MEMORY LANE

Though decidedly not pottery related seeing this small wood Dharuma, seen all over Japan, never fails to bring me on a journey down memory lane. On one of our trips to Japan we planned it so that we would be in the Kyoto area to take advantages of two large flea markets on successive weekends. On the first weekend we found ourselves at the small table of a woman who was easily in her 80s and we purchased a small itto-bori figure and when we got to our hotel room she had wrapped up this very cute itto-bori style carved Dharuma in our package. A week later we ran in to her again where she called us over and after thanking her for the gift, she had another very nice itto-bori carved dragon which we purchased and this time, she gifted us the smallest wood carved geta with two kokeshi dolls attached to it. Two years later we ran into her again, she was all smiles and showed us a carved wood tonkotsu inro dated 1844 which we purchased and she added an old Edo period lacquer netsuke to go along with the carved dragon and tigers on the piece. That was the last time we saw her though friends of ours several years later saw her and mentioned us, apparently she had a bid smile and every time I look at this little carved piece, I have a big smile as well.