Portents and Meanings

Three exceptional learning experiences formed the foundation of my thirty-year career as a bonsai professional. The first was the week I spent studying at the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum in 1993, and another was my bonsai study trip to Japan for one month in 1997. The third experience happened chronologically between those other two and consisted of the three days spent with Yuji Yoshimura in January of 1995. Although it was the briefest of the three, the time spent with Mr. Yoshimura proved to have the most profound effect, the true importance of it as a formative experience revealing itself only by degrees over the course of the succeeding decades.

As regards technical education, the entirety of time represented by all three events combined is a pitifully insufficient amount. When someone apprentices with a bonsai professional in Japan, for example, the duration of the apprenticeship is typically at least a year, and often several times that. There is so much to learn about bonsai — as a practice, as a profession and as an art. It was not my lot to be a bonsai apprentice in Japan or anywhere else. This was all for the best because I feel certain bonsai would never have become my career by pursuing that route. Having a Master and following orders, subjugating individuality to obedience, is a time-honored means of learning a craft or profession, but it is by no means the only way to go. A highly-structured, formal education is best for many people; maybe most. On the other hand, for some there seems to be little choice but to learn by jumping in and doing, struggling to figure out step-by-step how to progress, falling down repeatedly but doggedly persisting in the effort. Some people can't be told. They can, however, be guided.

Mr. Yoshimura was born the son of a bonsai apprentice. Later, he became an apprentice himself when his father became a Master and brought up his son to be heir to the family business. I don't know if Mr. Yoshimura ever dreamed of being anything other than a bonsai professional. He had other interests, music for example, but I don't know if he ever thought of pursuing that as a career. It seems to have been Mr. Yoshimura's fate to live a bonsai life, although he went about it in his own individualistic way. A key to Mr. Yoshimura's personality might be found within the tension that existed between what society expected of him and what he wanted for himself. The traditional Japanese society in which he was born and raised essentially pre-determined that he would follow his father's trade, while his personal nature dictated that he pursue his own desires. In his willingness to step to the beat of a “different drummer", as one Western philosopher poetically phrased it, Mr. Yoshimura was out of step with his own cultural rhythms. He was certainly Japanese by birth and upbringing. His ethnicity was manifest in his physical characteristics, but in his rebellious and independent nature he was unlike the majority of people in Japanese society at that period of history. 

Yuji Yoshimura was a sort of cultural halfling between East and West. He used his Japanese bona-fides as it suited his purposes, playing the part of the austere bonsai master for the sake of impressing a Western audience. It was a role that came naturally to him. But Mr. Yoshimura was attracted to America, and American ways suited him to the degree that he felt comfortable taking up residence in this country, immersing himself in our culture. He was at once the personification of Japanese tradition and a person for whom the Western ideal of the primacy of the individual held irresistible appeal. There was powerful dynamism in a personality containing such a contrasting combination. And there was a price to be paid for it, too.

All the advice Mr. Yoshimura gave me about my responsibilities as curator of a public collection, while not exactly going over my head, at the time mostly perplexed me. The methods he taught me for doing bonsai made more immediate sense. The tangible elements of the study experience — the restyling work he did on the baldcypress from the Arboretum collection, the donation of the hemlock bonsai, and especially the creation of the large American hornbeam group planting — were what most impressed me at the time. Those were the easiest to reference when talking to others about the experience. When people saw those bonsai it gave credence to the value of my time spent with Mr. Yoshimura. When asked if he taught me anything special, I would answer in the affirmative without ever getting too specific. Even today I can't think of a great many technical tips I can say for certain came to me from Mr. Yoshimura. He contributed a good deal of information in that regard, but it all gets blended in with things I learned elsewhere, before and after my time with him. The real gold of my Yoshimura experience was in all the stuff that perplexed me at the time.

Here is an example: During one of our late-night conversations, Mr. Yoshimura was talking to me about learning bonsai from other people. He knew I had already been exposed to several teachers and there would undoubtedly be more in the years ahead, given my position as curator of a public bonsai collection who was learning on the job. He counseled me to listen closely to what the experts had to say. Listen closely, he advised, but then take what the experts said and measure it against my own experience and my own idea, then decide for myself what was right. He stressed that it was important not to blindly follow what anyone else might teach me. He opined that, in the end, maybe half of what I was told by any expert was worth accepting. "Fifty-fifty," was how he said it. Then he drove home the point. "Even with me," he said, "the things I tell you — maybe fifty-fifty."

I had never before come across a teacher who said such, and never since. What kind of teacher tells you that it is not only okay but might actually be best if you don't go along with half of what they tell you? I know what kind of teacher does that — the kind who wants you to learn how to think for yourself.

In a sense, Mr. Yoshimura was preaching to the choir. I think he sized me up and understood the type of person he was dealing with, then chose to frame my situation in a manner that would resonate with me. He was, in effect, giving me permission to go about my business in the manner which I was most likely to do it, anyway. The intriguing aspect was that Mr. Yoshimura seemed to be anticipating circumstances and possibilities that had not yet begun to surface in my own mind and offering advice on how to handle them. His great gift to me was one of psychological preparation.

Or, maybe not. Looking back over the past lends itself to imagining portents and meanings that may not have been part of events as they transpired. It's tough to know what to make of the past sometimes. It was always tough to know what to make of Mr. Yoshimura. He was such a curious individual.

When the old artist put the finishing touches on his last masterpiece at the end of my final day of study with him, it precipitated a flurry of activity on my part to pull together all my belongings and get on my way. Not least of my concerns was how to move the new hornbeam planting on the large plywood slab out of Mr. Yoshimura's dining room and into the vehicle I was driving. Mr. Yoshimura was not going to be able to help me carry it out, that was for certain. He offered that Gail, who had returned sometime earlier that evening, might help. I was anxious to go, though, and not confident that Gail was up for the job, so I squatted down next to the table and slid the big slab of wood over onto my shoulder. Then, with the strength of youth and the urgency of being several hours late, I stood up. Balancing the large, unwieldy planting on my shoulder and holding on with both hands, I made for the door, carrying the the forest like a waiter bringing out a big platter of food to a table of dinner guests. Once the vehicle was loaded up and I was ready to depart, I went back in the house to say goodbye. But Mr. Yoshimura wanted to tell me a story before letting me go. We stood there at the doorway and this is what he said:

Once, a long time ago, there was a student who was studying with an old learned Master. The two of them were outside, sitting beneath a tall persimmon tree. The Master looked up at the fruit in the top of the tall tree and said that he would like to have some. The student, who was young and able-bodied and wanted to please his learned elder, immediately jumped up and announced that he would climb the tree to get his Master some persimmons. The old Master nodded without saying anything further. The student began climbing the tree. It was a difficult climb and a long way up to the top where the fruit was. Once he was high enough, the student had to reach out with one hand to grasp for the fruit, leaving him only one hand with which to hang on for dear life as the tree top swayed in the wind. The old Master remained seated, watching closely but never uttering a word. Finally, after gathering some fruits and bundling them in the folds of his kimono, the student began to painstakingly inch his way back down. It was a real struggle because the student still had to use one hand to hold onto the bundle of fruit and now he was feeling exhausted from his efforts. He very nearly fell once but caught himself in time and managed to hold onto the persimmons. Slowly he worked his way down and all the while the old Master sat looking on, saying nothing. Then, when the student was finally most of the way down, just a short distance off the ground, the old Master suddenly leapt to his feet and cried, "WATCH OUT!"

His tale now apparently over, old Mr. Yoshimura looked up at me with a twinkle in his eyes and a crooked, toothy smile. He chuckled softly and said goodbye.