by Naomi Fina
In the years before my grandfather, Jiichan, passed away, he taught me two things. First, he taught me to love the water; the careful ebbs and flows of ocean tides, the creatures that lurked below the surface. In his old age, he spent hours on the beaches of various Puget Sound islands digging for clams, particularly on bright summer days when the tide was low, and the entire day stretched before him. On those days, he always wore the same tattered Seattle Mariners cap covering two grey strands of old man hair, the writing on his shirt faded beyond recognition. He rolled a clunky metal cart onto the shore with a bucket and shovel and set about methodically turning aside sand and rock to find a perfect bed of clams to dig. I was fascinated with how he managed to find dozens at a time. One day, I asked my grandfather how he did it, how he could sense what the wildlife was telling him without the guidance of a book or device. He smiled, his dark brown eyes crinkling softly, and gently pointed to the rocky area that surrounded us.
“All over this beach, you can see spurts of water erupting from the ground at random times. That’s where the clams are.”
Of course, I had to test this theory myself. Armed with a hand shovel, I set out to discover what caused these little spurts of water, and if it truly was the clams as my grandfather had claimed. And voilá! A mere foot of digging unearthed one clam, then another, and soon a stack. My grandfather, not one for emotion, looked proud. “She’s a natural!” He exclaimed to my mom. I beamed with all the pride that a 9-year-old can have, delighted to be carrying on the
family tradition. From that day forward, I was always by his side, digging holes in the sand, carrying his cane, and learning to drag the cart as it grew too heavy for his arthritic hands.
The second thing my grandfather taught me was to treasure the night. Nighttimes are when we gathered for family dinners, when we did puzzles and played dominos until the late hours. Evenings were when we huddled around a campfire late at night during the summer, watching the last embers die out as the sky darkened above. Evenings were when Jiichan would point out the stars, which freckled the dark summer haze above. His hands, wrinkled by time, would help mine trace connections through the sky. He could name constellations I could never remember, and was always the last one to come inside, the last one to drive away. He made the dark, a seemingly scary concept, feel safe. He made it feel like home.
I still love the ocean. I still love the nights.
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It’d been a long day. For Australian uni spring break, my friends and I had decided to travel to Tasmania, a short flight away from Melbourne. On our first day, we’d driven to an old military base nearly two hours away, and the time spent in the car winding around Southern Tasmania’s lakes and rivers had sapped our energy. When we got home to our AirBnB back in Hobart, darkness had fallen, and my friends Taylor and Julia decided to take a nap. I laid on the pullout couch, scrolling social media. As I clicked through posts, I saw story after story filled with the Northern Lights. The night before, the Aurora Borealis had made a rare appearance across much of the US, and the skies of my hometown friends were lighting up with vibrant greens and reds. It was hard not to feel jealous; getting to see the Northern Lights had been one of the best parts of my previous year at school. They also reminded me what I missed most.
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Jiichan passed away in April of 2023. He was 94. I was sitting on the floor of my college dorm room when I got the call from my mother. She did not have to say much; he had been sick for a while and the last time I had seen him, he was in the hospital recovering from Covid. The last time I said goodbye to him, he was unable to speak. I had said “Bye Jiichan,” and hung up, with a pit opening in my stomach. On that night, I cried alone, sitting on the floor of my room 2000 miles away from the people I most wanted to see. I didn’t tell any of my friends that my grandfather had died; I didn’t want to see the look of pity in their eyes.
For days, my friends and I had been discussing the chance to view the Northern Lights that were bound for Southern Minnesota. Many of them ventured into the Arboretum to find the ideal viewing spot for the rare phenomena. On the night my grandfather passed, I couldn’t find the energy to go out there; I lived a 10-minute walk away from the Arb that at that point felt like a marathon for a prize that wasn’t even guaranteed. Instead, I sat outside my dorm on the concrete, watching the light polluted sky, hoping that it would reach me instead. As I stared up at the sky, my eyes still wet with tears, I found myself thinking of Jiichan. Had he ever seen the Northern Lights?
At first, the sky simply reflected darkness. The few people who had ventured outside near my dorm made disappointed comments about the lack of light and began the long trek to the Arb. Yet as I continued looking up, I was able to make out a few flashes of flight; nothing major, nothing green, but a tiny spark of the atmospheric phenomenon that the Northern Hemisphere is lucky enough to witness. For ten minutes, I watched as the lights danced in the night sky above my new home, far from the places that I’d called my own for so many years. Part of me wondered if those tiny flashes of light far above were the last moments of Jiichan on this planet.
###
In Hobart that night, I put my phone down, suddenly annoyed. Why did everyone get to see that? Why had I chosen to go abroad so far away? I wasn’t even in the same hemisphere as them. I looked out the window of our AirBnB. Fresh air and the thrum of the nearby river beckoned invitingly, a welcome refuge from my negative thoughts. I pulled on my boots, slid open the door, and walked into the night.
In some ways, Hobart, Tasmania felt like home. Like Seattle, it was surrounded by water and mountains, with the River Derwent separating the east and west sides of the city. Mount Wellington loomed just next to town, the satellite station atop it blinking red and green lights intermittently. The streets were quiet in late October; it was just entering spring and the brisk winds of winter lingered, driving native Tasmanians indoors. I tugged on the zipper of my quarter zip and quietly cursed my decision to leave my big jacket back in Melbourne.
I made my way down the block towards the beach, passing Victorian-era houses. The beach called from the end of the street, the water lapping against the shoreline. I stood at the edge of the water, remembering how much Jiichan had loved the ocean. I wondered if there were clams beneath the surface. In the darkness, it was impossible to tell if water was spouting from the rocks.
I could see lights blinking across the whole bay, the rolling hills dotted by homes and streetlights. Above, the stars pushed through the haze of light pollution, tiny beacons of light in dark skies. It felt like late summer evenings at home, gathering with friends on the shores of Lake Union and watching the city come to life around you. Normally I loved the lights of the
city; it made me feel at home, surrounded by humanity. Tonight, the only lights I wanted to see were thousands of miles away. The person I wanted to see, even farther.
“Ayo! What’s up?”
I turned to see Taylor and Julia walking towards me.
I shrugged, attempting nonchalance.
“Just wanted to go for a quick walk. Why are you guys out here?”
Taylor pointed at the sky. “The Southern Lights!”
I stared, confused. “Southern?”
Julia nodded. “I didn’t know they were a thing either, but apparently they’re out tonight. You just have to look through a phone camera to see it.”
Taylor smiled widely, her eyes trained on her phone pointed to the skies. I paused for a moment, then decided why not?
For a few moments, we stood in silence, eyes channeled on our phones. We fiddled with the exposure, attempting to find the ideal setting. Out of the silence, Taylor gave an exhilarated whoop.
“I got it! Look!”
We crowded her phone.
Streaks of green and red light filled the screen. The stars dotted the background, white lights in the sea of green. It looked so much like how they’d looked that night in Northfield – the
lights in a wild array that made perfect sense. The lights intertwined, red and green dancing in the heavens. Flashes of light; Jiichan, once again. I felt my heart ache, a little joyous, a little sad.
Julia frowned, looking annoyed at her phone. “Mine won’t capture them here. I think the light pollution is too bad.”
Taylor looked towards Mount Wellington, a mischievous glint in her eye.
“You know, I bet the view from the top is real good.”
We locked eyes. I grinned.
We raced from the beach to the car, our earlier exhaustion disappearing. Julia, the only one of us who felt confident driving on the left side of the road, yanked the car into drive and ripped out of the driveway. We sped through the streets of Hobart, necks craned out the window to see if it was growing stronger, brighter. We swerved around corners with reckless abandon, anxious in our pursuit. Julia ran a red, maybe two. The temperature dropped as we climbed in elevation, but I couldn’t feel it. When we reached the top, the parking lot was filled with cars. Apparently we weren’t the only ones with the desire to see the lights.
We jumped out of the car and ran to a lookout point slowly filling with people. The platform faced south, positioning us in the direction of the lights. The three of us huddled together for warmth, eyes trained on the southern skies. In the near complete darkness at the top of the mountain, we watched the green lights dance across the horizon, touching the line where the Tasman Sea met the surrounding mountains. Above them, red light hovered, tinting the sky with a shade of blush before fading into the blue of midnight. Below, the lights of the city and sprawling neighborhoods gleamed, warm lights dotting the landscape. It felt so familiar, like
home had found its way to me thousands of miles away. I leaned my head against Julia’s shoulder and smiled.
Hi Jiichan.
