長兄の話（３）

『長兄の話（３）』

　長兄の二番目の趣味は、新聞記事を切り抜いてスクラップブックに張ることでした。そんなわけで、我が家では古新聞は穴だらけでした。私が小学校の頃は、習字の教科がありました。習字の練習は古新聞を使い、先生が1枚だけ清書用半紙をくださいました。穴の開いていない新聞紙を家で探すのにとても苦労しました。その時は兄を恨みました。

　長兄の三番目の趣味は、植木鉢に大輪の花を咲かせる菊作りでした：針金で枝を支えて、水やりや肥料や虫取りをして、大切に、大切に育てます。

　毎朝食事前に仏様にお参りするのが、長兄の日課でした。ある日、「キャー」という長兄の声が仏間から聞こえてきました。仏間に入って、立派な、大輪の菊の花が供えられているのを見て、誰も声が出ませんでした。「お母さん、どうして切ってしまったの？」と長兄。母は一言、「菊が大事か、仏様が大事か」。仏様の花がその時家に無かったので、母は兄の菊を切って捧げていたのです。　昔は親（我が家では母）が家では一番怖い存在でした。その兄も、もう亡くなり、寂しいです。

"About my elder brother(3)"

　His next hobby was to clip out newspaper articles and put them on his scrapbooks. That was why old newspapers in my house had many clipped marks. In our elementary school there was a calligraphy subject; We practice calligraphy using old newspapers. For handing in, a teacher gives us only a piece of plain paper for calligraphy. So I had a lot of trouble finding the newspapers free of clipped marks in my house, when I felt like complaining about it to him.

　His third hobby was gardening, especially raising chrysanthemums in the flowerpots; supporting sprays with wires, watering, fertilizing and getting rid of insects, he grows mums very, very carefully.

　Every morning he made it a rule to offer a prayer before the Buddhist home altar before breakfast. One morning all my family heard him screaming in the room where the altar was situated. Entering the room, we saw splendid, large-flowered mums offering before the altar, which made us utter no words. He said, "Mother, why have you snapped off my treasured mums?" She replied, "Which do you think is more precious, your mums or our ancestors?" Our mother had snapped off his mums and offered them before the altar because no flowers to be offered had been available at home then. In the past parents (as for my house, my mother) had the strongest presence at home. That brother had already passed away. I miss him very much.