A Better Anniversary
a diety who answered my plea
I’m a raven when it comes to religion.
I’m a syncretist, weaving a structure of ritual and belief that speaks to me, just as ravens are known for collecting shiny things that strike their avian fancies.
Rifle through my wallet, and you will find divine protections. A blessing from Benzaiten, a Buddhist patron deity of artists. A tiny frog, kaeru in Japanese, expresses the hope that money will return (that verb, in Japanese, is also pronounced kaeru).
On my desk are two amulets, one dedicated to Ame-no-uzume, the Shintō patroness of artists (and the deity who enticed Amaterasu from her cave by performing the first striptease in Japan’s history), and one from Hennōji, a Buddhist temple in Honomu, Hawai’i, where, last November, I asked the delightful priest there, Rev. Clark Watanabe, to pray for my writing work.
I have amulets in my car to protect me as I drive. One is from Tsubaki Shrine, the Shintō Shrine formerly found in Granite Falls, Washington. One is from Sensōji, Tōkyō’s oldest Buddhist temple, where Hiro and I met for our first date.
There is a small amulet on my work lanyard. Hiro bought it for me at Kiyomizu, a Buddhist temple in Kyōto, in 2023. During our Japan trip, I had tripped the day before, and he found an amulet specifically to keep me safe as I walked, marked with a design of the Buddha’s feet.
[photo]
And it was an amulet I purchased in 1993 that brought Hiro to me.
Figuring out exactly when this purchase occurred is a story for another day.
That said, I had traveled to Kōbe for work. A colleague suggested I visit Ikuta Shrine, an exquisite Shintō Shrine complex in the city’s downtown.
As I entered the precincts, I stopped to read the history of the place and to learn which deity was enshrined there. Wakahirume, in Shintō tradition, is the goddess of the rising son and is believed to be either the younger manifestation of Amaterasu, the sun goddess, or her younger sister.
In the third century CE, Empress Jingu sailed back to Japan from a visit to the three kingdoms of the Korean peninsula. Unable to land near modern-day Ōsaka, her ship put in near modern-day Kōbe, whereupon Wakahirume appeared to one of the nobles attending on the Empress to demand she be revered there in Kōbe. Therefore, Ikuta Shrine boasts more than eighteen hundred years of history (although the shrine was re-sited where it is today in 799 CE).
When I was twenty-seven, I wasn’t that fascinated with Japan’s history. Subsequent information on the shrine drew my eye, however. Wakahirume hears the prayers of the lovelorn!
At that point, halfway through my ten years in Japan, I had undoubtedly figured sex out. (Please read my essay for The Audacity’s Emerging Writer series here to see what I mean.) Love, however, kept its distance; a significant factor in that was my level of delulu: believing that an exponentially increasing series of one-night stands could result in love.
I had, however, met Hiro on GayNet Japan, the Tōkyō-based dial-up modem bulletin board service. And yet, there was a problem: Hiro and I had exchanged phone numbers and chatted on and off for months, BUT Hiro never seemed to want to meet me in person. On the phone, Hiro was charming and funny, but his reluctance to connect was infuriatingly frustrating.
When I stood before the shrine doors in Kōbe, therefore, I had one request for Wakahirume. Help me meet Hiro.
To seal the deal, I stopped at the shrine office and selected an amulet. The priestess recommended one for love relationships, and I assented with a bow.
Summer ended. My friends, increasingly annoyed by my morning-after phone calls wherein I repeatedly crowed how the latest Mr. Right-Now was the one, intervened: no more sex on the first date, Brian.
And I agreed.
In December of 1993, Hiro and I visited Sensōji. We had been dating for three weeks, and I, as certain as I had been on the first, chaste date, loved him. We had come to the temple for protection. I was about to fly home to New York for Christmas, and Hiro needed an amulet to keep me safe during my travels.
When he offered me his gift, I gave him the amulet from Ikuta Shrine. Wakahirume helped us connect, I said, and I trust her to look out for you.
In thanksgiving, Hiro returned the amulet to Wakahirume during our Japan visit late in 2016. I purchased new amulets for both of us then, and in 2023 when we visited once more.
Updates
Querying season is upon me.
I sent letters to fifteen literary agents on May 8th and 9th, asking for representation.
I am trying to keep my eyes away from my inbox for the next six weeks. (If I don't receive a response by then, I will start a second batch of queries.)
Wish me luck!