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TL: Are there any other topics that you'd like to talk about, that we haven't addressed yet?

YB: Well, right at the moment I really can't think of anything, unless you bring it up for me. I guess my memory doesn't always come up with something that... [Laughs]

TL: Well, how about these last years. After George passed away, you maintained some interests and you developed new ones. And so what are some of the things that have been important to you in the last...

YB: When Clarence passed away, I had a difficult time adjusting myself. We had lost the child and then the father, and I felt very much alone, even though I had friends. With George, they said, "Yone, we don't want to see you sleeping here at the house the first night or so. Come and stay with us." I thought it over very deeply, and thought -- and the Japanese Buddhist have this feeling, never leave the house empty without a light if the person passed away in this house. Leave it lit because the soul is still here, is what they would tell you, and it used to scare me. But as you grow older, it's a feeling that your memory and the person is still with you. And these girls wanted me to go home, but I said, "Do you mind if I stay here? I'll be okay." I said, "I'll phone you, so just listen to the phone if I have to call you."

And I felt that if I left the house that night, it would be so difficult to come back in to a empty house, that if I stayed here for a period of time, I would get myself adjusted to the thought that he's still with me, but no longer here. And so I did and I didn't find it as hard. It's funny, but before I found it very difficult. 'Cause everything around here would remind me of him, what I would do. And I had to adjust myself to that thought, knowing that he wasn't here, but still thinking of him. And so I didn't find it as difficult as if I had left it, and had to come back and start all over again.

But he was so good to me. He was so thoughtful in everything he did, and lots of husbands don't do it. He'll go and put up a flag and maybe pick a rose that I was expecting to make a little corsage for somebody. He'll pick it and he says, "Here's a posy for you. Good morning." And he'd bring it in and put it in a little vase for me, or tack a little note on the refrigerator, or I'd put a little note in his lunch. And he says, "Everybody's envious of my lunch," and I said, "Why? Isn't it good, or what?" He says -- they play pinochle. He says, "I can play pinochle with one hand and eat with the other, and they can't because they got to use both." I said, "You have to eat with both hand." "Yes, but the orange you fix for me" -- I slit the sides down and opened it up like a little lotus flower, and then put it back together again. And then put it in a little bag, so when he opens up the bag, it spreads open and all the oranges are just like this, see, so he can pick it up. And they'd say, "General -- George, how did you train your wife to do that? I can't get my wife to do anything for me." [Laughs] But he wanted to play cards and I thought, "Well, I'll make it easier so his fingers wouldn't get dirty." And everything was made so that he could eat with one hand.

But there was always cute notes. Some of 'em are still on the ice box. But the P-I used to put out a comic strip of "Love Is." It was two little cupids with no clothes on, stark naked. And there was always something written with "Love Is." And one day it was "Love Is" with a little baby crib and the mama cupid was looking into the crib and instead of the little baby, he took a little potted bonsai plant and put it on the pillow. So I thought, "Uh, oh. I'm paying too much attention to my bonsais, maybe he's trying to remind me that I'm forgetting him." But that's what he had posted on the refridge one day.

But he does things in a way without hurting me, but reminding me or asking me. And I often thought, "I wonder why everyone can have a little of that, but it's either all or nothing, or part of it." But he was very, very thoughtful in every way. It wasn't a real expensive gift, but it was a little thoughtful gifts that he'd bring. And the cards -- I got to bring up some of those cards for you, they're beautiful. Musical cards. People are asking for them so if I take the name off -- 'cause if I move into a little apartment, all the things I want to take, how am I going to take everything? All my books? I may take one of certain things to sort of remind me of him. And his one Ho Tei, I think I want to take that one up there, with the gold on it and bronze, sort of a bronze-like.

TL: Did you start your interest in tai chi while you were married to George, or after?

YB: After George passed. Well, before that, I took up the ki of aikido. The ki part is the training part before they flip you over and everything, the intensive part. And I went to that for about seven months and George... I says, "George, come on." "No, I'll watch you." So I took it, and it's different in many ways, but they still train and teach you how to generate the ki in your system and to be able to bring it out, and I had learned to do that before. I was able to do it.

But when I went to this class, which is a sort of a religious group, but, curious me, I had to open any door that came along that sounded like healing. I had to look inside. So I opened this door, and I thought, "Fine, there's a class." So I paid for it, and took it up, and they presented me with a medallion that you wore around your neck. And I thought, "Gee, is this for membership, or what?" And then they wanted me to come to church, and pay so much, and mail so much to their church. I said, "I did not take this class with the understanding that I was to become a member of an organization, a church particularly. I already belong to one." I said, "I like to be out of it." So I officially had to request, return the medallion.

But in the meantime, they tried to teach us that if you learn this course, you can preserve a strawberry, an egg from spoiling or rotting, keep it fresh, and do anything with your hands. Well, nobody would prove it and I thought, "Gee, nobody has proof or a sample of it." I thought, "Well, I'm going to try it." So I've got three strawberries in there. One's ten years old and another one younger, but if the strawberry's green, it's a little different. It's just like people. Some firmer ones look younger, and the overripe ones get squishier. And that's just the way my strawberries are. And you can preserve -- that's just like the strawberry you cook, that has no sugar in it. But when you cook strawberry, it turns brown. Remember, we used to can strawberries? And that's just the way, and it's still not spoiled. There's no mold. So in one jar, I neglected and ignored it, put it away where I wouldn't even go by it. And the jar was just full of mold, fluffy gray mold.

<End Segment 40> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.