fin was thrust into her hand and off they went. This time they went east, into the open ocean.
Miho soon found out why. They met up with an enormous group; the horizon practically boiled with the breaking dorsal fins! As Miho’s small group joined in, she was lost in the energy and conversation that flew around her.
Not only did images of what was around them constantly swirl by, but so did images of things that had happened, or maybe they were things to come—Miho wasn’t sure how you told the difference. She saw the births of babies and the unfortunate accident between a big male and a boat. She saw the location of great feeding grounds and then heard something that really shocked her.
The lags began to talk about humpback whales! They were imaging the whales leaving. Miho understood her new friends were wondering if the great-winged whales had started the journey to their Alaskan feeding grounds yet. Then they began to sing the humpback songs! Miho knew these songs! She had heard them so many times they were as familiar as the poetry her father liked to recite.
The lags had pitched the songs up a lot, but they were humpback songs, nonetheless. She longed to know how to ask questions. What did the songs mean? Why did they share them? Did every whale and dolphin in the ocean know and share the songs?
But it was like gossip in a grocery store. Soon the chatter turned to something else. After a time, the group split into several smaller groups and headed off in different directions. The calls that flew between the groups were about schools of fish and great ships and sunrises and sunsets. Miho thought that perhaps they were all setting out to find good feeding and would reconvene later to share information.
Miho found her hand grasping a familiar, star-marked dorsal fin. Shinju’s mother! Miho sent her images of oysters and pearls and soon the group turned north. Miho continued to dive and rise and breathe with the group, but didn’t know how to ask where they were going or what they were doing. It was almost like being lost in Nagoya!
Soon, they swam along an unfamiliar shoreline. There were no houses or boats or any landmarks for Miho to confidently remember where they were. Star and Shinju took Miho to a rocky outcropping. Miho climbed out, grateful for some time in the sun, out of the chilly water.
Notch was the first dolphin to show up with an oyster clasped between his black-lipped jaws. Sure enough, there was a pearl inside! Miho longed to know how to say, “Thank you.” Notch sped off, but as he did, a youngster with a strange zigzag to her white striping came, also with an oyster. Lightning, Miho thought. This was a good name for the speedy little girl with the odd stripe.
As Lightning returned to the depths, three males came. Miho noted the differences in their dorsal fins and dubbed them Curly, Larry, and Moe. She had seen them before; they were the ones who had chased off the shark. They were always together and always clowning around.
This odd parade continued until Miho’s pockets were stuffed with pearls. She was now dry and sweating in the afternoon sun and happy to get back into the cool, blue Pacific. She showed a picture of the mermaid cove to Star and they set off.
All the way back, Curly, Larry, and Moe took turns leaping over her just as she turned to breathe. More than once, they made her laugh and she got a mouthful of water. When she stopped to regain her breath, Shinju was always beside her. She talked to the little gray dolphin in English, just as she did to her stuffed dolphin at home. When they were underwater, Shinju, in turn, talked to Miho in Dolphinese. They were becoming friends.
It was hard to leave her friends in the cove. Miho knew she only had tomorrow and part of the next day to convince Ojisan to stay in Goza. She wanted to find enough pearls so he could quit his job in Nagoya. It was at that moment she realized she didn’t even know what kind of job he had, or if he liked it or not. Understanding, she reminded herself. It could be more important than courage.
Miho ate alone, with the stuffed Shinju sitting across from her. She spread the pearls out on the table and told her one-eyed friend about the massive crowd she had been a part of today. She told her about Lightning and Curly, Larry, and Moe and how the real Shinju liked to stay next to her. She told her old friend how her new friends passed around the songs of whales and how they had helped her find all these great pearls.
Miho cleaned her dishes and found a black lacquer bowl to put the pearls in. Then she fetched her phone and set it up in front of the bowl. She started the video recorder, ran around the table, and crouched down so that she was peering over the to
p of the bowl at the camera.
“Konbanwa, Ojisan! When you come back to Goza, I’ll have even more of these! I have some friends that are very good at finding them and they let me keep them all! I can’t wait until you come back. We can sell all these and maybe stay here always! I hope you’re OK too. I’ll see you Friday. Um, OK…” She paused, knowing what she would say if it were her parents, “…love you. Bye.”
She ran around and turned off the video. She sent the clip to Ojisan and then she started to worry what he might say back. So she turned off her phone and went to bed.
29
Curly, Larry & Moe
The next day, Miho was eager to get back to the dolphins. So eager, in fact, that Sensei stopped her shodo and asked her what she was doing. “Satoru satori,” she said.
He shook his head. “You make the lines, but where is your head?” Miho looked at her work. It did seem… thin. It lacked a depth and solidness that should come with “understanding.”
She rose and gathered her things. “I am sorry, Sensei. I have to go. I have something I have to finish before Ojisan gets back tomorrow.” He nodded, not asking for more information. Miho thought he was the coolest grownup she had ever known.
She cleaned her materials, grabbed a quick bite to eat at Ojisan’s, and then hurried to the mermaid cove. The dolphins were not there. Miho was disappointed. She looked out at the ocean. The wind that had traveled so many hundreds of miles across the water was whipping her hair back off her face and bringing the wonderful salty sea-smell to her nose. Ships dotted the horizon, and the call of sea birds punctuated the rhythmic slap of the swells coming into the mermaid cove.
She closed her eyes and turned her face to the sun that had not yet reached its midday zenith. The heat on her face was like a familiar hug and a good reason to relish diving into the still-shaded cove.
When Miho surfaced, there she was…Gaia! The otter bobbed over the swells and rubbed her paws together. Miho’s disappointment dissolved as she stroked over to Gaia. “Konnichiwa, Gaia-san,” Miho said and did her best to do an otter-like roll.
“Konnichiwa, Miho-san,” Gaia said and did a real otter roll. Miho wished she could be so sleek in the sea, like Gaia, like the dolphins.
“I see you have been listening and learning.”
“I have! Gaia, I…” Miho began, but Gaia held up one paw to silence her.
“I can tell you are learning and understanding more, having fun too, eh? But you need to be able to listen even deeper. If you are ever to go into my real depths, your deep listening is vital. Vital, do you understand what vital means?”
Miho chewed on the word. She knew that vital organs were the ones you really needed to live. “Vital are things you need for life, right? Like your heart and lungs and stuff?”
“Yes, precisely. Miho-san, your ears must be keen. Today you practice. Listen. Listen deeply.”
And with that, Gaia tucked herself into a gray, rolling ball, dove, and was gone. Miho stared at the ripples where Gaia had been and wondered what she should practice.
Listen, Gaia said. Deep listening.
Miho floated and thought about what she had learned from the lags. She could hear the pictures they sent her. She was able to speak, but probably sounded like a baby to them. She had just started to understand how to do sonar scans. Since sonar required the hardest listening, Miho decided to practice that.
She looked down and could see through the gray-green of the water only to her knees. The mermaid cove would have to do. She dove and kicked hard to the bottom. She had just started to scan with her feeble sonar when she had to come up for air. It was frustrating to be so pokey after the speed she had shared with the lags. She went under again.
She was surprised to find her mermaid cove covered with oysters! As her scanning improved, she was excited to find there were a dozen or so that had pearls hidden within—she would be able to stay in Goza for sure!
She was just getting the last of the pearl-containing oysters when three lags came streaking out of the gloom and almost gave her a heart attack! She was so startled she dropped the oysters and had to kick to the surface for air.
It was the Three Stooges, and they all had their heads out of the water. All three were whistling and chattering. Miho quickly got her breath and dove so she could better understand them.
Shark! They all talked at once, showing her the big tiger shark. Curly said, in Dolphinese, “Get out of the water!” Mo bombarded her with a command she didn’t know and Larry let out a warning squeal that made them all shut up and turn.
The shark was approaching! Mo again gave the command she hadn’t understood and a tremendous sound blasted out from the three dolphins. The shark swerved. Miho knew what this was. Mr. Hernandez had told her about the dolphin’s ability to stun prey with their sonar.
The tiger shark swerved away at that pulse, but it began to turn back! Part of Miho, her body, wanted to kick to the surface and get as far away from the shark as possible. The other part, her mind, remembered what her mother had taught her about acting like prey. She held her position.
The shark picked up speed and angled straight toward her! She curled her Hokusai hand into a fist. But instead of cocking her arm back to deliver a punch, which wouldn’t have been very powerful in the water, she brought the fist to her mouth.
The dolphins had their rostrums to help direct their sound, Miho had her Hokusai hand. The four of them pulsed their sound waves toward the shark. Miho would have laughed if she didn’t need to hold her air. It looked like the shark swam into a glass wall. Bonk! He floated for a moment, dazed. The Stooges let out what had to be the dolphin equivalent of a cheer. High fives all around!
Miho kicked to the surface. She looked down and saw the shark turn and swim, although a bit crookedly, back out toward deeper water. Curly, Larry, and Moe followed her up. She did her best to thank them.
Miho scanned them. Just as she could see into the oysters, she was able to see into her friends as well. She could see their bones, their organs, and even their beating hearts. The ability to see inside meant there was no lying in the world of dolphins. Each could see a faster heart rate or churning stomach.
Miho didn’t know her dolphin anatomy that well, but when her buzzing scan hit Curly, she saw what could have been his stomach or liver. It had odd bumps all over it. Some were quite large and had fingers reaching out toward other…vital organs.
She didn’t know what to do about this information, except swim over and wrap her arms around her new friend. She stayed there for a moment, feeling his heart beat against her chest. She didn’t know what else to say. It had been a long day in the water, and her mind was a muddied jumble of English and Japanese and Dolphinese. A simple hug would have to do.
30
Call Me
Miho ate a fine dinner of steamed oysters and sat with Shinju nestled under her chin. She stared at the two lacquer bowls filled with shimmering pearls. Would this be enough? Would Ojisan see that she could be a good Ama like his mother? Maybe she could be even better, because Gaia had given her the power to see right into those oysters! She was sure her Oji would know how to turn those pearls into money so they could stay in Goza.
In the back of her mind, a thought began to repeat, like a steady drip, plunking into a sink from a leaky faucet: Gaia said hurry. She wants you for something.What? What? What? Drip, drip, drip went the thought. And, like a dripping faucet, Miho soon tuned it out and focused on her immediate challenge.
What else would Ojisan want or need to stay here in his hometown? Perhaps Sensei would know. Besides, she needed to restock the pantry so she could make her uncle a great, “Welcome Home…Hint! Hint!” meal.
She set little Shinju aside and went out into the night. The ocean breeze was whisking the day’s heat away, and the waves were hitting Goza with a bit more energy. Miho knew that the day’s wind had whipped up the sea and all that energy had to go somewhere. She stopped to look out at the water. She thought about how
the ocean gathered energy from the wind and turned it into waves.
If there are wave-wishes from the sun, can there be windy-wave-wishes at night? Sure! She thought hard on the image of her uncle saying, “Of course we will stay in Goza!” She sent her wish out to the breaking waves, where the wind’s energy was released once again.
Tomiko was just starting to lock the door when Miho arrived. She shook her head at Miho. But Miho steepled her hands under her chin and made a face that meant, “pleeeeeease?”
With a roll of her eyes and a pursing of her lips, she cracked the door. “Go away! I’m tired. I’ve been working all day. Not that you know anything about working hard—spoiled, silly, hafu.”
Miho was shocked! Then she realized Tomiko was assuming Miho didn’t understand her fast, rude Japanese. But she did. She had…understanding. She paused to think, so she wouldn’t be rude back.
“I am sorry you think that a gaijin, like me, is spoiled or silly. I am neither. But I do wish to speak to your most honorable father, my Sensei. If it isn’t too much bother, could you tell him I am here?” Miho cast her eyes down and bowed. She should have bowed out of respect, but she did it to hide her smile.
Tomiko’s eyebrows shot up and her eyes got round as…well, pearls! She was speechless for a moment and Miho guessed that didn’t happen very often. When the middle-aged woman recovered her speech, she said, “I will not bother him! He isn’t well. As a matter of fact, there is no lesson tomorrow. You tire him out! Go home!”
And with that, she slammed the door and snapped off the light. Now it was Miho’s turn to be speechless. Is Sensei really sick? Maybe she just didn’t want me inside. I tire him out? Miho had walked there feeling hopeful. She walked back feeling dejected. She would just have to face Ojisan with what she had, what she knew, what she…understood.
She sat on the veranda and watched the waxing moon rise in the east. It beamed a lane of light across the inky sea. Miho, as always, wondered if a whale would appear. Thinking of whales made her think of dolphins, and soon she was thinking of the strange lumps she had seen in her friend, in Curly.