A Tribute to My Late Father                                        Ruriko Yoshida

Dear Father,

The time has come to bid you farewell in this world. To think that this will be the last moment that I can see my favorite father, my heart becomes filled with sorrow.　Now that I must bid you farewell forever, I recall the many, many events that come to my mind anew like a revolving  lantern. I now realize how fortunate I was to be able to call you Papa…my father. To think back, life was a long and hard road for my father. Yet, my father was always cheerful and, even if there were difficulties, he did not show it on his face, and always loved Mother and us children.

To trace back my early childhood memories, I recollect that my father worked diligently from morning till night. In anything that my father did he was quick and industrious. In Utah when he was farming he took care of my sick mother and the four young children.　Upon returning from the fields, without resting, he would fill the washtub we used to have with hot water and bathe the children, from the youngest on up. He would say, ”Come Aiko, next is Taeko, next is Ruriko and last is Masayuki・・・“　He would bathe the four of us, who were covered with sand, and then he would take that hot water and launder our clothing , using soap and the old washboard.　And, finally, with the left over water, he would mop the floor. It was when I was only five years old, when my mother was very weak, that  I used to watch my father. One day I felt so sorry for my father that I wanted to make him happy. I took it upon myself to wash the rice and cook it for my father and others who came home for lunch. Not being quite six years old, I failed to measure the correct level of water and the rice turned out only half cooked. But my father smiled and kept eating the half cooked rice, saying “It is delicious, it is delicious,” and he proceeded to pat my head. This happened fifty years ago, but it only seems like yesterday. It is a happy memory that I’ll never forget. At that time, my father and my uncle and aunt, who were good friends, farmed together. One of his recreational activities was to play baseball with the young men on Sundays. My father was the  manager. and all the youngsters looked up to him and called my father ‘Tom’. As the tournament day approached, Aunt Alice and my father would prepare lots of delicious sandwiches, which was his way of showing his generosity.

In 1935, when I was eight years old, following the custom of the then first generation’s belief of receiving an education in Japan, we went to Hiroshima to live with my grandparents.　Unfortunately, the Sina-Japanese War and then World War Ⅱ broke out and the communication with Japan ceased. After the atomic bomb was dropped, the war ended and communication was resumed. My father worried about us and immediately started to send packages every week, four times a month to Japan where food was extremely scarce. In the packages were coffee, candy, canned goods, sugar and sometimes rice packed in the flour sacks which were neatly sewn. Later on my mother told me that all of this was done by my father. My father, who loved his children dearly, continued this every week and every month until we returned to the United States two years later. We returned two years after the war ended, thanks to our parents. When I started the repatriation process, I discovered that my father had paid for first class fare for my two sisters and myself. I was really surprised. My father’s love for his daughters was shown here again.

When we reached San Francisco, I saw my father, who had come to welcome us. He was young and full of energy and when he saw us on the deck he waved his hands and could hardly wait for us to disembark. Upon leaving the ship, I held his warm hand. When my father said, ”Welcome home” I could not help but cry.  After an overnight stay, we returned to Utah and there my father resumed working night and day and this impressed me immensely. We could not sit still, and we followed him into the fields to help him…but we could not do one tenth the work my father could do.

The Following year, in 1948, in order to help his children who could not understand English well, my father quit the work that he was so used to and came to Los Angeles to start a new life. At fifty years of age, to start gardening as a new career must have been very difficult for my father. Thus, daily life was work, work and more work for my father, who worked as hard as he could.

Dad, thank you very much for your long, hard work. You certainly must have been tired. To bid farewell to my father, who sleeps very peacefully, I would like to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. And if there is a life after death, in the next world I would like to be born again in that world and call my father ‘Papa’ again. Goodbye, Father. Rest peacefully.

Ruriko

Translated by John Matsuda