the mother was in kyoto and nara in the spring of 1974, exactly 40 years ago. i hope that my kyoto and nara in 2014 will be my own journey but will also let me see some of the same places with her memories overlaid on them, retrace some of her steps (or not retrace, for that suggests purposeful intent, or having some  — i simply would like to know that as i wander through the city sometimes our paths would cross in space though not in time.)

i also quite like the idea — though i admit it is a lot of sentimental codwash — that some of the deer she fed would have been the ancestors of deer i’m feeding.

(recalling also peter and harrient in oxford: “twenty three years ago i fed these identical ducks with these identical sandwiches… and ten and twenty years hence the same ducks and the same undergraduates will share the same ritual feast, and the ducks will bite the undergraduates’ fingers as they have just bitten mine. how fleeting are all human passions compared with the massive continuity of ducks.“)

the massive continuity of deer would be a good title for something, but i don’t know what.