Something That Has Eyes

 

 When my family moved into our new home, the moving company said, “If you have something you want to throw away, we can dispose the articles, except for those that have eyes, particularly dolls and pictures.” They said they couldn’t dispose even stuffed toys and posters of singing idols.

 Let us think like we are workers in a moving company. If we dispose articles like dolls and pictures, they could be precious dolls and memorable pictures of someone whom we had never met. It could be spooky.

 My grandaunt didn’t have a child. After her passing, I cleared up her house. I commuted to her house once a week. It took about two years. Of course, I recycled those I could recycle. I separated her waste.

 Her husband, my granduncle, was a photo processing shopkeeper. His hobby was photography. There were many photos in her house. I put off disposing the photos because I assumed it was an easy job. I never had a spooky feeling about the photos. My granduncle was my good friend. He would never curse me. Unfortunately, when I was almost finished clearing up the house, I became sick. I stayed in a hospital for a long time.

 We should not leave a house empty for a long time. From the hospital, I asked my wife to employ a clearing up company. I didn’t think about the photos.

 The clearing company invited a Buddhist monk. The monk chanted a sutra for the photos. Of course, we needed to pay him extra. I am not stingy, but if I discarded the photos at first, we didn’t need any religious ceremony.

Dear friends, if you move or clear up things left by deceased people, you should discard those that have eyes first. These things should be handled by close people.

Picture by Masayuki Wada