Jizo

It’s National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day, but I don’t yet know this as I wander up a side street in Nozawa Onsen, a bit bedraggled in my yukata and short jacket. I’ve left our inn with no clear destination, just want to be outside in the clear autumn air while I wait for whatever will happen next. I’ve already bathed in the inn’s onsen, eaten savory buns steamed in the springs’ hot water. My travel partner is taking a nap. We’ve survived a typhoon, the day-long storm derailing our itinerary, and now the sunny afternoon lures me outside once again. The town is busier than it had been this morning, with schoolchildren congregated at the corner who yell hello! hello! A few elderly men sit at the footbath soaking their feet, smoking and scrolling through their phones. I instinctively turn right and head up a steep cobblestoned lane, glimpsing the red torii, a curved arch, that signals an entrance to a Shinto shrine or temple, a holy place. As I approach the temple complex, I’m drawn to a shrine that holds several seated Jizo, the Bodhisattvas that protect unborn children. I’ve seen these shrines before, at Yamadera, a […]