16. SAM

Matsuyama, 1948–1963

The Occupation lasted until 1951, but by 1949, the Americans had decided to dissolve the military government teams in each of the prefectures on Shikoku. That spring it was announced that only one team would remain, and it would be in Takamatsu, not Matsuyama. Captain Schneider was being transferred to army headquarters in Washington, D.C. Our group of translator-interpreters, which had worked together for four years, was about to break up. Like my colleagues, I was apprehensive about where I would find work. But soon after the official announcement, Colonel Scranton, the Ehime MGT commanding officer, summoned me to his office. I was dumbfounded when he announced that he had arranged for me to be hired by the Ehime Prefectural Board of Education as its first English Teacher Consultant.

It was a wonderful job. I worked hard during the day, taught my classes at night, and spent whatever time I could find studying more about language teaching. And I also thought a lot about my life so far. Even though I was only twenty-seven, I felt that I had experienced a great deal. I wondered how I could have thought and functioned as I did during the war. Now I was clear about who I was. I was an educator. Peace was ultimately what I was working for, but I think that even then, with all the effort I had put into trying to sort out what had happened to me during the war, I would not have quite put it that way. But I did know that I was extremely fortunate to have work that involved both Japanese and Americans, to be helping both sides, and to have arrived at a point where my everyday life reconciled my skills from my Mother Country and Mother tongue and my Father Country and its language. And I knew that I was fortunate to have had my post-war experiences and be doing work I loved because my home life was getting no better, no better at all.

I officially held my job with the Prefectural Board of Education for six years, but I was on leave of absence for two of those six years. More about the leave of absence in a bit.

As the Prefecture’s English Language Consultant, I observed that most of those teaching English in the secondary schools were woefully ill-equipped for their jobs. Suzuki-sensei, I realized, had not been an anomaly. Tragically, high school teachers were not educated in spoken English, and they had virtually no opportunity to practice. Hence, both their abilities to speak and their abilities to understand spoken English were extremely limited.

After one year in my new post, I decided to start a special program for the vacation period before the start of the academic year in April. I commandeered an old school building that had been standing empty since the educational reforms were put into place two years earlier. And I pressed virtually every native speaker I knew into volunteer service. We managed to gather a group of about a dozen educators and military personnel. They came from all over western Japan. We called the program “in-service” training and circulated materials to all teachers in Ehime, making it clear that if they came, they were to expect housing in the same unheated school where the class would be held. We even told them to bring their own blankets. We only had enough funds to purchase tatami mats to spread over the wooden floors of the classrooms at night. Teachers as well as students would have to curl up in their own blankets. The program was strictly on a volunteer basis, and our brochures made it clear that the one rule absolutely enforced during the two-week intensive program was that only English could be spoken. Japanese was completely banned.

I was astonished when a hundred teachers registered. The program, the first of its kind in Japan, was a spectacular and unexpected success. The teachers were enthusiastic and made great strides. They found the experience of working on their listening and speaking skills extremely rewarding. I particularly loved watching them gain confidence day by day.

After that first year, the prefectural officials endorsed the program as an annual event; they were delighted when word of the program spread and officials of other prefectures asked to borrow me as an advisor. I traveled to Hiroshima, to Sendai, and to Kyushu to help officials there set up similar programs. Those were happy days professionally.

Late in 1950, I read an announcement that competitive exams would be held to choose scholarship recipients for a one-year study program in the United States. It seized my imagination. I didn’t talk about it much at home, but Father and I discussed it one weekend during a fishing excursion. They were now rare occasions for us, but I still treasured those peaceful times. He said he understood my enthusiasm, and talked about how he would like to see the States again. Kayoko wasn’t mentioned, and he didn’t speak about Mother. We both knew she was not likely to be pleased. “Isamu,” he said, “you’re quieter about it now than you were then, but I remember this kind of enthusiasm when you were determined to pass the Navy’s entrance exam.”

I pulled my line out of the water, saw, as I suspected, that the bait was gone, added some more, and recast as I thought of how to respond.

“Well, Father, I’m a different person now.”

“Yes, I know, son,” he replied. “I’ve been proud of everything you’ve accomplished since the day Yamamura-sensei took you to the office of the Occupation. You’ve built a career to be proud of, and this would be an opportunity to secure your future in that career. I’m sure you’ll ­succeed.”

Late in the year, I traveled to Tokyo to take the exam. It didn’t seem that difficult to me, but the throngs of applicants—thousands I thought—made me doubt that I would be chosen. An oral interview followed the written exam. On the trip home I told myself not to get my hopes up too high. My welcome home was a week-long dose of the silent treatment from Mother and Kayoko. I went back to work and tried to forget about seeing San Francisco again.

About a month later, I was summoned to the office of the Prefectural Education Director. There was a phone call from the States for me. When I picked up the phone, I was astonished to hear Shirley Schneider’s voice. She had retired from the army after reaching the rank of major and was now working at the Institute for International Education in Washington. She told me she happened to notice my name when the list of scholarship applicants had come across her desk,

“Now, Isamu,” she said, “if you pass, what university would you like to go to? Scholarship recipients are not given the option of choosing their schools, but if I know what you’re thinking about, I may be able to help.”

Without hesitation, I said, “University of Michigan,” and explained how much I admired Dr. Fries’ work and what an honor it would be to study with him.

“Well, Sam, there are no guarantees, and you do have to pass. But I can’t imagine that you found the exam all that difficult. I’ll do what I can. I was delighted to see your name on the list. I spent all day yesterday remembering the good times I had in Matsuyama.”

In June, official word arrived that I had been awarded a scholarship. And I was going to attend the University of Michigan after an orientation at Yale. I was supposed to report to the GARIOA (Grant in Aid and Relief in Occupied Areas) office in Tokyo on July 9. A month of frantic activity commenced. My superiors at the Prefectural Board of Education gave their permission reluctantly, and only after a week of negotiations. Leaving in the middle of the school year was highly irregular. When I announced my news at home, there was no acknowledgement, except Father’s quick smile of pride, that my achievement was valued. During my last weeks in Matsuyama, Kayoko spoke to me rarely, and when she did her tone was either surly or sarcastic. I began to yearn for my release and started telling myself that the time in the U.S. would be good. I would miss Kayoko, and missing her I would learn to appreciate her. My feelings would change.

I went to Tokyo alone, reported to the GARIOA office, listened to the orientations, and reported to the dock in Yokohama on the morning of July 13 with a great sense of excitement. It was almost twenty years since the journey that had brought me to Yokohama. Twenty years since the only home I had known was relegated to memory and Matsuyama became my world. The ship was a troop transport, crammed with GIs on their way home from battle in Korea and all of the 470 GARIOA scholarship students. We slept in bunks in three tiers and had little to do during the long days. It took us eleven days to reach San Francisco. Everyone was on deck when we sailed under Golden Gate Bridge, which had not yet been built when Mother and I had left for Japan. Father talked about how he had seen the towers when he left the year after us—but only the towers; construction had been just beginning when he left. When the white houses and streets of San Francisco came into view, I was close to tears. My home town. What a journey my life had been.

The ship docked in Oakland, where we spent a few days in dorms on the campus of Mills College. One day the group went on a bus tour of San Francisco. I found myself pointing out landmarks.

I also went on an excursion with Mr. Nishikage, a friend of Father’s, who had been in San Francisco all this time, except for when he, like all issei and nisei, was interned during the war. Mr. Nishikage kindly drove me around to all the places I wanted to see: our old house on Cedar Street, the beach, Cliff House, North Beach, Fisherman’s Wharf, and Chinatown. Mr. Nishikage also took me home to meet his family. That was the day I saw my first television.

After a few days, the entire GARIOA group was put on a special train for the East Coast. The trip to New York took five days, and small groups of students got off in Denver, Chicago, and Pittsburgh. After we arrived in New York, the five of us who were scheduled for orientation at Yale changed trains and headed for New Haven. We stayed in dorms with students from all over the world. My roommate was Finnish. Our orientation lasted three weeks. The days were filled with lectures on American history, geography, architecture, and popular culture. On the weekends, local families took us in for home stays. I spent my weekends with the Weber family in Westport. I still remember their warm hospitality and many kindnesses.

When the program at Yale ended, I had a week before I had to be in Ann Arbor for my first classes there. I went to New York and saw all the sights and then went to Washington, where I stayed with Major Schneider, who insisted that I call her Shirley. I tried, with mixed success. She took time off from work. The first day we went sightseeing. The second day we stayed home and watched the signing of the U.S.-Japan formal peace treaty on television. Here I am, I thought, sitting in the capital of the country where I was born, my Mother Country—the country I considered my enemy for many years, the country I fought against—and I’m alive, well, safe, and prospering. As I watched Prime Minister Yoshida sign the treaty in San Francisco, I thought about all those who were gone—Kobayashi and Hayashi among the hundreds of thousands—and was grateful that I was not among them. Grateful for my new life.

When I arrived in Ann Arbor, my first order of business was to introduce myself to Dr. Fries, who kindly agreed to be my advisor. I followed his suggestion and enrolled as a regular student so I could earn academic credit. I loaded up about twice the number of courses most students took and buckled down to study. At the end of the year, I was grateful that I had been earning credits. Dr. Fries suggested that I stay for another year and finally get a bachelor’s degree, but there were complications. The scholarship couldn’t be extended for another year, even though the GARIOA program would pay for my return passage to Japan if I managed to find a way to finance another year. Again, I was lucky. Dr. Robert Brown, a full professor who had sought me out earlier in the year for assistance with Japanese-to-English translations, had just received a grant and employed me as his research assistant. In addition to taking summer classes, I picked tomatoes and other crops on the farms outside the town. I was very proud when I received my B.A. in June 1953 and immediately set out for Japan. I wondered what awaited me at the Prefectural Board of Education and at home.

The trip was quite comfortable—on a commercial liner. When we docked at Yokohama, I smelled Japan again—a mixture of takuan pickles and soy sauce—and realized that I had gotten used to the Campbell’s soup smell that surrounded me and reminded me of my childhood when I had arrived back in San Francisco after my years away.

I sent a telegram from Tokyo, and Father was at the pier in Matsuyama. I got off the ferry, intoxicated, all over again, with the beauty of the Seto Inland Sea. “It’s wonderful to have you home,” he said. “We have sea bream for dinner. We’re celebrating.” He arranged for my trunk to be delivered and suggested that we walk home. “It’ll give you a chance to stretch your legs, and it’ll give me a chance to hear everything. Start with San Francisco. When we get home, there won’t be time for all the details I want to hear.”

Dinner was delicious but conversation was strained. My feelings for Kayoko had not changed for the better; in fact they were slightly worse. Mother had no interest in stories from the States and only wanted to know about my plans for my future in Matsuyama. She mentioned grandchildren several times during dinner. I tried not to think about the child my wife had wanted to dispose of.

The next morning, I went to the office and thanked my colleagues for tolerating my two-year absence. I learned that the in-service program had grown so large that a summer session had been added. I had a month to get everything ready. I was happy to jump into work, to do my part to support my colleagues who had filled in for me, and to have an alternative to the chilly atmosphere at home.

The in-service session was a great success. We took over an old country retreat in a mountain town called Kuma, and two hundred students and twenty teachers had a wonderful summer adventure. The program continued for years, with the spring session in Matsuyama and the summer session in the mountains at Kuma. The programs were always exhilarating for everyone involved. The group photos show smiling teachers—and teachers of teachers. Everyone came away with a great sense of accomplishment.

In 1955, I was invited to join the faculty of Ehime University. I was happy to do so and became an assistant professor in the English Department of the College of Education. About a month after I started and was still settling in, Dr. Robert Brown, the professor I had assisted at the University of Michigan, called from Tokyo. He had just arrived there to head the Asia Foundation and invited me to come to work for him. When I explained that I had just started a new job and couldn’t leave Matsuyama, his response was “Okay, if you can’t come to us, we’ll come to you,” and went on to say that the Foundation was willing to fund any project I considered beneficial for education in Japan. I did go to Tokyo to discuss this with him and his staff. Starting from that summer, the physical conditions of the in-service program improved immensely thanks to Foundation funding. We all still slept on tatami mats on the floor, but the food improved, we were able to paint and patch the old buildings in Kuma, and we could afford heating for the spring program.

I also undertook regular missions on behalf of the Foundation to schools all around Japan, to give advice on curriculum innovations and suggestions on how to operate an effective in-service teacher training program. In the spring of 1957, one of those trips took me to the University of the Ryukyus in Okinawa, where I helped the school set up its first language laboratory. The University had an advisory committee of educators from Ohio State University and from secondary schools around the state. They were interested in my work and stopped in Matsuyama on their way back to Tokyo on their trip home that summer. They observed both the Kuma in-service session and the special English Language Training Center I had established at the University. The Center was, I believed, the logical next step after the in-service spring and summer sessions. It allowed junior and senior high school English teachers who were able to get a three-month leave of absence to focus exclusively on new pedagogical methods and on sharpening their own language skills.

My professional life was full of challenges and successes. But my life with Kayoko was no better. I can’t live my entire life like this, I told myself. After the New Year holiday in 1960, I finally suggested divorce.

Kayoko was horrified. “No, never,” was her one and only response. Mother agreed with her, and Father too, by his silence. When I insisted, a huge family council took place. All the aunts and uncles got together to discuss the situation. The result: no divorce.

I rented a small apartment. I lived alone and found that the life of a rebel was quite lonely. The only visitors to my apartment were my private students. Some of my colleagues at the university were understanding, and a few of them even went in a delegation to Kayoko to try to persuade her to agree to a divorce. They were unsuccessful. All they would tell me was that they had spoken with Mother as well as with Kayoko.

By the end of the year, despite my loneliness, my resolve had grown. Kayoko couldn’t be the center of the rest of my life. Mother made it clear, via messages delivered by Father, that my presence was expected for the New Year holiday. The week before Christmas, I ran into Yamamura-sensei on Okaido. We stood and chatted for quite a while, and by the end of our conversation I had agreed to attend the Christmas Eve service at Reverend Graham’s old church, where Sensei’s wife was a congregant.

It was dark and raining that evening, and I was almost late. I slipped into the last pew as the service began. The church was full and smelled of wet wool. The others passed a hymnal down the row and smiled as they shifted to make room. I enjoyed singing some of the hymns I remembered from Sundays in the Grahams’ parlor and found the familiar gospel story about the birth in the manger touching. The high point, however, was during the communion, when I sat in the pew and listened to Yamamura-sensei’s flute solo. I knew he believed no more than I did, but was convinced that he too found the experience peaceful, satisfying, and quite comforting. As I listened, I realized, once again, what a talented musician he was, and thought about how lucky I was to have him in my life.

When the service finished, Sensei appeared at my elbow and said, “My wife sent me to make sure you join the reception in the church hall.”

We climbed up the steps to a wide room with a skylight. The ladies of the congregation had arranged tables around the edges of the room. Warm punch and sweet treats awaited us. It was very western-style and reminded me of post-lecture wine and cheese parties in Ann Arbor. Yamamura-sensei and I were met by an officious elderly gentleman, Morishita-san, who was clearly a pillar of the church community; he congratulated Sensei on his performance and made a vague, incomprehensible comment about looking for the Christmas star through the skylight. As he moved away, Mrs. Yamamura appeared at the top of the steps and walked toward us. “My dear, you were wonderful,” she said to her husband. “And I’m so happy you persuaded Imagawa-sensei to join us. Thank you.” Her broad smile was a Christmas present for both of us.

Sensei announced that he would get us all drinks, and Mrs. Yamamura smiled her thanks, turning all attention to me as her husband started off across the room.

“Isamu, I’m glad we have a minute to ourselves,” she said. “And I’m going to be direct, because I think you’ll want to hear what I have to say. I see that you met Morishita-san. His wife, who grew up next door to the Shizuyamas, told me that she ran into Michiko in Osaka last month. Since none of us had heard anything since the end of the war, and because I know how close the two of you once were, I thought you’d want to know. She had a little boy about five with her. She told Mrs. Morishita that she met her husband in the country when she was evacuated from Kure before the end of the war.”

The rain had stopped. I walked home through the quiet misty streets, the cloying taste of the punch still in my mouth, thinking about Michiko. I wished her every happiness, but couldn’t help wondering how many others in Matsuyama knew. Sometimes I felt that my hometown was one giant conspiracy to keep me tied to the unhappiness of my personal situation. Perhaps even Mother had heard the news about Michiko. But, of course, she’d never breathe a word to me.

By the time I reached my apartment, I decided that it would be best to stop fretting about what Matsuyama thought about me. I knew I should be very grateful for the genuinely kind affection of the Yamamuras. I unlocked the door, slipped off my shoes, got out the whiskey bottle, and poured myself a drink before I even turned on the heater. I’d manage the holidays, I promised myself as I took the first sip.

The New Year brought a wonderful and welcome surprise. In February, I was invited to Ohio to establish an intensive English program at the university to train foreign students and prepare them for the rigors of English language instruction in the regular undergraduate and graduate programs. I decided to accept the offer and spent much of my time thinking about how I would be in the Midwest by the end of the year.

And I thought a lot about Akiko Sato. She was the new secretary in the English Language Training Center. She had arrived the year before. After she was there about a week, she came into my office to ask me a question about her work. It was the first time we had spoken in private; it was immediately and overwhelmingly thrilling for me. As she said, “Sensei, I wanted to check with you about paying these invoices,” I was seized with the sudden and absolute knowledge that she could change my life. I know she felt something too, because she never again came into my office alone.

Akiko’s job with the English Department was her first after she finished her own degree in English literature. She had come to Matsuyama to attend the university. Although she had a large family in her home town of Ukawa in the mountains of Ehime, she was alone in the city. Each day that followed I grew more and more aware of her. She was pretty, cheerful, and full of bright, open interest in language, literature, and teaching. When we returned to school after the holiday, I finally allowed myself to acknowledge that I was smitten. I determined to take action.

I realized that seeing her face when I came through the door was absolutely the best thing in my day. It was hard for me to concentrate in the office. My colleagues noticed too. “Sam,” said Mori-sensei, a perceptive young teacher who had come to Matsuyama after studying in the States for three years, “you’d be a lucky guy to get a girl like her, but.…” He was, of course, referring to the Kayoko situation. I held my tongue until the summer, and just before I told everyone that I was going to take the position in Ohio the next year and asked for a leave of absence, I spoke to Akiko late on a Friday afternoon when the rest of the staff had left.

When I finished speaking, I felt that I had handed her my heart. I was convinced she thought the same thing; she reached out toward me, cupping her hands, holding me in her gaze. Tears filled her eyes but she kept her focus on me and leaned forward as they began to spill. “Oh, Sensei, oh, Isamu,” she finally said. “What are we to do? How can I answer?”

I wanted to take her in my arms, but with her words, she looked away, folded her hands in her lap, looked down at them, and said the words that thrilled and crushed me at the same time, “You are so precious to me. But, but…I have to think. I have to think what to do.” She shook her head and never lifted her gaze. I sat in agony. Here was a woman I loved, a woman I wanted to spend my life with. There was nothing I could offer her. She was right. She had to think what to do. She got up quietly and left. I spent the weekend alone with my books and my work, replaying our conversation over and over in my head. As I recalled her tears, the strength of the connection between us, and her look of absolute resignation as she turned away, I pictured Father turning away from me outside the gate to Mie and starting back to the train station.

So I wasn’t really surprised when Akiko was not at her desk on Monday morning. After everyone was settled, the chief administrative assistant came to see me with a letter in his hand. “Sensei,” he said, “Akiko has resigned, and she’s left already. Her letter says that her sister, who teaches school in Tokyo, has had an accident and broken her leg. Akiko has gone to help her. I doubt that she’ll be back before the end of the year. I’m very sorry to lose her. She was a good worker, a good colleague, and a wonderfully cheerful person to have here everyday.” His words were kind; he knew exactly how I felt. I was grateful for his discretion.

“Yes, we will all miss her,” I said, and turned to my work.

The year in Ohio flew by. Establishing a program at a major U.S. university presented a challenge I was eager to test myself against. Working with students from all over the world was a new experience, one that yielded its own difficulties and its own rewards. I learned how to manage a classroom with Scandinavians, Latin Americans, and Arabs, as well as with Asians. My colleagues were kind, but loneliness was a constant companion. I wrote to Akiko every week. After I arrived in Ohio, Mori-san had kindly sent me her address in Tokyo. I suspect that he had it sooner but waited until I had left Japan because he knew she didn’t want to see me. I poured my heart out and told her about every new experience, every challenge, every triumph, and every failure. I also wrote about my childhood memories of San Francisco, and what I now thought about my early experiences in both of my countries. In these letters, I did the most thorough job I could of trying to figure out how I ended up eager to give my life for the cruel, false phantom of patriotism and loyalty the war had led us into. I wrote about my new experiences and my ideas for language training and promoting cross-cultural understanding. And how astonishing it was that I was alive to write about such things and how lucky I was to have work that made use of all my experiences.

It didn’t matter that she didn’t answer. In the spring, when the end of my time in Ohio was in sight, I wrote about the cherry trees blooming on campus and how they reminded me of the evening in Tokyo we suited up for attack. I told her how I had left my papers to be burned, what I was allowing myself to think then, and what I thought about all of it with more than a decade’s distance and perspective. Two weeks later a postcard arrived with a picture of the cherry blossoms at Yasukuni Shrine in their full glory. The only message was Basho’s: Samazama no / koto omoidasu / sakura kana. I stood on my doorstep holding the postcard. Why did I have to meet this woman, this woman who strikes the perfect right note in everything she does with me, even when she withholds herself from me because I’m not free to be with her?

In my last month, three letters from Mother and one from Father arrived. Mother wrote about how everyone missed me, especially Kayoko, and how important it was to the family to have me back home in Matsuyama. Kayoko, she wrote, was willing to try again. When Father’s letter arrived—supporting Mother of course—it was clear that I had no choice. I wrote back to Father, told him I agreed, and sent details on my itinerary.

He met me again at Matsuyama Port on a bright June day. Sunlight spilled from a blue sky and danced on the water as the ferry pulled into the dock. I told myself that I was happy to be home, and that sunshine and the beautiful day were part of a new beginning. Seeing Father’s dear face was a joy, but realizing that both he and Mother had aged visibly diminished my happiness and made me all that much more resolute to try to make everything work.

I threw myself into my work at Ehime University, but found everything just a bit too small. Mori-san, who had filled in while I was away, had done a great job. At home, things were strained, and, to me, unreal at first. They improved to polite and perfunctory. Kayoko and Mother had no interest in hearing anything about Ohio. For the first few weeks, Father talked about San Francisco, where I had stopped on my way home, and made me talk about the flight, since this was the first time I had traveled across the Pacific by air, peppering me with questions and asking my opinions as a pilot. But after a few dinners where Mother’s only contribution had been, “Oh, is that so?” and Kayoko’s had been complete silence, Father dropped it.

I took on private students again, and on the few nights when I wasn’t using the study for classes, I sat in there planning lessons, sketching out new materials for classes and for the in-service program—and writing more letters to Akiko.

At the end of October, Kayoko announced that she was pregnant again. She told Mother first, and Father and I found out at dinner one night. Mother was glowing with excitement; she talked about continuing the family line and about the history of our two families in Matsuyama and in Ishii. Kayoko looked rather pale and said nothing, but seemed thoroughly pleased with herself. Father leaned back at the table and said, “Ah, now that’s news. Congratulations to you two. How lucky we will be to be grandparents.” When he raised his glass to toast Kayoko, she smiled at him; her eyes then glanced past mine and she turned to smile at Mother, who was sitting beside her. It was clear that there would be no talk of abortion this time. I thought about a son, about my son’s future, about our future in Matsuyama. This would be it.

Kayoko was sick most of the time, and Mother fussed over her, nursing her with tenderness and care. By the end of the year, her color had improved; she began eating and started to help Mother in the kitchen again. Mother made the New Year celebration especially festive. The house was decorated, and we were doing well enough to buy presents for family, friends, and colleagues and to have a delicious feast for the holiday. I had a nice break from work, but even in the midst of the festivities and even as I told myself that things would be fine, the certainty that this would be it wormed its way into my consciousness. I smiled and joined the family activities, but felt flat and unconnected.

I spent my free days during the holiday reading the latest Graham Greene novel, which had arrived in a package along with an Amish quilt and handmade chocolates from my boss in Ohio, Jim Knowlton, who had been promoted to full professor and appointed director of the university’s international center. Father liked the chocolates; Mother, who was famous for her sweet tooth, did too, even though she pronounced them too sweet. Kayoko tried one, swallowed only part of it, and said, “Not for me. I can’t imagine ever getting used to foreign food.”

Mother and Kayoko examined the quilt. “Look at how regular these stitches are,” said Mother.

“Yes,” said Kayoko, “but don’t you think the pattern is rather loud?”

“I think it may be a traditional American pattern,” said Mother. “Didn’t Sam say something about it being a pattern of some religious group? Let’s take it when we pay our New Year’s call on Aunt Furusawa. She can tell us all about it.”

When they were off in Ishii Village the next day visiting Aunt Furusawa and the other neighbors there, I wrote Jim and thanked him for the package. I made sure to also thank Jane, his wife. I didn’t have much of an idea about the details, but imagined that she had spent long hours working on the quilt. I remembered a similar one in the Knowlton’s guest bedroom, where I had stayed for a few days after my lease came to an end and I was making my final arrangements to leave for San Francisco and catch my flight to Tokyo.

“My grandmother made it,” Jane had told me. “Every stitch in it was put there with love for her family. I think of her every time I come in this room.”

I emphasized how impressed all the women in my family were with the beautiful pattern and the skilled details of the construction of the quilt and how they had told me to send special thanks to her for such a generous present.

Jim wrote back toward the end of January telling me that the program wasn’t going well without me and offering me a full-time job as director. I had to write back and say no, but his answer was, “Just keep it in mind. We need you. We’d love to welcome all three of you after the baby is born. Remember, the new school year doesn’t start until September.”

The crisis came in late March, during the break between school years. I was in my office at the university, getting ready for the opening ceremony of the in-service session, scheduled for that evening, when the phone rang. Father said, “Isamu, go to the hospital immediately. I’m on my way there now. Your mother is already there with Kayoko. It seems she’s in labor.”

“But it’s too soon!”

“Go, go now,” Father said. “I’ll see you there.”

It was long after midnight when the three of us arrived home. My son had been born and lived for less than an hour. His mother had lived for about an hour after that, but her hemorrhaging was so severe the doctors could not save her.

When we came through the door, Mother ordered me and Father to sit down and said she’d make tea. We heard her crying in the kitchen. As she knelt to join us at the low table and began to pour the tea she said, “Calling Kayoko’s parents tonight was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. What a loss for our family.”

Father pushed his tea cup aside, got up, and went to the cabinet where he kept his scotch. “What we all need is a real drink,” he said. He poured for all of us and said, as he lifted his glass to his lips, “There are no words for this.” We sipped in silence, until Mother, who was still crying quietly, got up and went to bed. When she left the room, Father’s only comment was “Son, you need another.” He filled my glass. I drank again, and we sat together, drinking without talking, until the sun came up.

I’m not sure how the next month went by, but it did. All I can remember of the funeral, which was held on a chilly, rainy morning, were wet, warm sympathies of friends and family. As I gazed at my family, I thought, these are the same aunts and uncles who had ruled that there could be no divorce. After the funeral, there was the in-service session and planning for the new school year.

I made up my mind just before the school year was scheduled to begin. I wrote to Jim and sent the letter special delivery. He wired back. I made an announcement at the university the next day. My colleagues were surprised, but supportive. Mori-san clapped me on the back and said it might well be the best thing. He made me promise to write and to consider coming back to work in the summer in-service program.

Mother was shocked. “No, you can’t. Not now,” she said.

Father said nothing, but searched my face with the intensity I remembered from Mie. Finally he asked, “When?”

“Actually, tomorrow, I think,” I said. “I need to go.”

“No,” said Mother, “you have to wait for the forty-ninth-day ceremony.”

“No, Mother, I can’t.”

I had to go to Tokyo before I left for Ohio. I went to pack.