My mother in that last penetrating gaze knocked down the ideological framework I had constructed. This woman who had brought me into the world and reared me, this woman who had never once let up in her love for me. . . in the very last moments of her life spoke clearly to me! Her eyes spoke to mine, and with finality, saying: “Your mother now takes leave in death, but her living spirit will be beside her little one, Takashi.” I who was so sure that there was no such thing as a spirit was now told otherwise; and I could not but believe!
