Cutting Back

by Leslie Buck

  Trying to stylize the pines that fall day in the monk’s garden was like uncovering an intricately woven basket hidden inside a haystack. Pines grew so much stronger and thicker here than in California. In spring, pines send up a long, thin shoot that looks like a candle. In late spring, the candles open up into a cluster of needles, called a whorl, that radiate from one stem. A California pine’s candles only grow about two to four inches a year. In that same time, Kyoto candles grow a foot and a half! Hence spring styling in Kyoto looks dramatic. To top this off, the men paid incredible attention to small details. Kei told me, “I leave fifteen to seventeen needle pairs per whorl at the tops of pines. As I move down, I prune out fewer and fewer needles.” I had a hard time believing his exact needle count, so I climbed up one of the monks’ pines and counted the needles myself. Sure enough, despite the fact that Kei worked like a Cuisinart, every top whorl indeed held fifteen to seventeen needle pairs. A professional pruner must think about that day’s finished look, the next year’s growth, the growth five years from then, and, on top of this, way into the future. I felt beaten.

  I practiced counting needle clusters for a while and felt I’d gotten it when I looked over at Kei’s tree. He was hardly styling his tree at all! In fact, he was leaving his pine as thick as I normally did in California. In contrast, my pine looked way more stylized and overpruned. If I pruned a tree too much back in California, my bonsai teacher Mas would tell me, “Your tree looks a little cold.” Bonsai teaches the aesthetic pruner how to hold back, to humble oneself, so the plant has some say. Working on bonsai is perfect training for the landscape pruner; if I even slightly overpruned a two-foot bonsai tree, there wouldn’t be much left! I looked around the Kyoto monks’ garden and saw that the men were leaving the styled pines thicker and fluffier than I’d seen them do in other gardens. I must have missed out on instructions earlier in the day. Some clients just like the pines thicker, sometimes the scene calls for a thicker tree, or occasionally the client just doesn’t want to pay for super stylized pines. “Why didn’t Kei say anything to me?” I moaned, frustrated. I’d done as I was told yet continued to fail.

  Clouds loomed most of the day, and just after lunch it began to rain, then pour. Boom! Lightning struck nearby. Light flashed on the darkened pines, and yet the men continued to work. We worked for four hours in the downpour without a break. My thick plastic rain suit kept me protected, except for the water and sweat dribbling down my arms. I felt chilled, but as long as the men kept going, I would too. Near four o’clock, Nakaji came over one more time to yell at me. Three feet away, he had a lot of reprimands and corrections to give, his lips moved energetically, but I couldn’t hear a word he uttered with all the rain and thunder. I did my best to yell loudly, “Hai! Hai!” and tried to do something really fast that looked different. My cloth jikatabi shoes got soaked, but eventually Bossman motioned me over to the truck and handed me a pair of plastic jikatabi rain boots. Stoic Masahiro wore his soaking shoes till dusk.

  Changing into the rain boots in the dry car while the men continued to work, I hung on to a few precious moments of protection from the crazy men outside, the relentless downpour, the thunder crashing around us, and the lack of anything I’d ever known. The car became a haven where I could hear my thoughts and encourage myself to continue. The new shoes felt good thanks to a cherished extra pair of dry socks in my bag. I hung out in the warm car a few seconds longer than needed, then headed back out.

  Surprisingly, I look back on that day at Tenryuji as a peaceful one. Birds chirped early in the morning, then hid out somewhere during the rainstorm, probably cleaning themselves delightfully. They may have liked their impromptu shower in their Kyoto tree bathhouse. The monks served us individually wrapped mochi, small balls of pounded rice filled with sweet bean paste, lightly dusted in rice flour. We also ate mochi on sticks, dipped in a sweet dark brown sauce. I called them mochi shish kabob; the men called them dango.

  While drinking steaming hot tea during the last break, under the shelter of a wooden temple building, I placed a soft, flour-dusted mochi ball against my cheek and thought about how I must have felt as a baby while nursing. I’m certain this was not the traditional way to handle mochi, but it felt good! Kei said that when people visited the monks they brought food and drink offerings, which the monks passed on to us. Thank you, monks and monk visitors! The monks left the trays discreetly behind a special sliding door. As we tended the garden, we could hear their rhythmic, monotone chants and drumming coming through the walls of nearby buildings, pulsating through the rain. Their prayers surrounded us: clip-yell-chant-pound, clip-yell-chant-pound, clip-yell-chant-pound, strike.

  Communicating in Silence

  “Otsukaresama!” the men shouted to the other male workers who strode assuredly through the office door each morning. The exact definition of this phrase eluded me; perhaps it was a mix of “Good morning!” and “Welcome back!” and “Dude!” I never quite knew the exact meaning of the word, nor did I use it. I just left it for the men. But any time I heard it shouted, I’d still feel the excitement of an old friend returning home. I learned this phrase by witnessing the interaction directly, without verbal explanation, and in this way I learned many things from my crew.

  Uetoh employees returned that day from the Tokyo landscaping project. Unfamiliar faces showed up in the office. Everyone began talking at once. Uetoh builds gardens throughout Japan and in countries around the world, including Germany, the Americas, and China. Sometimes they design the gardens and then build them, and sometimes they just do the installation. I explained to Kei how in the United States, landscape architects are given more societal respect and pay than installation crews, who often have little aesthetic training. Kei explained, “It is not considered shameful to be a garden builder in Japan.” He continued, “First a landscape architect designs the garden. Then the builder of the garden makes changes to the design as the garden is installed. The two have equal skill, control, and pay.”

  One of my clients in California had a plan made of his garden by a famous Japanese garden landscape architect, but then chose to hire an unskilled construction crew to build the garden, following these plans. The garden cost him almost a million dollars, and it looked as though children had overseen the piling of rocks. I felt so sad looking at that garden. If he had a limited budget, he should have done the opposite and hired a skilled installation crew who understood plants, rock placement, and the overall design of a garden, and skipped having the landscape beautifully drawn on a piece of paper. A simple sketch could help homeowners on a tight budget. Of course, larger, more prestigious gardens need both talents working together. But the skill of the garden builder is the basis of landscaping a Japanese garden.

  After dozens of bows were exchanged, the craftsmen caught up on news while running equipment to the trucks—all while taking side glances at the American. I felt even more the odd one out than usual. I clambered into the truck next to Kei, wondering how the men could keep up their high-spirited banter at seven in the morning. As we left the company property and sped onto city streets, the men gradually became more silent, until they sat as quiet as churchgoers. Praying to the god of safe driving? I wondered.

  In fact, the craftsmen preferred silence most of the time. The ongoing friendly chitchat between my American gardener friends and me did not exist for Japanese craftsmen. They seemed intent on trying to outdo each other in pruning, speed, and effort, with hardly a word exchanged. That quiet morning, as we moved along the streets of Kyoto, chilly air seeped into the truck and nudged its way through my two layers of fleece sweaters. I’d arrived in Kyoto at the tail end of summer, and early autumn coolness had silently caught up with me. Slanted fall sunlight extended long, crisp shadows onto garden paths. The colors in trees and flowers, previously washed out by summer’s brightness, intensified and deepened as we moved into November. Kei bumped into me occasionally when the truck swerved. Our accidental contact reminded me of how little human connection I’d
had of late. Like many of my Southern relatives, I’m used to hugging friends and touching people’s arms when I talk to them. None of this could I do in Japan. I had to sit up straight and never speak of my emotions. I felt lucky to find a friendly coworker like Kei. I relied on him to help me navigate the craftsmen with his translation skills, and, as a result, he’d become a familiar face amid foreignness. Yet I noticed that Kei was particularly silent that day. I wondered why but let it go. Most of the time, working with the men, I felt both surrounded and alone. Regular friendly chitchat existed only in my thoughts.

  As soon as we arrived at the monastery, everyone ran off to their various assignments. If I’d studied the language more, I’d have known what to do. Nakaji gave instructions while driving. Then he gave more detailed instructions while Kei put his shoes on. Kei always waited till the last minute to slip on his jikatabi, even though he could have done this in the car. I waited against the car’s warm hood until I heard some movement and found Masahiro behind the truck, untying ladders. He looked up nervously as I approached. I asked him in rudimentary Japanese, “Me . . . take the ladders off . . . the truck?” He responded rapidly with multiple unintelligible sentences. I stared at him. How hard is it to say yes or no? In my thoughts, I waved my mental shears threateningly at him. I attempted to translate his words and figured he’d said, “I’m just untying ropes right now. We’ll take the ladders off later.” So I went back to leaning against the front of the truck to stay out of his way.

  Then Masahiro jogged past me with a ladder in each hand. Well, does he want me to help or not? I vented. I reached for a ladder to follow him, but the young apprentice turned around, ineptly thunking a ladder against a tree trunk, and shooed me away. He mimed for me to stay put. Stoic Japanese gardeners can be trying.

  He continued to run past me, back and forth, unloading equipment. I grew impatient and felt tempted to glare at him. Don’t do it, Leslie, I lectured myself, trying to be mature. You’re not supposed to show anger. Even furrowing one’s brows in confusion looks like out-of-control anger to someone in Japan. Instead, I averted my eyes each time Masahiro passed. I figured that when visible methods fail, resort to passive-aggressive behavior. Bossman popped his head out of the bushes, ordering me, “Matsu!” (pine). I tried to follow him, but he’d already disappeared. I returned to my companion, the truck.

  Finally Masahiro turned up and signaled for me to follow him. I stomped impatiently down the path behind him. He led me to a big pine, which I examined. A tall extension ladder rested in a crazy position against a trunk almost two stories tall, with all kinds of ropes securing it in a way I never could have figured out. I realized that while I’d been having a meltdown by the truck, Masahiro had been prepping my ladder for me to climb safely. He’d probably been ordered to do this task by Nakaji but didn’t know how to tell me. Poor Masahiro, caught between a commanding Japanese boss and an equally commanding American woman. The young pruner mimed for me to prune the pine, something I figured he was dying to do himself. Regretting all my previous thoughts, I put a pleasant look on my face and responded, “Hai!” He wished me “Gambatte!” as proud as a Boy Scout who’d just earned his ladder badge, and ran off. While in Japan, I thought gambatte meant “good luck.” Only later did I learn it meant “don’t give up,” which is a much more craftsmanlike way of thinking.

  After I’d completed the upper branches on the tall pine—quite poorly, in my opinion—Nakaji grunted and led me over to another pine with a beautiful extended lower branch of six feet. This pine stretched its limbs out on a small hill, like a dancer on a raised stage, accompanied on either side by sizable rocks sunken in the earth. It faced a large living room window just four feet away. Is he crazy? I thought, looking from the pine to the close proximity of the window. The pine was clearly the garden’s masterpiece, the focal tree. No matter how poorly I felt I’d done on one pine, Nakaji would offer me another one, even more challenging.

  I was instructed to work on the lowest, most elaborate branch first, so I took a deep breath. After I’d done a fair bit of thinning, Nakaji came over to inspect. For the first time in a month, he decided to give me detailed feedback. He gestured wildly, pointed to particular areas, going on for a while, while I stood still, unable to understand his words but knowing I’d completely messed up. I couldn’t resist my desire for an interpretation of his critique, so I looked around for Kei. “Kei, Kei!” I discovered him hiding behind a shrub across the garden, close enough to have heard. He hesitated as though he didn’t understand, then shrugged and walked over to where Nakaji waited impatiently. No turning back now.

  I placed my yellow dictionary into his hands with an encouraging, appreciative look, and he opened it in search for words. I waited apprehensively, excitedly. I’d never received direct feedback from Nakaji. “Nakaji said,” Kei spoke with clear enunciation, “your pine looks as though it were blown by the wind.” Hm, I reasoned, blown by the wind could mean good or bad. After all, there is a tree style in bonsai called shakan, windswept. Then Kei flipped through the dictionary, to the back, then the middle, his face constricting with concentrated effort. “I have it,” he said. “Tortured,” he proclaimed. “Nakaji said your branch looks tortured. Blown by the wind and tortured.”

  Kei and I looked straight into each other’s eyes for a few seconds and burst out laughing. I had to appreciate his honesty. When I was twelve, I baked my first homemade bread. I asked my sister how she liked it. My sister took a hammer and hit the loaf, hard. I can still hear the bang! bang! as the hammer hit the hard-as-a-brick loaf while we both laughed uncontrollably. Her attempt at humor in the face of complete failure still makes me smile. The pine branch looked equally dire, but the message had been delivered with poetic grace. No wonder Kei had been resistant to help. I cringed inwardly as his words sunk in.

  Learning pine pruning through trial and error felt like physically wrestling with an idea for a while before taking it on. It took longer than it would have had Nakaji just given me a few sentences of explanation ahead of time, but the lesson stuck; it became entrenched in my being. I might also ask myself how I’ve learned about the most intimate matters, such as sex. Through a book? Or by trying, failing sometimes, and trying again until it felt right for me? Trial and error is an intimate learning process.

  Once when I tried to ask the curator, Sadafumi, a question about gradual pruning to encourage atmosphere at the Portland Japanese Garden, he hesitated a second, then told me, “Leslie, in Japan we so rarely teach verbally, we often don’t even know how to give feedback. One cannot expect to find good teachers in Japan; an apprentice must instead be the good student.” I tried to hide my disappointment over Nakaji’s “tortured pine” remark, so I maintained a “no biggie” look on my face. No frown, no smile. I looked over the previously fluffy pine branch, and indeed it looked bare. Back to the drawing board.

  With American instincts, I asked Kei how I could improve. After much head tilting, he said I’d pruned the branch too flat instead of leaving it fluffy and mounded. He also said I wasn’t pruning gracefully enough. One of the lessons I teach my beginning pruning students is, “Follow the line of a tree from trunk to outer branches. The thickness decreases gradually, from coarse to fine. Make sure that as you prune, the remaining branches transition gradually and gracefully.” Kei’s branches looked like a river with a delicate network of connecting streams. My branch looked like a choppy ocean on a day when the wind kept changing directions.

  Kei suggested that I take out larger branches rather than pruning out many little ones. He abruptly cut off advice time by saying, “Anyway, Leslie, you must understand that Nakaji speaks in an old-fashioned, thickly accented dialect. None of us can understand him most of the time.” He walked off. I took that to mean, “Don’t ask me for any more translations.” Nakaji led me over to work on a pine far in the back of the garden. I held back my tears, still trying to see failure as an opportunity to learn. It just felt hard to be wrong every day.

 
When the announcement of morning tea came, I could have kissed the mossy ground. We sat in a covered bench area while Masahiro brought over tea and a plate of large round purple plums. I curiously picked one up to inspect. I tried to do so slowly so as not to appear greedy or impatient. I’d had enough of standing out for one day. I tasted the plum. It was not a plum, but a huge grape with seeds! Wow, the power of genetic selection. I asked myself, Just how do the guys eat grapes and handle the seeds? Hold on a few seconds, Leslie, and watch, I thought as I sat back quietly, eyeing them closely.

  Bossman, definitely the manliest man on the crew, with the creases and wrinkles of someone who has lived life in earnest, popped the grapes one at a time into his mouth, chewed them up, swallowing the fruity part and spitting the seeds and skin out forcefully on a newspaper placed between his spread legs. Hm, I cringed inwardly, I don’t think I should do that.

  I watched the next senior worker, Toyoka. I thought he might be a good role model. Toyoka, new to the crew that day, was fairly tall and slender and surprisingly strong. He spoke with a beautiful clear voice that did not insist on your respect but assumed it. The men looked up to him. He was the calmest and most polite gardener I’d ever met. Toyoka slowly peeled the grapes one by one, eating the naked fruit peacefully and then gently spitting the seeds into a cloth napkin folded neatly in his hand. Okay, that seemed more doable, but peel the grapes? I’m a delicate woman, but a hungry delicate one! And I didn’t happen to have a cloth napkin. The other guys followed suit, peeling each grape before eating it. I couldn’t believe my eyes. They worked as hard as soldiers, and then peeled grapes while sipping green tea from tiny cups. I felt it was precisely this ability of theirs, to manage both the most delicate and the most physically demanding tasks at the same time, that enabled them to build and maintain the highest-quality gardens in the world.