Mixed Media on Canvas
W21xH21 inch
 
When I visited Yamanaka Onsen in Kaga City, Ishikawa Prefecture, I heard that there was a 2300-year-old giant cedar about 10 km away from the hotel I stayed, so I rented and rode a bicycle in the rain to see it. Kayano Osugi is one of the four sacred trees on the grounds of Sugawara Shrine and is designated as a national natural monument. It is also known as "Tenran-no-Osugi", as it was carefully observed by the emperor when he stopped by during the 2nd Ishikawa National Athletic Meet in 1947.
I expected the cedar to be majestic, but it looked more shiny and lively than old-fashioned, partly because it was covered with drops from a light rain. When I looked up, the sheer size of the trunk gave me the illusion of being sucked into the sky. Leaves were falling at my feet, some of which had fallen long ago and were brown and dull, while others, which had probably fallen recently, looked so young that I could not tell how old they were. For us humans, 2,300 years is a mind-boggling number of years, but for this sacred tree, it must have been only a few years ago.