The shrine sweeper

At the top of the stone steps, Gen-san sweeps the little shrine yard as he has every autumn for fifty years — slowly, thoroughly, one leaf at a time, with a broom older than most of the street.

This year the leaves are winning. The Matji, delivering his afternoon matcha, assess the situation, confer, and offer assistance. Individually they are terrible at sweeping — the broom is a hundred times their size. Stacked, however, four Matji make one short, determined, extremely effective sweeper.

By dusk the yard is clean, the leaf pile is magnificent, and there has been exactly one incident of leaf-pile diving, punished immediately by more leaves and forgiven at once.

Gen-san says thank you the old way: lanterns lit early, and the long table under the shrine tree laid for everyone — postman, baker, tofu maker, bathhouse, police box, Hara-san, Hana-chan, the cat. It was the nearest thing to an English village fête I have seen in forty years, and I offer that as high praise. At the head of the table, where the light is warmest, one barista and his small green family pour for the whole street. The foam, everyone agrees, stands up properly.