A girl and her fukusa

Those who know me may know that I am a student of chanoyu - Japanese tea ceremony.  I am a rank beginner - I have a long way to go before I can even conduct the most simple of tea ceremonies.  The discipline is what I crave, that and the meditative state that comes over me when I'm reducing my focus to the simple and yet demanding steps of ritually cleansing my tools and preparing a bowl of tea.  For me, it is just as demanding as any martial art, and as rewarding both physically and mentally (anyone who thinks tea is not physically demanding should try to sit properly in seiza and do anything at all - just sitting can be a workout in itself!)

A good friend of mine and I attended the tea ceremony demonstration at the Arizona Matsuri this weekend.  The master doing the demonstration was a woman from my school of tea, but not from my circle, so I had never seen her serve tea before.  The circumstances were not perfect, of course.  Tea ceremony is rarely done for more more than four or five guests, for logistical reasons if nothing else, and the demos held close to 30 people.  The master only made tea for the first two guests, and assistants from the mizuya (the area where one prepares for ceremony) brought tea to everyone else so that they could experience the flavor of the tea.

The master, an older woman in elegantly understated kimono, moved surely and calmly despite the difficulty of the situation and the noise of people moving around, taking pictures, murmuring to one another.  I watched her as she composed herself and began the ceremony.  her hands trembled, I know not if from fatigue or from age or for some other reason, but her movements were sure and deliberate, and achingly beautiful.

I found myself focusing intently on her handling of her fukusa - the silk cloth used to purify the tea utensils before and after ceremony.  This cloth, and the folding of it, is the most stressful part of ceremony for me, because I want so badly to do this well, and mine always ends up looking a mess once folded.  The master and her fukusa seemed almost as one, with the cloth almost seeming to anticipate her wishes and fold into elegant forms with only the slightest touch of her fingers.  There were no wasted movements, a slight movement of the palm, a thumb gently securing a corner, a finger run lightly along the center of the folded cloth.

The serenity of the master's face as she handled her tools struck me as beautiful, and in that moment I no longer noticed the people around me, the uncomfortable plastic chair where I perched, the less than perfect surroundings.  Because of the master, tea can be wherever it is.  I watched her prepare tea, and my heart was at ease, and I drank my tea with happiness in my heart and fully in the present moment.

Today, I took up my tools again, and tried to imitate her movements, to find within me the grace she displayed, and to find the personality within my fukusa.  My folds are still clumsy, my hands still imprecise, but there is joy in my heart and peace in my soul as the silk caresses my hands.  I continue along my path along the way, once again reminded that it is the journey inside me that makes the way, my way of tea.