The Courtyard Maple
In the Sakyo Ward of Kyoto, our traditional wooden machiya townhouse has a small inner garden (tsuboniwa) barely three tatami mats in size. When Kenji and I married six years ago, we planted a young Japanese acer maple (*Irohamomiji*) in the stone basin.
We imagined our future child taking their first steps on the cedar veranda, pointing at the dragonflies that hovered over the moss. We bought wooden picture books, a bamboo cradle, and hand-woven infant kimonos from an artisan in Gion.
We did not anticipate the biological nightmare that awaited us: hormone injections that left my stomach bruised purple, invasive egg retrievals, empty petri dishes, and four consecutive pregnancy tests with solitary, merciless pink lines.
The Letters on Washi Paper
Infertility is a silent, disenfranchised grief. People around you celebrate baby showers, complain about teething sleeplessness, and ask casually: 'So, when are you two going to start a family?' Every question is a small bayonet to the heart.
To keep my sanity, I started writing to our unborn child. Every month after a failed cycle, I sat by the veranda with a calligraphy brush and handmade washi paper. I didn't write about despair; I wrote an encyclopedia of what awaited them.
I wrote about the smell of roasted sweet potatoes in winter, the sound of the rain hitting the ceramic roof tiles, the way their father sings out of tune when he cooks miso soup, and how much love had accumulated in our house just waiting for their arrival.
The Horizon of Adoption
Last month, we closed our fertility clinic file forever. We signed the adoption papers with the municipal child welfare agency in Kyoto. In four months, a little baby girl whose biological mother cannot care for her will enter our front gate.
The child who will sleep in that bamboo cradle might not carry our genetic sequence, but she will carry every drop of devotion we poured into that garden for six years. Blood makes relatives; unconditional love makes parents.
To all the women and men crying over empty cradles tonight: do not abandon hope. Your love is not wasted; it is simply preparing the home. Solas Haven holds my star for the little girl who is finally on her way to Kyoto.
Related Memoirs & Chronicles
Is there a letter lingering in your silence?
Do not let your unsaid words weigh down your heart. Release them to the eternal living constellation of Solas Haven.
Enter the Sanctuary & Release a Star