Kami Imamura

The mornings are the hardest. The silence in the house is thick, almost physical. I open the shōji to let in the light, but it doesn’t fill the emptiness. My name is Sachiko, and I’ve lived in this same wooden house in Kyoto, Japan, for over sixty years. The tatami creaks the same way it did when my husband first carried me across it. He died twelve years ago. Since then, the rooms have been too quiet.

I’m 80 now. My two sons live far away—Tokyo and Sapporo. They call once a week, sometimes less. Always with kind words, polite tones. “Okaasan, daijōbu?” Yes, I say. Always yes. I don’t want to be a burden. Everyone is busy. The modern world doesn’t slow down for old women who sit and stare at the kettle while it boils.

Sometimes I take the bus into Gion. I sit on a bench near the river, watching tourists take photos of things they don’t really understand. Occasionally, someone asks me for directions or wants to practice their Japanese. I always smile. I miss conversations. Real ones. The kind that used to happen over miso soup, or while folding laundry together. Those days are gone. My neighbors have all moved or died. The new families don’t knock.

Every year I plant flowers in the small garden out back. I still talk to them. The hydrangeas seem to listen, their heads bobbing in the wind. It’s strange what becomes your company when you're alone.

But I’m not bitter. Loneliness is not the same as despair. I still take care of myself. I still write poems in a notebook no one reads. I still bow to the shrine in the morning, hands pressed together, thankful for another day. There is sadness, yes—but also memory, and that’s something the silence cannot erase.

If someone asked me what I want most, I wouldn’t say company. I’d say time. Time to matter to someone again. Even just for a little while.