"A beautiful gesture."
For Steve H.
“I think friendship is mostly about making time for a friend.”—Steve Heck
MAY 10—The sky was an ocean of blue, the day warm and bright. It was July in Seattle. Or, perhaps, the sky was obscured by clouds and there was a cold drizzle and it was early autumn. I cannot recall the day or season. And it doesn’t matter. This is what I remember:
I was well into a second chronic fatigue flareup and had been sick for many months—too long alone and lonely—when Steve came bearing flowers. He came with branches, vases, and curious tools—hasami (metal clippers) and spiked kenzan (“flower frogs”)—materials and implements for an Ikebana lesson.
That was thirteen years ago. I can summon few details of the visit and recall almost nothing of the lesson itself. I had difficulty following Steve’s simple instructions, my tremor was pronounced, my coordination was poor, and I was weak and dizzy. Steve’s visit left me exhausted. I remember that much.
But I also remember how happy I was to see him. I remember his smile and kindness—his presence. However beautiful the flowers were, they were not more beautiful than my friend.
What mattered then, and matters still, was the significance of the gesture itself. The gesture. The fact that Steve came to see me.
For more than a decade, through all those years of illness, Steve stayed in touch. He sent postcards from his frequent trips to Florida and other places. Between the postcards I received handwritten notes on homemade cards, featuring photos of his drawings and paintings.
Steve’s cards became treasures. One of them sits on my writing desk in a frame. It is a graceful line drawing of a cat. His notes were always brief, no more than a few lines. It takes few words to let someone know they are remembered. I remained always on his prayer list, he frequently reminded me. Until I no longer needed to be.
In a series of emails sent several weeks ago, Steve attached photos of his recent Ikebana arrangements. Looking at them, I saw once again that flowers are Steve’s primary artistic medium. It is an interesting one: sculptural in character and yet so short-lived the creations are like the sand paintings of Buddhist monks—intended to be impermanent.
The art of Ikebana has its origins in Buddhist shrine offerings. The arrangements are transient. Fleeting. Ephemeral. Ikebana is very much like friendship and indeed, life itself: a gesture.
Ikebana by Steve Heck.
Steve had this to say about his chosen art form:
Kado means “flower way.” Although not universally emphasized, Kado is the practice of Ikebana as a way of life—stilling the mind, working with living metaphors, reflecting on transience…
Ikebana is a concrete, noticeably transient non-narrative art form. [It] doesn’t carry much of a conceptual load. Rather, it says, ‘Here’s something to look at, if you would like to.’ It’s arranged to be pleasing and to have a composition that uses the parts to create a unified whole . . . rather than random placement of elements.
Ikebana deals with line, mass, and space, principally. Time is automatically included in the naturally changing materials.
Note: Photos by Steve Heck.