Sixteen in Japan, 25 years ago

My son was sitting on our kitchen counter last week, watching the sunrise while I made breakfast. He scooted over toward the sink to wash his hands, and knocked over his juice glass with his foot. Into the open silverware drawer the juice poured, dousing every utensil. I took out the forks, knives, spoons, and recycled bendy straws.  Then I grabbed the ample pile of newly-soaked chopsticks to the right of the silverware tray, gathered from Asian restaurants over the years. My children can’t part with a single pair, which delights my husband and me. We both lived in Japan. Separately–he, for three years after college, and me, as a high school exchange student on a U.S. Senate scholarship. Years later, when we met as graduate students in Virginia, we bonded over being fellow ‘Japan geeks.’

Our children have learned to eat dumplings and noodles with chopsticks, and would brandish them for every meal if we’d allow it. The slender bamboo sticks have been washed again and again in our sink, their metallic red Chinese writing long-lost to Dawn and the sponge. So, at my daughter’s and son’s urging, we’ve hastily replaced the writing with Japanese characters, using any writing implement within arm’s reach of the dinner table.

I was glad about the juice spill. Why, or when else would I have laid out every arrow-straight chopstick on that waffle-weave towel? The sight took  me away for a moment. Always only for a moment. But long enough to see Joe’s characters in black, and mine in blue. A glimpse of that mysterious bond between husband and wife that’s spoken about in the marriage ceremony. Our writing says “Nihon e ikimashoka?” Shall we go to Japan?  We have never been there together.  From our vantage point today, to do so anytime soon seems a near-impossibility. My host parents are aging into their 80’s. How to return my debt of gratitude for inviting me into their family the year I turned sixteen? Could our young children make such a trip, even if we could manage it?  Mysteries, all.