I have gotten on a train of the Chuo Line which is bound for
Kiso, in Nagano, my home country. The train is very crowded with
people. Some are reading books; the others are sleeping. They
would be tired from hard work. The train is filled with a gloomy,
dark and melancholy atmosphere. There are no seats which I can
sit down on, and I have to stand for three hours. Before long, it
is the time I would feel pain in my back and legs. But I don't
feel it at all. The scene which would make people think, "this is
beautiful," isn't for me in the least because my brain is full of
one happening. Because I received the telephone call from my
uncle about my grandmother's death yesterday, I don't have an
extra part of my brain to enjoy the trip. The call shocked me,
and I was very agitated. I also felt other things besides
sadness, but I wouldn't know how to explain them even if I tried.
The train went on running into the darkness of the night.
When I saw myself mirrored on the window of the train
vacantly, I remembered the time I spent with my grandmother
vividly.
"We're here! We're here!" my driving father said. Asleep in
the car, I was awakened by his voice. There were many many
mountains here and there, and they were overgrown with many high
trees. Between two mountains, the Kiso River flowed, and along
the river the road we drove on ran. I smelled the good and
comfortable smell of trees. The sight was artistic and
mysterious. I saw the same sight many times, but it took words
from my mouth. In a short time, a red bridge appeared, and on the
opposite side of the river, a big house came into sight. It,
indeed, was my grandmother's house, where she had lived frugally
while being surrounded by fortunate nature since she was a
child.
At that time, she was eighty-nine years old. She had only
white hair. She was very short and very thin. It was possible to
say that her body was only bones and skin. Her back was bent like
a crone. When I was a baby, she sometimes held me in her wrinkled
arms. Needless to say, I don't remember that. She had no
outstanding characteristics to speak of. She was an average woman
like women everywhere. But in her mind, there was twice as much
kindness and consideration as in anyone's heart. How many years
did it take me to know that even such an ordinary grandmother was
my only and important one?
One day she almost talked a little and asked me with her faint
dim voice, "Do you want to go to the mountain next to our house
with me? If you want to, I will guide you." The mountain she
mentioned to me was a small one. I worried about her health, but
I decided to follow her. It seemed that when she walked up the
mountain she was another woman, because in spite of no paths and
a steep slope, she could guide me quickly without losing our way.
While walking up she talked to me about some kinds of flowers,
trees and living things, and whenever she did, I nodded to her
many times. Now, I think on the train, certainly she got very
tired that day, and she had already known that she would before
we walked up. But her feeling that she wanted to guide me must
have been bigger than that.
The day my family returned home came. We adjusted our baggage
and prepared to go home. We said "good-bye." I didn't feel pain
and grief because I thought I would see my grandmother again.
Everyone except my grandmother felt the same way as well. But she
didn't. Then I saw that some tears dropped down her cheeks. I
couldn't understand that, and I didn't even try to ask my parents
why she cried. Now, in the train, I think, certainly, she thought
that she was so old that she didn't know when she would die and
that she might not be able to see us again, so she cried
involuntarily. I had thought until her death that her existence
was only natural since she was my grandmother. But she was one of
the persons who thought about me earnestly. Such existences are
very important, serious and never natural. And certainly, ones
who have them are not only my grandmother, but also others close
to me. But ironically, when we can realize this is the time they
pass away.
The train went on running into the darkness of the
night.
by Mitsuo Kawai
