A telephone box in a corner of the garden in late autumn. One day, three elderly people visit “The Phone of the Wind”. I didn’t notice. My wife told me that someone was coming and I thought they would come up later.
Nobody came after a while, so I went down. But no one was there. When I looked at the notebook in the box thinking that it was strange, there was a message…
“Let’s go home, Katsuya. from your parents and grandparents”
The moment I read it, the letters bleeded and disappeared. They lost their son in the earthquake and probably hadn’t found his body yet, so I wanted to hand over Jizo at least. The sadness of those who come quietly and return quietly like this is deep.
The second tear was a person who wrote on the note “This is my third time to visit here. I was finally able to call.” I usually talk while guiding the visitor, but on that day there was another visitor and I was alone.
A big man, squeezing a black phone in “The Phone of the Wind” box and talking loudly. He stayed quiet for a while, but he never left the telephone booth, so I asked him “Are you OK?”, the man said, “I lost his wife.”
As I asked him “If necessary, I would hand over the Jizo that I had entrusted to me from the Jizo Project”, he nodded and had a tea at the cafe. He has written on the notebook “I was finally able to make a phone call, and I will continue to regenerate my hometown for the rest of my life. At that time, I will go to see you with my heart.”
Again, there are large individual differences in mental recovery, such as not being able to pick up the phone or feeling like entering, so it is better to quietly snuggle up and say “It’s okay”. There are a lot of people, and I have to keep in mind.
