Orchards (2 page)

but they don’t know

what I know, Ruth—

that it’s all

because of you

B
efore landing

I’m bumped up

to business

to a seat of vast slippery leather

with ample room even for my

Russian Jewish bottom

that Baachan will scorn

but it’s on the aisle

so I can’t see out to

          coast

          fields

          towns

          cities

whatever is out there

where I will soon be

after landing

and immigration

and baggage claim

and customs

my older cousins

Koichi and Yurie

appear with a banner

that says
Kana-chan

take my bags

bow to airline staff

and lead me to a parking lot and van

following them

I see they are both

lean

Yurie’s legs two

skinny

sticks

below

a hipless

butt

on the highway

we drive past wet paddies

with green lines of rice

forests of bamboo and cedar

trees different from in New York

tile-roofed houses

town centers

then offices

apartments

housing complexes

cities of concrete

buildings all jammed close

like the play blocks

of the Collins kid I sit for

will Emi sit for him

instead

this summer?

thinking of him

thinking of her

thinking of home

I’m homesick already

I think

from the front

passenger seat

Yurie says

you’ll live with me in my room

I thank her and add

words my mother

would want me to say—

I’m sorry to be

a bother

no bother

she says

I work during the day

so I’m mostly not there

she says she hopes

I will have enough privacy

she hopes

I will feel at ease

she says she is sorry

about what happened but that

she is glad

I am here

that it will be

like having

a sister

as we hum along the highway

Koichi puts on music

and I fall asleep

dream an earthquake sways

our New York house

bends and flexes it

like a bamboo frond

till Emi’s and my second-story room

bows down

down

nearly scrapes

the ground

and I jerk

awake

Kohama Village is dark

when we arrive

cross the narrow bridge over the river

and veer left at the village hall

where I learned to ride a unicycle

taking turns with Emi

when the adults were all

at Jiichan’s cremation

three years ago

Koichi wedges the van

into the driveway

cuts the engine

figures appear

in the still night

Baachan looks me over in yard light

as I step from the van

and straighten

she notes my size

and grunts

Aunt bows,

takes my two hands

firm in hers, says

okaerinasai
—welcome back

Uncle nods and nods

I bow and bow

Koichi unloads my bags

Yurie hooks her arm in mine

and leads me inside

to their home

my home

for now

after I wash my hands

twice

and gargle

as instructed

I join them in the front room

where Baachan kneels

before the altar

tells Jiichan

I’m here

tells the ancestors

I’m here

announces my visit

yanks me down to kneel

light incense

close my eyes

and reflect

I suppose

later, Aunt takes the jar of my mother’s jam

that I’d pulled from my suitcase

and places it beside altar greens

and incense

as an offering

to Jiichan

the first three days

in Kohama

I wake up

early

even before Yurie

who rises at five

to dress

and wash

and start the laundry

and help Baachan

make the miso soup

serve the rice and fish

and eat and drive to her job at a pharmacy

I try to help

but my ears

aren’t used

to Baachan’s words

Aunt and Uncle and Koichi’s words

so much Japanese

so fast and constant

not

the half-and-half mix

of English

and Japanese

I hear from my family

or the Japlish I share

with Emi

in New York

to my relatives here

I am Kana-
chan

I am Japanese

period

even though it should be a

semicolon

since half of me

is not Japanese

even though I’m

Kanako Goldberg

and feel alien here

I try to learn fast

make up for my

non-Japanese half

but Uncle makes

remarks

like after I set the breakfast table—

how are we supposed to eat …

with our hands?

I rush to set out chopsticks …

seconds

too late

they seem to think

I can just switch

one half of me

on

and leave the other

half of me

off

but I’m like

warm water

pouring from a faucet

the hot

and cold

both flowing

as one

B
ut even being away

from home

even trying to be

all Japanese

is easy

a million times easier

than the hardest thing

I’ve ever done, Ruth,

which was to speak to your mother

during shiva

to utter the Hebrew words

of consolation my father taught me

which seemed

no consolation

to her

your father, your brother

neighbors, relatives

your dogs even

side by side, alert, waiting—

for you?

everyone gathered

in the house

I’d never been inside

that was when I wondered

had my mother converted

to Judaism

had my family gone

to synagogue

had I attended

Hebrew school

had I been at

your Bat Mitzvah

like Sarah, before she moved away,

would it have been

different?

but my father always said that when he married my mother

he never intended to make

a Japanese woman

Jewish

farm rhythm means

meals at six, twelve and six

setting out soy sauce

          bulbs of sweet-sour
rakkyo

          pickled daikon

          salted plums

dishing out rice

ladling soup

bowed heads to begin

slurping

chewing

light talk

clearing

tea

no dessert

I wish Yurie didn’t have to work

I wish she could be here all day

I wish Emi

were here

Aunt takes me on errands the second day

Baachan sends me alone the third—

on foot

          to tofu shop

          and green grocer

on a bicycle with basket

          to fish shop

          hardware store

          and district library

          three villages away

where I linger

gaze at rows of spines

in Japanese

and a few old picture books

and textbooks

in English

I get a card

to borrow

manga biographies

of chemists and physicists

and an English high school text

Physics and You

because

thanks to you, Ruth,

I can’t seem to read the books

my mother sent with me

can’t get past first pages

can’t handle building plots

or tolerate conflict

the unpredictability of fiction

I can only stomach

Marie Curie

Albert Einstein

and
Physics and You—

facts

numbers

equations

velocity and relative motion

kinetic energy

rotation

acceleration

gravity

inertia

on the last day

of the fourth week in June

my fourth day in Kohama

still jet-lagged

groggy and just starting

to get the hang

of Baachan’s Japanese

Uncle takes me

to meet the principal

and homeroom teacher

at the district middle school

on a finger of land that pokes into the bay

where they’ve arranged for me

to attend classes

part-time

for four weeks

the school sits atop a hill

of
mikan
terraces

and a steep slope of forest

where egrets roost—

the white of the birds

flowers

I’d thought

from afar