The Day My Grandmother Comes to Visit: The Tale of Genji, My Grandmother, and Me

I wonder when it was that my paternal grandmother gave me the first edition of The Tale of Genji translated by Junichiro Tanizaki.

Six volumes of The Tale of Genji, including a separate volume, bound in light blue cloth.
When I turned the colored tissue paper that covered each chapter—which I heard was inscribed by Tanizaki's wife, Matsuko—the sensual story translated by Junichiro Tanizaki would begin.
I felt my heart flutter as I gently turned the pages, placing my hands on the smooth paper so as not to damage them.

My father left home when I was in fifth grade, and they officially divorced when I was in my second year of high school.

Even after my father left, my mother continued to visit my grandparents, keep them company, help care for my grandfather alongside the home helper, and support my grandmother just as she always had.

Even after my grandfather passed away when I was in my third year of high school, and even after my father passed away later, my mother continued to visit my grandmother, who lived alone, every single week until she moved into a nursing home in Tokyo.

I only visited my grandmother's house occasionally.

My grandparents' house was so quiet you could hear a pin drop, and when I opened the heavy door made entirely of glass, a Western doll that my grandmother cherished would be sitting on a chair at the edge of the entrance hall.

On the bare concrete wall hung a massive oil painting of that same doll, painted by my grandmother.
There was another heavy glass inner door, just like the entrance.

When I opened that heavy door, as if pushing the air itself, there was a living room that was always tidy, without a single speck of dust.

In the hallway beyond the shoji screens of the living room stood a bookshelf packed with my grandmother's collection of literary anthologies.

My grandmother's house always had an unchanging, quiet, and almost oppressive solemnity, and visiting was always a tense experience.

My grandmother would always greet me with a composed smile, saying, 'Oh, welcome, Yuru-chan,' but I rarely felt any warmth from her.

After my grandfather passed away, it was my job to serve tea to visitors who came to pay their respects and to take care of the flowers they brought. And I was paid for it.

It was very much like my grandmother to pay her grandchild to take care of the flowers.

So, I worked properly for the money I received, tending to the flowers and cleaning the rooms.

When that was finished, I would have cookies with my grandmother and we would chat a little. About books I had recently read, about my siblings, and about the guests.

It seemed that the fact that I was reading books made my grandmother happier than anything else.

At that time, I was often reading Shugoro Yamamoto's Edo-period human-interest stories, which my grandmother had of course already read, and she would listen to my thoughts with a beaming face.

When my mother came, my grandmother would start talking seriously about the company my grandfather had run, and her expression would change completely from when she was listening to me talk about novels.

She was both a person of iron who supported a businessman and a girl who loved literature; surely both were the foundation of who my grandmother was.

Such a grandmother visited our house a few times to have meals with my grandfather.

My grandmother would stand at our entrance with a smile, but the serene atmosphere of her house would drift with her, and it was as if that chilly air from her entrance hall was clinging only to her.

For my grandmother, my mother would busy herself with cooking and cleaning from the morning, and the table would be lined with homemade dishes she had put her heart into, as well as high-quality ingredients ordered from afar.

The meals were always filled with tension, yet my siblings, unlike me, would choose their words carefully to answer my grandmother's questions, while I struggled with honorifics I wasn't used to, answering in a stumbling, incoherent manner.

My grandfather, sitting next to me, would say nothing, just sitting there with a smile on his face. Despite her small stature, my grandmother's presence, with her back held perfectly straight, was overwhelming.

For my grandmother, the purpose of these meals seemed to be mainly to talk with my mother about the company and friends, and halfway through, she would stop the fixed smile she had for us and begin to talk seriously with my mother about various things.

I would always feel relieved at that moment, and from then on, I would quietly and slowly eat my mother's cooking.

After having tea and sweets, my grandparents would return to their own home.

The air of relief the moment my grandmother left the entryway.

I only remember a relationship of tension and honorifics with my grandmother, and I only occasionally recall the moments when we talked about literature or when she taught me how to make the shredded salad she made every day.

When she passed away the year before last at the age of 104, she was bedridden and had a hazy demeanor throughout, and when I visited her once, she was mostly asleep and we couldn't talk.

Even so, it seems she read books until the very end and spent her time leisurely, eating chocolates brought by my cousin.

When my mother went to her hospital room, she would ask about each of my many children, and apparently, she would ask if Yuru-chan was doing well; I was surprised by her clarity, realizing she had remembered them.

My grandmother remained herself until the end, passing away with dignity.

A year and a half has passed since my grandmother died, and I am turning the pages of 'The Tale of Genji' for the first time in a while.
My grandmother's face, surely having read it many times, came to mind. I feel as if I am reading it with her.

More than any jewelry or expensive bags my grandmother owned, being able to receive Junichiro Tanizaki's 'The Tale of Genji' was very important to the relationship between my grandmother and me.

I didn't cry when my grandmother died. But for some reason, as I write this, tears are overflowing.

Even though I had a tense relationship with my grandmother until the end and found her difficult to deal with, perhaps I had misunderstood her all along?

Next time, I will visit my grandmother's house, where the entire collection of literature remains, and try opening that heavy, tranquil-looking entryway.

Perhaps my relationship with my grandmother is only just beginning.

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