Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Ephesians 5:19-20
I brought a copy of Charlotte’s Web home with me the next evening and began to read it to Chiyo the spider. Our progress was delayed for a couple of weeks when a male Doru spider came along.
But Chiyo’s romance was brief, and soon we were entangled in “Charlotte’s Web” again.
We followed Charlotte and Wilbur as summer gave way to fall and sweet gum leaves began to turn red.
“What a poignant story,” Chiyo said when we reached the end. “Do you think I could learn to write words on my web like Charlotte?”
“Easy, peasy, Japanesey,” I said. “Shoot, by next summer I’ll have you weaving Shakespearean sonnets into your web.”
But Chiyo’s mood seemed to darken.
“I don’t want to get ahead of myself,” Chiyo said, her voice almost infrasonic. “Just teach me to write ‘Thank You.’ Gratitude brings fulfillment; grievance brings misery.”
“Spins a web, any size, she’s profound, and she’s wise,” I sang.
“Maybe, the people who planted these two trees will see it,” Chiyo said. “Turned out to be a perfect spot for my web. And a safe spot, too.”
“Thank you is only eight letters,” I said. “We can knock that out in no time.”
“Just teach me the ’T’ teacher,” she said, her voice tiny again.
I fetched a sketch pad from my desk and brought it outside.
“The ’T’ is simple, Chiyo. It consists of a horizontal line balanced on top of a vertical line, like so. Got it?”
“I think so.” “The H is just as easy,” I said.
“Let me work on the ’T’ for now, T. Michael,” Chiyo said.
“Suit yourself,” I said.
Thanksgiving came and went, and Chiyo’s writing lessons were temporarily stopped as she tended to her egg sack duties. Most evenings, she said she was tired and wanted to turn in early.
December brought subzero temperatures and I worried, but Chiyo allayed my concerns with her customary stoicism.
“You know what CHIYO stands for?” she asked me once.
“What?” I said.
“Can’t help it, you’re old,” she said.
The holiday season complicated things for Chiyo’s lessons, and my morbid attitude made matters worse.
I spent the night of the winter solstice cloistered away in my room web surfing, and I learned of a Japanese way of saying “Thank you” that consisted of only three Kanji symbols, a much briefer way of expressing the sentiment which came with a fresh nuance. I couldn’t wait to share it with Chiyo.
According to Suki Nihongo, the largest Japanese dictionary on the web, the kanji symbols for “Thank You” originated in a Buddhist expression meaning “rare” or “difficult to exist.”
“In a religious context, it was used to express gratitude for things considered precious or miraculous.”
In other words, it was perfect.
I rose at dawn and ran to the balcony to tell Chiyo what I had learned.
But when I looked at the space between the trees, all that remained of her web was a horizontal line from tree to tree and a vertical string dangling from its center.
Chiyo was gone.
At first, I felt cheated, angry. The story was not supposed to end yet. Not this way.
She didn’t get the chance to learn the kanji symbols or the rest of the letters in Thank You, but then I realized we had built something lasting together, something that the indifferent forces of nature couldn’t take away.
And as I watched what remained of her web blowing in the wind, I remembered what she said about gratitude.
I now understand what Shakespeare meant when he said, “Brevity is the soul of wit.”
The single “T” that Chiyo left stood for many things now, and I will cherish them all. Every time I type my own, I will think of Chiyo.
Next spring, Chiyo’s daughters will emerge from the egg sack and fly off on the warm spring zephyrs to build their own webs at points unknown. I hope one of them stays by my balcony.
I will miss Chiyo because “it is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer.”
*I have been fortunate to know someone who is both.
Merry Christmas.
*From Charlotte’s Web, Chapter 22 (A Warm Wind)