The Last Season of Empty Suitcase

Happy spring semester 2009! This is the fourth season of Empty Suitcase, which means that I am going to graduate with a Master’s degree in English this May! Before I open bottles of champagne for congratulations, I need to finish my thesis project with three hardcore doctors. My academic shield and sword always melt away by the radiation of their knowledge. With the broken armor, I finally understand that I am not the academic person who is going to apply for a doctoral degree, but at the same time, I am excited to be free from writing assignments this early summer. So, I am ready to be a samurai and cut through all the tough scholarly situations, write book length collection of poetry as a thesis project, and of course edit Analecta, the literary magazine from the English Department.

Actually, I just finished academic leftovers from the past fall semester seven days ago. I studied during Christmas break because I took an extra long Thanksgiving weekend. It was a good holiday— my heavy metal guy visited me across the Pacific Ocean and met my Japanese parents— and it was also a sad moment— my grandfather passed away—so I changed my flight schedule and thanked all professors who understood my situation and gave me extended due dates.

When I arrived at Nagoya, my home city, my grandfather was in a paulownia casket with hundreds of chrysanthemums and orchids. My grandmother was so happy to see me and talked to him— your granddaughter came from America. Can you hear me? — But he was already a corpse. He used to talk too much, but the silence and ignorance of her questions made me realize that he was really dead. On the following day of my arrival, he became ashes. I carried the box to his apartment after my grandmother walked holding her cane and soaking-wet lace handkerchief. She wore a black kimono during the funeral process for three out of 49 days. There was the Fujimoto crest— a falling wisteria— on her kimono and she told me that if my future husband died that I need to wear the kimono with the crest on it. The obi-belt for funerals was as white as her face.

My mother, who took care of my grandfather for a long time at a hospital, kept saying, “His last car was a hearse” and cried. Her mother comforted her saying, “Everyone’s last car is a hearse.” The last time I went back home in summer 2008, my parent’s car was crashed into by some random cars, fortunately nobody was injured, but my father needed to buy a new car during this worsening economic situation. The car incident gave them an extra difficult situation while caring for my grandfather. They needed to carry personal care and nursing equipment to the nursing home by public transportation and spent extra money for a taxi to take him to the hospital. My father and grandfather discussed the new car while he was in the hospital. He wanted to go to his favorite Sushi bar after getting the new car.

Two weeks after the cremation, my heavy metal guy came and I introduced him to everyone. And then when I realized I was myself again, I was in the immigration office at the Detroit International Airport. The officer asked me, “This is the middle of a semester. Were you homesick? Please place your fingerprint, Ms. Fujimoto.”

I still do not know how I should write about someone’s death even though I am a poet. Poetry is about a high quality of crystallizing emotions, so I should have known better about how to express emotions in writing. However, time passed quickly, so the emotions have never digested well, which is like bad food poisoning. It is not just sorrow but also thinking about how my grandmother is going to live alone in an isolated apartment far from close and extended family and who is going to take care of her finances and beyond, and who is going to inherit the Fujimoto name. I am the firstborn daughter who has her own dream coming true in America. Well, I will know my decision at the end of the semester when I walk in the graduation ceremony.