A Thousand Winds
Midnight is when today becomes yesterday. Even as May 9, 2008 became May 10, Masami's Mom Hideko let this life of hers give way to her next. The way she lived her active life, she does not, says Masami, sleep anywhere; she is always with us as a thousand winds that blow.
She must have been a bird circling in flight, says Masami, when Teruaki went to Hideko's hometown Toku Island; to Osaka where they had met, married and spent honeymoon years, to thank his relatives for coming to her funeral; or to Germany, where they had several times after Teru's retirement visited their old friends, to tell them about her in early December.
She shone as soft stars,too, when Masami and her family went to Hawaii and scaled Mauna Kea, and gazed up at the starry skies in summer. When they had Seika's and Yuko's son Shusuke's birthday parties, Hideko was in the room, craving for a morsel of the cake and a cup of tea.
Teruaki has not built a grave. She did not die; she is still with us, around.
Proud Prince
Midnight is also when tomorrow becomes today. Last year, when our Christmas message 2007 was being written, Seika spent day after day, week after week and month after grueling month bent on preparing for private school entrance exams. What he brought in mind at that time was his tomorrow as a student attending the junior-high division of Ichikawa Gakuen High School, one of the top private high schools in Chiba Prefecture. His efforts paid off. The severe competition notwithstanding, Seika earned his admission.
He made another legend this time again. The night he returned from the Ichikawa entrance exam, he received a phone call from one of the cram school teachers. He said, "I guess I'll pass." Masami felt as if she'd have to reach out to pick up her jaw. How dared he say that, she gasped to herself, even before the results were announced?
When March end was drawing near, Masami and Seika were in Osaka, the rakugo Mecca in western Japan. This was in fact a trophy for his successful attempt at Ichikawa entrance and featured several visits to famous rakugo theaters, giving Seika a chance to see Master Sanshi and get his signature on his sensu fan.
This deepened his rakugo dedication even more after his Ichikawa admission.
Its educational culture that values students' specificities soon turned out to have good chemistry with Seika. Its library has a fairly large rakugo funny story CD collection by legendary masters. Seika frequents there and now, just a bit more than a half year after entrance, has almost engulfed the whole lot. Now he is requesting new title purchases. Seika was offered in early summer a chance to perform rakugo at a school seminars, one in the morning and the other in the afternoon, to an audience each of a couple hundred parents wishing to enroll their kids to Ichikawa next year; got his own rakugo slots at its culture festival towards the end of September (his performance proved to be among the DVD titles produced after the festival); and was requested by his friends to perform a funny story or two on the school playground during the Athletic Meet in early October (and he did).
Now he is one of the school celebrities known even to Principal/President Koga and his wife. When one of the former students, now a professional rakugo story-teller, visited President Koga, Seika was called to the Principal's office and got a sensu fan with his signature on it from him in person.
Masami and Hideaki are growing a bit anxious if this dedication of his will tell on his school work.
Free at Last
Masami is free at last. She gave her all to help Seika prepare for the entrance exam until the end of January, but since April when school year begins in Japan, she became an empty nest. She began her job search and in September landed a new one at Crocs, the newly up and coming shoe-maker company. She had just meant to be a gal-Friday there, but the management never fails to spot an outstanding timber if there is any around. She began as a part-time helper in Quality Control, and come next year, she will replace the current QC manager, deemed inadequate and to be ousted soon, as a full-timer.
She cannot stay alive without a daring ambition. Guess what. Her new goal is to accumulate an enough wherewithal for purchasing a post-retirement residence in no other place than Hawaii. She conceived the idea while planning a tour of Hawaii in early spring. After visiting the Big Island in August with Hideaki and Seika, she is nightly viewing Oahu real estate websites. It is easy to imagine that a passion she picked up now is Hula. After the Hawaii trip, she began attending weekly Hula class, making preparations for year-end presentation events in Tokyo.
