Those were the days, my friend…

Dad removes the fresh mochi from the mochi maker and slices it to near perfect squares for the ozoni that mom makes only at New Years. A memory breathes of a time when Japanese ceremonial tradition demanded pounding the mochi by hand–fathers lifting and dropping the heavy kine, resembling a giant mallet, into the sticky mound of undifferentiated rice; mothers risking a hand to shift and move the rice for evenness. The pounding finds a rythmn and a harmonic counterpart is perfected. In the back patio, the mochi maker sits with calm indifference to earlier whispers of rice spirits.