This happened 22 years ago. Yet a death in the family cannot be counted in years. It’s always as if yesterday. With Japan’s season of obon just past, the time seems appropriate to look again at that somber “yesterday” when my wife’s mother passed away. Two years back, I posted a column that described her initial decline into failing health. To read that again, please click here. Never was she hospitalized. We had care workers dropping by the house daily. She died in her bedro

She jiggled in blue-striped pajamas before the bathroom mirror. She looked a fright, a witch, a hag. Her eyes were packed in red, her hair a ratted ball, and her face sallow and lifeless and above all old! She stuck out her tongue. Of course, it was caked! She put a cold hand to her throat and said, “La, la, la…” The sounds croaked out. Oh she was sick! How could she possibly, possibly sing?

Meet "Father Smith" -- silver hair, gentle smile and a voice so mellow that it flows with a grace from beyond. Maybe there’s a God and maybe there isn't, but when you're with Father Smith, you tend to believe there is. There's just one thing. He's as phony as hell. "I'm an English teacher," he says. "I marry people at a hotel chapel on weekends. I wear the robes, a cross, the whole nine yards. Nobody knows. And nobody cares." He smiles his smile. "Except for maybe me."

There are rules in love stories.

I asked my future wife to marry me while we were in the ofuro.

I am sometimes asked how I met my wife. I like to say this unknown girl rushed up and tackled me. My wife’s version is different