Sweet Potato Man

After the client leaves, I run outside to the balcony at my sixth floor apartment. No boats are in sight. Actually this is not terribly surprising, since my apartment is, and always has been, located on a city street in downtown Tokyo.

“What is that steamboat sound?” I ask.

“Don’t you know?” says Sayaka. “It’s The Sweet Potato Man.” Her pretty face lights up.

Oh, sure. Growing up in Flushing, New York, we had so many sweet potato men.

I ask her to explain.

“He’s a street vendor. He sells the most delicious sweet potatoes, roasted a special way over a wood stove. The flavor is incredible. Every fall he comes, selling these wonderful sweet potatoes and the children line up to buy them.

“I can’t tell you how delicious these special potatoes taste. They’re a sign of fall. The Sweet Potato Man comes and, even though I’m no longer little, it makes me so happy just to hear the sound that he is here.”

COMFORT IN SMALL PACKAGES

What is that low tooting sound, actually? Are we hearing a horn from his truck, like some Good Humor Ice Cream Man of the sea? Or is this the singing voice of Sweet Potato Man, mellowed by years of roasting those twisty, meaty, orange root vegetables?

I never find out. Another client is coming momentarily. I will offer my choice of American teas, brought with me especially for the small ritual of greeting clients. So I tidy up the boxes, rinse a fresh teacup, and make sure the water steamer is full.

On this trip, I offer a normal green tea, plus Trader Joe’s finest:

• Blueberry green tea
• Raspberry
• Blueberry
• Roobios
• And “Pomegranate White Tea.”

This last box of tea, grabbed off the shelf when I made my last-minute shopping trip for packing, features a lovely photograph of an open pomegranate. The seeds look plump and juicy, as if ready to bounce upward into your hand. Above this picture, large red letters proclaim “Antioxidant Powerhouse.”

Here in Japan, I have had time to read the rest of the box. To my shame (and Trader Joe’s), these are the real ingredients: “Made with organic white tea leaves, hibiscus flowers and lemongrass.” Yes, read that again. Notice anything missing?

When getting my clients settled, I take care to have my interpreter translate the name of this choice of tea as “Hibiscus.”

RITUALS OF COMFORT

Drinking tea, even fake pomegranate tea, calms clients down. Just having a cup of tea nearby, untouched, seems to help. Most of my first-time clients are practically trembling with trepidation. By the end of the session, all will be well. And some things will be far more well than before.

As my sessions complete for this trip in Tokyo, between clients, I’m thinking about rituals of comfort and how one can know it is fall, or any season, without a Sweet Potato Man. What is my seasonal comfort food? (What is yours?)

By the time I wake up the next morning, I have an answer. Not THE Answer (something most of my clients desire even more than “THE Secret.”) What is my personal version of The Sweet Potato Man? I know. It is silence.

Silence of the fall, the summer, a rainy season, you name it.

Silence of waking up early in the morning or listening, hungry, at night.

Silence of Tokyo or Sterling, Virginia or Frankfurt, Germany or Andover, Massachusetts, or London, England. In all of the places where I’ve been this year, in every season, there has been a distinctive brew of silence, better than the finest pomegranate tea.

Tucked away wherever I go, hidden into reality as there were a portable secret pocket where I could reach my hand, I can always find a special flavor of silence. God‘s voice is speaking, here, in this season of sweet potatoes and joy.