My son’s celebration-robe

　In the previous article, I have mentioned that it is a tradition for a baby to wear Hitotsumi-kimono as celebration-robe. This time, I would like to narrate on the episode of my son’s celebration-robe.
　Many of you must have seen a baby covered with black or red celebration-robe at Omiya-mairi of your baby or your acquaintance’s baby. Usually, Hitotsumi with black and blue are for baby-boy, and bright red and pink pattern are for baby-girl. Hitotsumi-kimono is the size only babies could wear, and for the age of new-born to about three years old. And it could be worn only at Omiya-mairi, so it is perfectly all right to rent it. What is most important is the heart of celebration.
　However, as we knew the gender of our baby from early stage, and we had sufficient preparation period, Shigyo Sosyu, grandfather of the baby, had ordered Hitotsumi-kimono to the dyer in Kyoto for the baby. I was so thankful to him.
　This is the completed celebration-robe (photo). As I mentioned in the last year’s article vol.8 “Tears of Otomo no Tabito” that Otomo no Tabito is the ancestor of Shigyo-family, and the personage who is related to the source of the new era name Reiwa, and my son was born in the first year of Reiwa. Having to do with this background, for the celebration-robe, we ordered to have the replica of “Jisetsu Dai-shogun,” which Yasuda Yukihiko painted this Otomo no Tabito, depicted on the back-side, and it is surrounded by plum-blossoms, which beautifully bloomed in Tabito’s residence with scarlet Sun shining gold. Plum-blossom is not only an auspicious pattern, but also a symbol of Reiwa-era. And the scarlet Sun illuminating Tabito seems to give an impression of the dawn of an absolutely new era transcending human intellect.
　I sense that the children born in Reiwa-era and living in an absolutely new era may have the poles apart experiences from the people before our parents’ generation who were conscious of “the continuation of previous eras,” which Showa-era and Heisei-era had. Discontinuation with the era of absolute anthropocentrism is already beginning. If you wish to live all the more as a decent human being, you will not be able to just live imitating the previous eras on a live-and let-live basis.
　The dyer who made the celebration-robe seemed to have truly agonized and agonized over how to depict it. And on the celebration-robe, which she delivered to us on the night of the day before Omiya-mairi, there was a ray of Sun illuminating Tabito flashing like the Cross. Tabito facing the ray of Cross — Yes, at the time when the era does not need human beings, and yet, to be the existence of keep burning the flame of life, one must free own-self from the diminutiveness of human being. This celebration-robe embraces the prayer for my son living in the new era to hold the firm foothold linking with the ancestors, and have the courage to go beyond transcending human being. I myself would like to face my son with the full hope that he will certainly become as such.