My Year of Dirt and Water

by Tracy Franz

  A few minutes later, though, my hand cramps, and I have to stop. Shaking out the pain, I watch Sensei at work on her own project—a huge serving platter. I’m beginning to appreciate the truly uncanny sense of balance she has, her understanding of what will hold and what will not. Perfection is a given; she makes everything look effortless. Sometimes I think true genius rests in the body and not the mind, or perhaps somewhere in-between—when there is no longer a translation from one to the other.

  Returning home after class, I find that Tozen has written me a brief email, from Alaska. It has been a long time. Do you remember our conversation? I think I will retire soon. I am ready. Maybe you will come home and your husband will be the new resident priest. It is time for a change.

  Friday, October 22

  Alone in my quiet townhouse, I spend the evening drinking tea and sewing in the tatami room upstairs, a warm sense of gratitude or accomplishment rising in my belly. Just after midnight, I’ve almost finished the rakusu’s main quilted section, the part that takes the most time and skill and concentration. When I spread the last few pieces on the floor in front of me, I have to rub my eyes. How can it be? The last bit of cloth is cut too short. Way too short. And this piece comes from the last of a bolt of fabric from the shop down the street. There is no spare from the same dye lot. The only person who has the exact same shade of indigo is a single monk, my husband, now sequestered on a different island.

  The postal system here is good, but not that good.

  Saturday, October 23

  After Japanese class, I attempt to locate Otani-sensei’s house near downtown Kumamoto City, a hand-sketched map held open in front of my nose. Despite the artistry of the priest’s drawing—or because of it—I am deeply and desperately lost in a labyrinth of narrow, tributary-like roadways and jigsaw resi-dences. Bicycles, K-cars, vending machines, sheltered Jizo statues, and bits of cultivated foliage seem to cling to every spare nook and cranny. I round a bend and nearly run into Sakamoto-san, who is standing in the middle of the street staring at a small two-story complex.

  “Oh, Tracy-san,” he says nonchalantly in English, as if expecting me to be there. “I think this is Otani-sensei’s house. On the second floor.”

  “You think? Didn’t you say that you visited her before?”

  “Yes. Many times.”

  “So is this her place or not?”

  “I think it is her house.”

  We climb the stairs and Sakamoto-san opens the door, steps inside, and announces himself, a Kumamoto custom that always feels like an invasion and leaves me a little disconcerted. I tentatively follow him in as soon as I hear and then see Otani-sensei emerge from another room. We put on slippers, and she beckons us to settle around the low table in the small main room. In one corner stands a full clothing rack and a dressmaker’s dummy on which a partially completed suits hangs, absent an arm and a lapel.

  “I am a seamstress in my spare time,” she explains.

  “It’s lovely,” I say, inspecting her careful work—the invisible stitches and precise creases—before settling into my cushion at the table.

  I begin to take out my things from my backpack and try to explain the problem with the cloth.

  “Let me see,” she says, then makes that familiar air-through-teeth sucking noise that can only mean one thing: I’m screwed.

  “It’ll be okay,” Otani-sensei assures me in slow, measured Japanese. “I’ll be back shortly. Help Famiri-boi with his sewing. Famiri-boi, you make coffee.”

  “Yes! I am coffee tenzo.”

  Otani-sensei tucks a bit of my cloth into her purse and then, in a swirl of gathered items and self-chatter, she is out the door.

  “Okay,” I say, “so I guess we’ll start on your rakusu.”

  “We have not yet chanted.”

  “What?”

  “We must chant before we begin.”

  “We’re not in a temple—surely we don’t need to? And besides, we don’t have the sutra.”

  “In my mind,” he says, tapping his head.

  “Oh good.”

  “I am happy you are happy.”

  “I am not happy.”

  “I do not understand you.”

  “Remind me to teach you the finer points of American sarcasm.”

  “In here,” he says, ignoring me. I follow him down the short hallway and enter a room in which Otani-sensei’s priest’s vestments hang from another clothing rack. Against the main wall of the room, an altar has been carefully assembled. A framed photo of a cat sits prominently next to the Buddha statue.

  “These are the bones,” says Sakamoto-san, pointing to a small ceramic urn.

  “She must have been very close to her cat.”

  “Yes.” A solitary, then. Like Sakamoto-san. Like me.

  We burn incense, chant, and bow to the bones of a much-loved pet.

  A short while later, Otani-sensei returns, a bag of new indigo cloth in her hands.

  “You must begin again—there is no other option.”

  “Argh.” I throw my hands over my face. Sakamoto-san, finding this amusing, begins to laugh and cannot stop.

  “Don’t worry. It gets much faster and easier each time you do it,” says Otani-sensei.

  “Maybe she should do mine, too,” offers Sakamoto-san. “For practice.”

  “Make coffee,” replies Otani-sensei.

  “Yeah, Famiri-boi,” I say. “Make coffee.”

  My lungs have begun to burn by early afternoon—I suspect the ghost of a black-and-white cat. I explain and Otani-sensei opens the glass doors in the big room, and I sit on the balcony in the warm afternoon sun, listening to bits and pieces of the conversation drifting in. Lots of scolding from Otani-sensei. Lots of (jokey? not jokey?) questions from Sakamoto-san. Mother and son, I think. Otani-sensei, softening into this other role, has perhaps taken on Famiri-boi as another of her projects.

  As I stand and stretch, from the nonstop conversation in Japanese emerges a single, clear sentence in English from Otani-sensei: “This is a chrysanthemum.” A burst of laughter from both of them when I lean in through the open door.

  Sunday, October 24

  At 7:30 a.m. I meet Sakamoto-san in front of Fujisaki Hachimangu, Kumamoto’s most famous Shinto shrine. After locking his bike in my van, we walk over to the nearby Rinzai temple to sit. It had been Sakamoto-san who got the idea to visit this temple; neither of us is sure what to expect. He is, as usual, cavalier and unafraid. I am, as usual in such situations, a ball of nervous energy. As we enter, the temple wife greets Sakamoto-san and then looks doubtfully at me. “The foreigner will need to remove her socks,” she says. And then for emphasis: “It is very rude to wear socks in a temple.” I look down. How could I have forgotten this detail?

  “I’m so, so sorry,” I say in Japanese as I remove the offending items and tuck them into my shoes.

  “Does the foreigner speak any Japanese?” she asks Sakamoto-san.

  “I speak a little, though I’m not good,” I answer in Japanese.

  “The service will be in Japanese only. We do not offer English for foreigners.”

  Sakamoto-san, stepping toward a wall to consider a calligraphy, says nothing.

  “Follow me,” she says firmly and leads us into the main hall to join twenty or so others. I wonder which of us puts her off more—the awkward foreigner or the unapologetic (and somewhat un-Japanese) manner of Sakamoto-san.

  After we are duly seated on cushions, the woman hands us booklets for the ceremony. “Can the foreigner read this?”

  “Her? Read Japanese? Saaa . . . how should I know?”

  “It’s fine,” I say, giving my odd friend a sideways look. I don’t know if I should hug him or bop him in the arm.

  The room grows quiet as the priest enters, a kind-faced middle-aged man wearing rough indigo robes. (Koun, no doubt, would love the cloth.) The service starts with a flourish of ceremony and then an explanation of zazen basics, which is followed by a short bit of sitting, and the
n a lecture on the energetic merits of Tai-chi. “We will now do Tai-chi,” concludes the priest. Wait—have I heard correctly? I look over at Sakamoto-san who, phased by nothing, simply stands and awaits instruction. We begin following the ancient Chinese postures—Sakamoto-san with an unexpected grace and agility, and me, clumsily, as is befitting my bumbling “outsider” role.

  We settle into zazen again and this time the priest makes slow laps with the kyosaku. As he approaches, nearly everyone holds their hands in gassho and leans forward to request the stick; our blissful meditation is punctuated by bursts of rhythmic violence—bamboo striking flesh again and again. Thwack . . . thwack . . . thwack . . . thwack. I can’t help but smile as I think of women beating futon in the morning sun. If I let him hit me, would a lifetime of dust fly out of my body? Would I be purified?

  Afterward, there is matcha and delicate sweets, a lecture on “the three vehicles” which I cannot follow at all, as well as a much longer discussion that I do not wish to—something about how Christian foreigners are interested in visiting temples nowadays and how nice it is that they have an interest in Japanese culture (a kind of apology or explanation—or both—for my presence to the others).

  After we put on our shoes and walk back to my van, I ask Sakamoto-san what he thought of our Rinzai Zen experience.

  He shrugs. “It was the same—but different.”

  “Indeed it was. I wondered if he would give us a koan or something, but I guess that’s another venue. By the way—thank you for . . . standing up for me, or whatever that was you were doing earlier.”

  “What? I do not know what you are talking about.”

  “My friend, you are a true enigma.”

  “What is ‘enigma’?”

  “A person of a contradictory nature.”

  “Then I am not the enigma.”

  “Touché.”

  “What is touché?”

  “Never mind.”

  Monday, October 25

  “I think we should postpone our sitting group at Tatsuda,” says Richard over the phone this afternoon. “Clearly the schedule is no longer working for people.”

  “Okay,” I say with a sinking heart. “Shoganai.” (It can’t be helped.)

  Always the encouraging optimist, he offers, “We’ll get it started again. Maybe when Koun returns. But now is just not the time.”

  After I hang up, I climb the stairs and enter the little spare room that has served as my sitting area for the past several months. Sunlight glints off the small Thai Buddha in the window seat.

  Closing the curtains against fading light, an idea comes to me. I begin to move around the house—opening and closing closets and drawers to find whatever is necessary. There are a couple wooden boxes, some lengths of cloth, a few workable pieces from my pottery efforts, the items from our zazenkai. With these, I fashion a new and improved altar. I add a sprig of greenery collected from the backyard to one of my tea cups and fill another with fresh dried rice and insert a stick of incense. Thanks to my various monastic cleaning assignments and Jisen-san’s fierce insistence on precise placement of every item in the monastery, I have a pretty good idea of what goes where.

  When all is assembled, I light incense and a candle, pull out my zafu, settle in, and ring the bell as a gentle rain begins to fall against the roof. This is exactly what I need, I think. And my mind, for once, is still as lake water. . . .

  Suddenly, a yowl and then a crash against the window causes me to leap up from my seat in terror. What could this be? I edge toward the window to pull back the curtain and reveal Jennifer’s cat clinging to the second-story window screen, meowing pitifully to be let in. I blow out the candle and oblige.

  Tuesday, October 26

  It’s another rainy day today—there’s that patter against my umbrella as I am walking home from school, but the usual percussion has been altered by absence: no frogs, no insects. The season has shifted again, slowing into the coming winter. I see this settling in my students and in myself as well.

  In pottery, there is lots of talk about going to Aso to view the cosmos, that final, elegant flower of autumn. My experience of this backdrop of conversation, as a non-native speaker of Japanese deep in concentration in my own work, is that the women are talking about “cosmos” in the larger sense—and this transforms the meaning of each utterance: “Go to Aso. You will find the cosmos.” Ah, who knew? The mystery of the universe revealed in that great volcanic caldera, my first home in Japan and Koun’s second.

  During the last bit of class, Yuko-san shows up, youthful and glowing and very, very pregnant. Her sunny nature defies the season, and the women gather around to stroke her belly and ask questions. It strikes me that her new form is not unlike the roundness of the pots that have been shaped by those same hands this evening.

  Somehow it grows later than usual and as we are packing up, Yoko-san asks, “Tracy-san, when will you have children?” It’s not the first time this has come up. It’s a common topic, especially with my advanced age, thirty-going-on-thirty-one.

  “I’m not sure. . . .” I offer vaguely. What can I say? I never know how to answer this question.

  “That is difficult without her husband,” laughs Baba-san.

  “When he returns,” Sensei says. “Then there will be a baby.”

  When I get home, it is well after 10 p.m. Light is in the windows when I arrive and, as suspected, I find Satomi sitting at my table drinking tea and grading papers.

  “I had to stay late again at work,” she explains. At this hour, the bus only goes as far as my neighborhood.

  “I’m glad you’re here.” I put the water on for more tea and sit at the table.

  “A bad day for you, too?”

  “Not exactly. Satomi, do people ask you about having children?”

  “Yes—often. Sometimes it is about getting married. Either way, it is very annoying.”

  “I find it painful. I don’t know if I want children, or if I should have them, even. My own childhood was so complicated. I guess the possibility of failing in some way is terrifying to me.”

  “I think everybody’s childhood was complicated. But the possibility of being trapped is my worry—a wife and a mother with no possibility of anything else ever again. That is a Japanese problem.”

  Thursday, October 28

  It is cold again this morning—not only outside but also in my office, where I sit with one of Koun’s big, thick sweaters pulled over my suit jacket, my fingers slow and stiff as they move over the keys at the computer. At intervals, I stand and pace the length of the room in order to pull feeling back into numb limbs. An Alaskan in Japan. Sometimes I wonder how many varieties of cold have I experienced in my life.

  The official day for turning on the university’s heating system has not yet arrived, and no matter how often I argue the poor logic of this common local practice (which extends even to preschools!), the Powers That Be refuse to alter that official date. In Japan, comfort is never the point. The ritual of schedule is everything.

  It is the same in the monastery, or so Koun has told me. What do we do today? I don’t know. Let’s look in the ledger. A hundred years ago, on a warm sunny day, the temple gutters were precariously cleaned by a half-dozen monks in black samu-e. A hundred years later and to the day, a half-dozen monks in black samu-e clean gutters as the rain falls hard around them, so that their skeletal bodies are revealed by the irrelevance of wet cloth—wood ladder and ceramic shingle slick under foot and hand. This is gaman—follow the rules and do what must be done, no matter what.

  Is Alaskan “show no weakness” the same as Japanese gaman? Sometimes I think there is a connection—and also no connection. In Alaska, you are not allowed to show your misery. In Japan, it is essential.

  Friday, October 29

  Today, as per my students’ request, we hold a Halloween Party during class. Ironically, the same students who will sport all manner of bizarre dress-up paraphernalia for festivals and even everyday wear seem shy
about the concept of costumes in a Western context. In fact, despite our lengthy discussions about the fun possibilities, not one student brought a costume, whereas I, misreading that previous enthusiasm, am wearing a full-on Japanese Tare Panda suit, complete with thick padding. Many, many photos of me are taken. It is a well-documented humiliation. After class, I pass by one of my coworkers, who gives me an odd sideways look. “American culture,” I explain. He simply nods in response. Crazy gaijin. By this time, though, I’ve decided the suit is brilliant—it delights my students and it keeps me toasty warm. What more can I ask for?

  After work, I trade my bulky panda suit for more traditional wear, and I’m off to Otani-sensei’s house to continue rakusu sewing—there is much to finish before the precepts ceremony this coming weekend.

  When I arrive, she welcomes me in, and then disappears into the kitchen, from which a delicious smell wafts. I see that she’s neatly set out our things and the windows are opened to release the ghost of her cat. “We can turn on the kotatsu, if you like,” she calls from the kitchen. “I know it’s too early in the season, but . . .” Otani-sensei, it would seem, truly is a rule-breaker!

  As I sew, we both sip tea and chat about the various coming pleasures of winter: mikan oranges and kotatsu, the onsen.

  “How about in Alaska?”

  “There are other pleasures,” I say. “The snow is very peaceful. I miss skiing the trails alone. I miss the feeling of a winter day.”

  “Sounds cold. And lonely.”

  “Yes. But still, I miss it.”

  ~

  Sakamoto-san arrives an hour or so later, bursting through the front door in his usual abrupt manner. He is dressed in his Family Bank uniform and brightly striped toe socks, his hair a shock of black fuzz—presumably styled by the swift removal of the bike helmet tucked under his arm.

  “So what did you talk about before I got here?” he asks in Japanese as he takes his place at the table.

  “Lots of things.”

  “Really? You could understand each other?”

  “We can communicate just fine,” says Otani-sensei.

  “Um—I do understand some Japanese, Famiri-boi,” I say in English.