About 35 years ago, Neeny and Grandaddy hosted an exchange student from Japan in their home. His name is Tai. They maintained a friendship through the years, have visited each other, and exchanged news and Christmas cards. Every year since before I was born, Tai has sent 4 or 5 origami animals with his Christmas card, and those festive animals have adorned our tree--a reminder that we have friends that live on the other side of the world.
This year, when we got his Christmas card, I realized that I had forgotten to let him know of Neeny's passing. We put the origami figures on the tree, and I wrote him a letter letting him know how special he has always been to our family, and how much Neeny and Grandaddy loved him.
Today, I got a call from the post office that they were holding a package for me from Japan. I just opened it. There was no letter. There was, however, a calendar that shows how to make the origami animals, a few fragile pieces of brightly-colored paper, and a few completed animals. There are tears in my eyes as I type this, for I know these will probably be the last origami animals that adorn our tree, unless we teach our children to make them, which we will.
It makes me think of a poem we analyzed this week by Langston Hughes. It goes like this:
The Poem
I loved my friend,
He went away from me.
There's nothing more to tell.
This poem ends as softly as it began...
I loved my friend.
I think that absence of words may be the international symbol of sadness.
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