The Last Encounter

Many of the people I met when starting out in bonsai were advanced in years, my parents' age or older than that. Mr. Yoshimura was actually a few years younger than my parents. People such as Dr. Creech, Dr. Armstrong, Janet Lanman and a number of others, were all older than Mr. Yoshimura, but they were in better condition than him. The term "condition" in this instance refers not only to physical health, but also to overall situation in life. Mr. Yoshimura's lifestyle wasn't very healthy, as I observed when I stayed with him, but he was also not well positioned in terms of personal wealth. Poor health led him to life's final phase sooner than he might have arrived there otherwise, and poor financial status left him without a dignified exit strategy. Mr. Yoshimura had been a pivotal figure in bonsai, especially in the West, and right up to the end no one in the business knew more or worked harder than he did. Even so, bonsai had afforded him only a subsistence living. Once he was no longer able to work, Mr. Yoshimura was no longer able to fend for himself.

My parents, and all my early bonsai supporters who were contemporaries of my parents, are gone now. They lived long lives, longer than Mr. Yoshimura's, but by the end they were all whittled down to that same defenseless condition, even those who had the means of maintaining their comfort. They all fell victim to the great diminishment. I know the pattern pretty well now. I understand it when I see it and know the end will likely come to that for me, too, eventually. Although people who knew Mr. Yoshimura better than I did may well have seen his demise coming from a ways off, it seemed to me it happened very quickly.

When Mr. Yoshimura left Asheville and went to Massachusetts with his daughter, he wound up staying there, taking up residence in an apartment near her home. His bonsai career was all but over. Mr. Yoshimura could no longer drive, he could not effectively use his dominant arm and was having trouble with his speech. He underwent a couple of surgeries and briefly seemed to rally. His friends in the Bonsai Society of Greater New York organized a celebratory event to honor him, centered around a liquidation auction of all the bonsai and bonsai materials Mr. Yoshimura owned, to help raise funds for his living expenses. It was a poignant act of closure because that group had been founded by Mr. Yoshimura with a few of his earliest students back in 1963. Bill Valavanis, Mr. Yoshimura's most successful student and always a faithful supporter, kept his mentor involved in the bonsai scene by having him be a guest artist at a symposium in the autumn of 1995. Mr. Yoshimura sat in a chair on the stage, pointing and giving instructions as Bill did the work on a demonstration tree. The old teacher also critiqued bonsai on display at the symposium, thus carrying on his lifelong mission of sharing his knowledge despite his recently diminished capacity.

I saw Mr. Yoshimura just one more time. In March of 1996 I made a trip north to visit the Brooklyn Botanic Garden in New York and the Arnold Arboretum in Massachusetts. This was a fact-finding mission to study the bonsai operations at these institutions, taking particular note of how they displayed their trees. The Arnold Arboretum is part of Harvard University, situated in Boston, and going there afforded the opportunity of visiting Mr. Yoshimura at his apartment. Arrangements were made to do that on the last day of my trip. Mr. Yoshimura's daughter, Yoko, was there, and it was good to see her again. It had been a year since her father's fateful trip to Asheville. I knew that Mr. Yoshimura had been struggling to adapt to his new reality, being no longer independent, unable to do bonsai, disinterested even in playing his guitar. I brought him a sketchbook and a little watercolor set with a few brushes, thinking maybe it might be a creative diversion for him. He had always been a creative person and often did drawings to illustrate the educational literature he produced for his classes. Mr. Yoshimura thanked me for the gift and put it aside. I later learned from Yoko that he never used any of it.

We talked easily enough. Mr. Yoshimura's new surroundings were newer, cleaner and less cluttered than his home in Briarcliff Manor had been, and it felt different encountering him there. One thing hadn't changed, though — he still spoke to me in riddles sometimes. At one point I was updating him on the progress I was making in promoting the bonsai program at the Arboretum, how I was feeling ever more confident in my own ability and that I hadn't forgotten his encouragement to think big and do something different. I updated him about my young family, too, because Mr. Yoshimura had always expressed interest in them. I was explaining how my responsibility to my family made it all the more important that I be successful in what I was trying to do at work. I told him that I really liked my work and felt excited about the challenge it presented. Mr. Yoshimura listened attentively, nodding occasionally. Then he looked right at me and broke into a big smile, laughed and said, "Oh, I see — you are trapped!" I couldn't make heads or tails of that comment, but I laughed along with him.

It happened that around this same time Dr. Creech had decided I was ready for a study trip to Japan. As part of the effort to get me there, I had been writing to various bonsai professionals with whom I had acquaintance, soliciting letters of support from them. Naturally, I wanted Mr. Yoshimura's endorsement because he was the most important bonsai professional I knew. I took the opportunity on this visit to ask him in person if he would write something for me and he laughed again, but this time he looked away and shook his head sadly as he did. "No," he said. "You do not want me to recommend you. It would not help." I was surprised by this statement because I didn't know at the time about the ill will some bonsai professionals in Japan felt toward Mr. Yoshimura. Later, when I better understood the circumstances, I realized he had acted in my best interests. It was an awkward moment when Mr. Yoshimura flatly declined to help, but I kept the conversation going by explaining how Dr. Creech thought a study trip to Japan would be an essential piece of my bonsai education. Then Mr. Yoshimura said, "It's not there anymore." This comment perplexed me, so I asked him what he meant. "What you're looking for," he replied. "You won't find it in Japan. It's not there anymore." Again, I really didn't understand what he was talking about.

When I left Mr. Yoshimura that day I suspected my time with him was over. It was sad to see him the way he was then, so reduced, so restricted and unhappy. Yoko did everything she could to take care of her old father and make him comfortable, but there was nothing for it. On the other hand, it was an increasingly busy time in my life. New horizons were opening up, with ever more work to be done and I was absorbed in it. I thought often of Mr. Yoshimura, spoke often of him, and often thought I should call him or write to him, but I never made the time to do so. Then one day near the very end of 1997 I received a call from Yoko to tell me her father had passed on Christmas Eve. Immediately, I felt overcome by guilt and with a heavy heart pitifully apologized for being so neglectful, but Yoko said it was alright. "Arthur, he understood," she told me.

In spring that year a memorial celebration for Yuji Yoshimura was held at the US National Arboretum in Washington, DC. Former students of his who had gone on to notable bonsai careers, people like Bill Valavanis, Chase Rosade and Vaughn Banting, were invited to come and deliver eulogies. Dr. Creech was invited, as well. Dr. Creech came to see me and said that he would not be able to attend the ceremony, but would I mind to go in his place and deliver his remarks for him? "I told them you're my protégé," Dr. Creech said. "I hope you don't mind that I said that."

I went to the memorial celebration and delivered Dr. Creech's brief remarks, in which he recalled his longtime friendship with Mr. Yoshimura, describing him as "Our most distinguished bonsai artist." Dr. Creech had encouraged me to say something of my own when I was up on the stage speaking for him, and I did but I kept it short and simple. I said I was fortunate and highly honored to be associated with two of the greatest figures in American bonsai — Dr. John Creech and Yuji Yoshimura. After the speech-making was over I was approached by Yoko and invited to take part in a small and private ceremony. Together with her, Janet Lanman and Bill Valavanis, I saw Mr. Yoshimura's ashes delivered back to the earth in a secret and entirely appropriate place.

The only photograph ever made of Mr. Yoshimura and me, taken by his daughter on my final visit with him in 1996.