by Meredith McLean 

I ooze further down into the hot steaming spring water and rest my head against the brine-tinged rocks. My limbs become weightless and seem to spread out endlessly in the ripples. Snow comes to join me as she drifts amongst the onsen. Her cool flakes kiss my nose and shoulders, dissolving as soon as they appeared. 

In my periphery other women either quietly sigh to themselves or gather in pairs happily chatting and squawking. The watermill has been half-buried in snow like a corpse unattended, the gravedigger given up mid-job. Snow preserves it in perfect condition, ready to turn-turn-turn again in the spring. Icicles hang stubbornly from its axel. 

I’m hidden in the southwest depths of Hokkaido’s mountains, miles away from any broadcast of absurd handshakes or endless, infinite columns of videos with android voices.

A sudden swell from beneath the ground invisibly plumes and a wave of extreme heat flows over me. I can tolerate thirty-eight, sometimes even forty degrees but that’s my limit. I slowly frog-walk to the other side and find a smooth-rocked gentle slope to hoist myself onto. I lean back with my palms facedown flat and out-turned behind me. 

When I first started going to onsens I would wash with my shoulders bent in, head down, then furtively scuttle to the water. But that shyness has thawed out with the snowflakes over the years. The whole experience is welcome and freeing. The ego ebbs away, your mind wanders untethered and undisturbed by handheld watchdogs. It’s a safe, women-only, time-free place to transmute the spirit and rejuvenate the soul in whatever convoluted form you believe it to be. I am still yet to find an onsen that doesn’t keep anything but obscured analogue clocks around the baths.   

In this safe space I feel good in my body. It transforms in the water. Sitting on the slope, the hot water only reaches a couple inches above my navel. My chest puffs out. Unapologetically completely bare and shining from the light-glare that ricochets of the reflective white powder. Every mark and freckle offered up to the snow. I can never give myself up like this anywhere else. And the snow receives me openly with raining flakes soaking into my soft, pale skin. Water droplets steam off my sternum and trace the curvature between my breasts eventually returning to its origin. Piping hot spring water curls around my curves. Wind nips at my dark fly-aways that have escaped my hair-tie. I sink lower again to hide from the chill. The trees stare at me and I stare back. Their leaves tremble from the small birds that flit from one to the other. Their chittering likened to the young girls nearby, visiting their families for the winter break. I catch the words for university a lot, gabbing away cheerfully.

But it can’t last forever. The recommended limit is thirty minutes at a time. I push it to forty-five before I can feel the heat consuming me. I step out, feeling the icy chill try to dig into my every pore. Swiftly I dance around the sliding door into the inner sanctum. I pad across the wet rocks in the steamy cave-like indoor baths and cross the final boundary. A flurry of towels and bras fly in the change-room. Lockers slamming. Hairdryers roaring. 

Then at last, I’m sitting on a cushion in the relaxation room.

It’s really just a room with vinyl flooring, a few vending machines, windows facing onto the back-end of the buildings and low-set fake-wooden tables. There’s a TV playing a Japanese talk show. Bubbles with floating heads gasp and cackle their reactions to some latest kitchen gadget. Regardless, there is a strange sense of calm in the space. I head over to the vending machine and slot in the coins. A tallie of Sapporo beer lands in the tray at the bottom with a thud. Music to my ears.

Sitting by the window is a cheerful old man. ‘Where are you from?’ he yells from across the room. I oblige. I love meeting strangers. We get talking. The old man, my husband and myself. Let’s call the old man Jun. Eventually self-conscious of all the shouting we join Jun’s table. 

We learn. We learn he retired several years ago and learns languages as a hobby. English, Spanish, some Chinese, he’s working on them all. We talk real estate in Sapporo. We talk Internet scams. We try to kindly impress upon him that it sounds like he has been caught up in one. He insists the messages on Facebook are authentic and we let him believe it. We talk hometowns and parents and family deaths. We talk heart attacks. We see tears and deftly steer away to other topics like the weather. The snow listens in on us from the other side of the glass pane. 

Another round. Thud, thud. 

‘This is a special day for us,’ he says.

‘Us?’

‘My wife and I. She is still in the baths.’ 

‘My wife was diagnosed with breast cancer.’ He explains. ‘She had a mastectomy last year.’ 

His eyes blink for a moment. I can see through them. A doctor’s office. Hands held. But things don’t stop. Dinners must still be made, eaten, enjoyed. Mail must still be collected. Kids and grandkids called at New Years. Money given to the littlest ones – Otoshidama they call it. Snow felled and shovelled and falling again. 

‘She has been embarrassed, because she is not the same as before’. A beat. ‘But!’ he yells giddily. ‘This is her first onsen since the operation.’ He is beaming. 

Unsure whether to nod respectfully or clash cans together we stick with a level, safe-bet ‘Oh that’s great.’ It seems to be the right answer. 

Snow falls. Time passes. A third round. Thud, thud. 

Around the corner comes a woman purposefully walking towards our table. From my cushion on the floor she appears strong and tall, almost Amazonian and warrior-like. She has long, deep charcoal hair with trails of sable and smoke tied and swept over one shoulder. She is not the frail, anxious woman I reflexively envisioned. I don’t know what I expected. A wounded victim? A defeated half-woman? Why did I think this way? How could I deny a woman’s power from within? It’s always there. Perhaps the onsen simply liquefies and intensifies it.  

Strong calves grow downwards from the hem of a yukata cinched at the waist. She vibrates with simmering energy. Her eyes radiate with smile-line crinkles either side. Graciously, tenderly, she says ‘Nice to meet you. Now let’s leave the couple alone and have some lunch.’ 

Jun smiles and hoists himself up off the floor. ‘Nice to meet you’ he echoes. ‘Take care of each other.’ We nod at his sage well wishes. Abruptly, he yells ‘Kanpai!’ and downs the last of his beer. We follow the salute and shout ‘Kanpai!’ with our arms outstretched, cans waving in the air. 

The couple turn the corner and out of sight. The slap-slap of their sandals slowly fades out until all we can hear is the television murmuring.  

‘Another round?’ my husband asks. 

I shake my head. I want to pour myself into the onsen one more time before the snow needs to leave.