You will find short stories on this site. Most are autobiographical. Some are fiction.

MITSIKO.

“Hello Tod. This is Mitsiko.”

“Hello … Um…How do I know you?”

“You don’t remember me,…from the OSAC ceramics class?”

“Oh yes. I remember you now.”

“Well, I am calling to invite you to join me at the OSAC Open House next Saturday.”

“Okay. That sounds like fun. I would like to go.”

We made arrangements to meet at OSAC for the open house. After our brief conversation, I thought back. Two years earlier I had taken classes in ceramics at OSAC, mostly as a diversion from my ruminating over my second divorce. I remembered that there had been two Japanese women in the ceramics studio during the three terms that I was there. One was tall, for a Japanese woman, and attractive but aloof. The other was short, ordinary looking, and outgoing. I wouldn’t know which one I had arranged to meet until the night of the open house. As I parked my car at Oregon School of Arts and Crafts, (OSAC) a Japanese woman approached. She was the outgoing one. We reintroduced our selves and went in join the throngs meandering through the various art departments of the school in which student work was being exhibited for sale. After going through most of the studios, weaving, painting, jewelry etc. we reached the ceramics department’s exhibition, Mitsiko lead me to her work. Her ceramics were traditional Japanese domestic pottery with subdued glazes. Her pieces were simple in design, yet well proportioned and technically well made. They were not the kind of pottery to sell well in such a setting. I bought one of her traditional Japanese bowls.

A short time later, she encountered a group of her ceramics school classmates and wandered off with them. Feeling abandoned, I completed my tour of the exhibition alone, hoping that she would rejoin me. She didn’t. It would not the last time that she would abandon me to be with another ‘friend’. I left. On my drive home I was reflecting on the evening. I had thought of this evening as a date, she apparently saw our meeting as a way to boost her sales. Over the following weeks, I thought about her and our brief but pleasant time together. Eventually I called her with an invitation to go out for dinner. She suggested a date three weeks hence. It seemed strange. Perhaps she was indicating a somewhat less than enthusiastic anticipation of our meeting again. Much later I learned that it was because her main man was going to be out of town at that time. Over dinner we shared stories of our lives. I learned that she was ten years my junior. That she had been married in Japan to an American business man from Oregon. After a couple of years of marriage, her husband, while on a business trip to Korea, met another woman, and wanted a divorce. Mitsiko quietly said “She was working in a brothel.” Her husband had invested in real estate in Portland and had purchased a modest house there. Mitsiko’s divorce settlement included ownership of that house. She was happy to move to Portland as she knew a Japanese woman who had moved there and who had written happy things about her life in Portland.

At the end of our meal I drove Mitsiko home. We continued to talk in the car in front of her house. As she grasped the car door handle to leave, she turned to me and said “Would you like to come in for a cup of tea?” I was happy to agree. We sat on her couch drinking our tea and talking. She went to the kitchen for something and when she returned she sat close to me. I put my arm around her shoulder. She snuggled up against me like an affectionate cat snuggles against its owner. After a while I asked “May a spend the night with you”? Not wanting to be presumptuous of my new friend, I added, “I won’t insist on making love.” She replied “Yes, you can stay”. Once in bed it became clear that she was looking forward to having intercourse, as was I.

That night was so wonderful that for days I felt like I was floating on a cloud. I was amazed by this turn of events. I had believed that Japanese women were bashful and retiring. Mitsiko was neither. We were together again three days later. The following weekend I traveled to eastern Oregon with a group of men that had been my pals in Eugene High School. We spent the three day weekend at Met’s cabin far up the Deschutes River. I could not constrain my enthusiasm when telling my friends about my new love. It was ironic that I felt so happy because on Friday, the day before going to Met’s cabin, I had received a phone call from the urologist who had performed a very painful prostate biopsy on me a couple of weeks earlier. He called to tell me that the pathology report had returned showing that I had prostate cancer and that I should make an appointment to see him as soon as possible.

The weeks that followed were extraordinary. I was working eight hour days for Kaiser. After work and on weekends I frequently spent my evenings and nights with Mitsiko. She had broken up with her former man friend. All-the-while I was dealing with concerns having to do with my prostate cancer. After reviewing my options with my urologist, I decided to have a prostatectomy. My surgery was not considered urgent, and so was scheduled months later. I joined a prostate cancer support group and met other men who were also dealing with various stages of prostate cancer. One had chosen “watchful waiting” rather than surgery or other treatment, an option I had considered. However, he had neglected to the proscribed quarterly PSA tests. Two years later his cancer had come back aggressively, resulting in metastatic cancer for which the only treatments postponed his certain death. Despite the possibility that the surgery would ruin my sex life, learning of his situation, made me satisfied that I had made the right choice of treatments. I would soon have my prostate and the cancer it contained, removed from my body. Once a month the support group had a potluck dinner. On these occasions, those men who were married, brought their wives. I took Mitsiko. Her outgoing nature made it easy for her to meet the men in the support group. I had told her some of the stories of their dealing with prostate cancer. She enjoyed getting to know the men in person.

We were in such a happy loving relationship we decided that I should move in to live with Mitsiko. I was ready to share expenses but was surprised when she suggested that I pay her market rate rent in addition to sharing the cost of food and utilities. The rent she requested was an amount that was considerably higher than expenses would have been. I didn’t object to her request, because I loved her, I wanted to live with her, and it would be nice to have her support following my surgery. I moved in and our relationship blossomed. Each day when I would arrive home from work, Mitsiko would greet me on the stair up to her house. Standing one stair step above me she would be my height. In this way she greeted me face to face with a loving kiss and long hug. She was a good cook of Japanese food. We enjoyed preparing meals together.

Shortly before my surgery, Mitsiko became reticent when I attempted to initiate sexual relations. I asked about this change. She passed it off as a change in desire due to menopause. She also stopped greeting me on the stair. It was apparent that our loving greetings had ended. Our woderful loveing relationship seemed to have been lost. Following surgery it became apparent that I was one of the unfortunate 50% of men who had nerve damage during surgery resulting in the loss of erections. I tried several methods of attaining them so that Mitsiko and I could make love like before. None were satisfactory. We gave up trying. We became like room mates. We shared her one bed but she stayed on her side and I on mine. This was not the relationship I desired. I didn’t blame her. I was no longer a satisfying sex partner. But there are other ways to express affection and she acceded to none. The menopause excuse for her lack of interest in sexual activities could not explain the loss of other signs of affection. I suggested that I move out. She insisted that I stay. But she remained affectionately aloof. I wondered if the only reason she wanted me there was to receive my monthly rent check.

It was Spring. Change was in the air. My new boss at Kaiser was pompous and incompetent. I was over 65. I retired. The renter, occupying my house in Astoria was three months behind in paying her rent. I had sent her an eviction notice. The old house was soon to be empty and in needed work. It was calling for my attention. My living situation with Mitsiko was unsustainable. I packed my things and moved to Astoria. Shortly after I moved out of Mitsiko’s house, Ron, a man she had met in the prostate support group, moved in. I believe that they had been carrying on an affair, that started at the time Mitsiko had told me that “menopause had changed her desire for sex.” I was happy to be out of that situation and enthusiastically embarked on the next chapter of my life in the small rural seaport of Astoria.