Even the stone upon which you stumble is a part of your fate.
--Buddhist teaching

Men generally travel for one of two reasons: to search out new adventures or to escape from old ones. My first trip to Japan was occasioned by both. For reasons I wouldn't understand for another 20 years, I was fascinated by Japan. Like a weak swimmer in a strong rip, I was drawn irresistibly to this mysterious land and its alien culture. I was also on the run from a failed relationship.

Like so many boys who grow up in families without sisters, I had always idolized girls, giving my imaginary lovers all the feminine qualities I most admired in a woman. The women who inhabited my dreams were delicate and very feminine creatures possessed of fine sensitivity and transcendent beauty. The almost two years I spent living with the girl I'll call Cathy disabused me of all those childish notions. "You'll never find a woman better than me," were her parting words. The fear that she might be right threw me into a deep depression and sent me scurrying to the airport.

In Japan, I soon discovered that Cathy had a propensity for exaggeration.

Then, as now, Japan's cities were crawling with beautiful women. You bumped into prim housewives at the market, jostled with dewy schoolgirls on the crowded bus and were jammed so closely next to cute office ladies on the subway that you could smell their perfume and read the labels on their blouses.

Then, there is The Look - the frank, unabashed way that Japanese women have of looking at a Western man. Very much like the appraising glance men give to a woman, it is a pleasant feeling to be on the receiving end for a change. In the West, not wanting to encourage a man, women tend to avoid eye contact. Not so in Japan. Perhaps this is because Japan is such a safe and civilized country that everyone recognizes the proper limits on personal behavior. Or perhaps it is simply because people in Japan are not afraid of one another. But, whatever the reason, the interest is obvious, as is the mutual attraction.
My first job in Japan was the first job of almost every new arrival: English teacher. I was living in Kyoto at the time and, every afternoon, I would ride my salvaged CB350 Honda down the Kamo River to the train station at Kawaramachi-Shijo and catch the Keihan Express to Osaka, where I would spend the afternoons teaching English to Hitachi executives. During the 40-minute ride, I would study, snooze, or gaze blankly out the window at the depressingly bland outskirts of Osaka.

Even in 1926, when the famous English writer Aldous Huxley passed through the area, the landscape was hardly inspiring. "The largest of these fungus beds," he wrote, "is Osaka."
It is hard to imagine two cities so close together yet so different than Kyoto and Osaka. A mere 40 minutes apart in space, the cities are thousands of years apart in time. Where Kyoto is quiet, highly cultured, and almost effeminate, Osaka is noisy, crowded, and brash. Kyoto was spared the ravages of war; Osaka was leveled. With their past obliterated by the B29s, the people of Osaka had only the future to look to. This does much to explain the boisterous, mercantile personality of the city where the common greeting is: "Are you making money?"

However, why stare out the window at the banal when there are much more attractive views closer at hand?

It didn't take long for me to develop an effective strategy for meeting girls. By a fortuitous quirk of design, the rows of bench seats on the Keihan afforded a certain amount of privacy for seatmates. Whenever I found myself sitting next to an attractive young lady, I would pull out my textbooks and dictionaries and begin studying. In those days, Western students of Japanese were still somewhat rare, and I would soon sense the sidelong glances directed my way. After 15 or 20 minutes of dutiful study, I would turn towards my seatmate and, feigning ignorance, say: "Excuse me, could you tell me how to read this character?" The conversations that followed were considerably more interesting.

It was on this train, on a chill evening in mid-winter, when the trees along the Kamo River were bare and stark, that I met the girl who would introduce me to the woman of my dreams.

Noriko was the girl's name. Even as I write these words, I can see her gently smiling face backlit by the window. Her skin was as translucent as a pearl, her voice as calming as a smile. As the "fungus bed" streamed by outside the window, we chatted about the things that total strangers chat about: Where was I from? Why was I in Japan? Where did I live? The 40-minute train ride passed in an instant. Before I could gather my wits, she was gathering up her things to leave. As usual when confronted by a beautiful woman, I was paralyzed into inaction. Quick, think of something! You can't let this angel fly out of your life as suddenly as she arrived! I needn't have worried. As Noriko stood to leave, wanting to "exchange culture," as she put it, she gave me a slip of paper with her name and telephone number on it. A few moments later, the train stopped at her station and, like a cherry blossom falling noiselessly from its branch, she was gone. It wasn't until later, when I was blasting up the Kamo River on my CB350, that it occurred to me - I had never even asked for her number.

The CB350 I had found abandoned in the student parking area of Kyoto University. While it didn't take long for me to get it running again, that bike had a chronic problem that drove me to distraction. It started easily and ran perfectly. But, as soon as the engine got hot, the revs would start climbing out of control. I triple-checked the timing and valves, pulled the carbs to bits, and tried different grades of oil, all to no avail. It got so bad that, when sitting at traffic lights, I would have to turn the key on and off like a kill switch to keep the revs under control. Then, when the light turned green, I would blast off, hoping the air stream would cool it off. But, of course, all this did was make it run hotter still. Truly, an infernal machine.

Other drivers must have thought I was some sort of foreign bosozoku (the Japanese equivalent of the Hell's Angels) because, in addition to my uncontrollably screaming motorcycle, I had decorated the back of my helmet with the four Chinese characters ryu-to-da-bi. This well-known Chinese/Japanese expression translates literally as "dragon's head, snake's tail," a good beginning and a bad end.

A few days later, I gave Noriko a call, and we arranged to meet that evening at a small jazz cafÇ near the Old Imperial Palace. When I arrived, I found her sitting at a large table set for four. It seems her boyfriend and a girlfriend would soon be joining us. Boyfriend? It turns out that her invitation, and the gift of her phone number, were entirely innocent. She simply thought it would be fun to introduce this lonely American (Was it so obvious?) to her circle of friends. The boyfriend duly arrived. The only person feeling awkward was I. As the conversation proceeded, I got my first intimation that Japan was a much more highly evolved society than our own. And how could it be otherwise? After all, the Japanese had been living together on these crowded little islands for more than 2,000 years. I was certainly not the first person do be deluded by the superficial trappings of Westernization and a few words of English.

"Can I introduce you to my girlfriend Miss Hiroko?" Standing before our table was a creature from another planet. She stood before us demurely, clasped hands holding a small, embroidered purse, her face a Noh mask framed by jet-black hair. I found that I suddenly had trouble breathing. The temperature of the room seemed hotter. I wanted to run away.

There, standing before me was the woman of my dreams.

Great beauty frightens me. She was so intoxicatingly beautiful that I had to look away. I could not bear it straight on. Like the tiny sips one takes of a powerful liquor, it was only in short glances that I could take her in. Before long, our foursome had become two couples, each unconscious of the other. She was from Hokkaido, the land of snows. She was attending college here in Kyoto. Would she like to go for a motorcycle ride? Of course, she would. We made a date for the next day.

Though I didn't yet know it, that chance meeting with the woman I had only ever dreamed about would change my life forever. Only after many happy years together would I think of Minokichi and the story of the Snow Lady.

Many years ago, in a small village in the province of Musashi, there lived two woodcutters: Mosaku and Minokichi. Mosaku was an old man, and Minokichi, his apprentice, was a lad of eighteen. Every day, the two of them walked to a forest about five miles away from their village to cut wood. On their way, there was a wide river they had to cross by ferry. A bridge had been built there many times, but the strong current always washed it away. During the rainy season, when the river rose, no bridge could withstand its force.

One very cold evening when Mosaku and Minokichi were returning from the forest, they were overtaken by a huge snowstorm. When they finally arrived at the ferry landing, they found that the ferry was on the other side of the river and that the ferryman had gone home for the night. Swimming was out of the question, so the two woodcutters sought shelter in the ferryman's shack - feeling fortunate to find any shelter at all. There was no brazier in the hut, and no way to start a fire. The tiny two-mat room had no windows and only one door. Mosaku and Minokichi closed the door tightly, covered themselves in their straw coats and lay down to rest. At first, they did not feel very cold and they thought that the storm would soon be over.

The old man was soon fast asleep. But Minokichi, fearful of the sound of the wind and the lashing snow, was unable to sleep. Outside in the darkness, he could hear the river roaring. Their tiny hut rocked and creaked like a small boat on a stormy sea. Minokichi shivered beneath his straw coat. At last, in spite of the biting cold, he finally drifted off to sleep.

Suddenly, feeling snow piling up on his face he awoke with a start. The door of the hut had been forced open! There, in the middle of the room, illuminated by snow light, was a woman dressed completely in white. She was bending over him and blowing her icy breath against his cheek. Mosaku tried to scream, but was unable to utter a sound. The woman in white leaned ever closer to him until her face almost touched his. Mosaku could see that while her eyes were terrifying, her face was astonishingly beautiful. After gazing at him for some time without moving, she smiled and whispered, "I was going to treat you like this other man. But because you are so young I will take pity on you. You are a beautiful boy, Minokichi. Do not worry; I will not hurt you now. But if you ever tell anyone about what happened here tonight, even your own mother, I will know of it. And I will kill you. Don't forget my words!"

So saying, she turned and disappeared into the snowy night. Minokichi then found that he could move again. He jumped up and looked outside. But the woman was nowhere to be seen. Snow from the raging storm was blowing into the hut. Minokichi closed the door and braced it with some pieces of wood. Perhaps it was just the wind that had blown the door open, he thought. Perhaps the woman in the snow light was just a dream. He called to Mosaku. There was no answer. Reaching out in the dark, he touched the old man's face, and then recoiled in horror. It was as cold and hard as ice. Mosaku was dead!

The storm ended during the night. When the ferryman returned to his hut, shortly after dawn, he found Minokichi passed out beside the frozen body of Mosaku. After a few days of care, Minokichi recovered, although he suffered for some time from the effects of that cold and terrible night. The old man's death left a deep impression on him. Still, he never told a soul about the woman in white. Before long, he was again working as a woodcutter - going into the forest by himself every morning to cut wood and returning at nightfall with bundles of wood that his mother sold.

One winter evening in the following year, as Minokichi was on his way home, he came upon a girl who happened to be walking along the same path. She was tall, slim, and very attractive. Her voice, when she answered Minokichi's greeting, was as pleasant to the ear as the voice of a songbird. Soon, they were deep in conversation. She said her name was O-Yuki (Big Snow), that she had recently lost both her parents, and that she was on her way to Edo (the old name for Tokyo), where some poor relatives lived who might help her find work as a maid. Minokichi found the girl strangely charming. The more he looked at her, the more attractive she appeared. When he asked her if she were engaged, she answered with a shy laugh and said she was free. She then asked Minokichi if he was married. He told her of having to support his widowed mother and that he was still too young to think of a wife.

After thus confiding, they walked along in silence for some time. But, as the ancient proverb says, "When the wish is there, the eyes say as much as the mouth." By the time they reached the village, they were much enamored with each other. Minokichi asked O-Yuki to rest awhile at his house. After some shy hesitation, she agreed. His mother welcomed her and fixed her a warm meal. O-Yuki behaved so nicely that Minokichi's mother soon began to like her very much. She persuaded O-Yuki to delay her trip to Edo. In the end, O-Yuki never made to Edo. She stayed on at the house as an "honorable daughter-in-law."

O-Yuki became an exemplary wife. Five years later, when Minokichi's mother was on her deathbed, her last words were words of affection and praise for her son's wife. O-Yuki bore Minokichi ten children, boys and girls. All were handsome and very fair of skin.

The other villagers thought O-Yuki was wonderful. They sensed that she was somehow different from them. Most peasant women age early. But O-Yuki, even after bearing ten children, looked as young and fresh as when she first came to the village.

One evening, after the children were in bed, O-Yuki was sewing by the light of a paper lamp. Minokichi, who had been watching her, said: "To see you sewing there in that light reminds me of a strange thing that happened to me when I was a boy of eighteen. I then saw someone as beautiful and white as you are now. In fact, she looked just like you.

Without lifting her eyes from her work, O-Yuki responded quietly: "Is that so, tell me about her."

Then Minokichi told her about the awful night in the ferryman's hut, about the woman in white and about the silent, icy death of Mosaku. And then, he said: "Asleep or awake, that was the only time I saw a woman as beautiful as you. Of course, she was not human, and I was terrified of her. But she was so white! Even now, I do not know whether that woman of the snow was a dream or a real being."

O-Yuki threw down her sewing, rushed over to where Minokichi was sitting, and screamed into his ear: "It was I - I - I! Yuki it was! You fool! I told you then that I would kill you if you ever spoke a word about that night. If it weren't for those children in there, I would kill you this very instant. You had better take very, very good care of them, for if they ever have reason to complain of you, I will give you the death you so richly deserve!"

Even as she screamed, her voice became thin, like a dying wind. She then evaporated into a bright white mist that spiraled up to the roof-beams and slipped out the smoke hole into the night. She was never seen again.

Though our meeting was less dramatic than that of Minokichi and O-Yuki, my wife and I have now been happily married for more than 25 years. And I shudder to think of what would have become of me had the Fates not taken pity on this troubled soul and sent this woman from the land of snows to save me. Just the other evening, as I was parking my BSA under the eaves of our simple home, I looked in the window and watched her playing the piano. It was a chill night, and in the warm, indirect light of the fading day, she looked as beautiful as the day I met her. At times like this, I'm tempted to run inside and tell her that she is, and always has been, the woman of my dreams. But I tremble at what might happen if I do.

The Honda CB350? Before we moved to Tokyo, I sold it to a fellow English teacher. Last I heard he was having trouble with it overheating.