Writing

An Excerpt

… the kintsugi body

I am thinking about kintsugi – the Japanese art of repairing broken ceramics. The art of kintsugi felt close to my journey - when the cracks became marks of being made whole again. I love that kintsugi is rooted in wabi-sabi’s main concept of simplicity and is concerned with the passage of time. It dates to the Muromachi period (1338–1573). Amid external conflict, Japanese society sought refuge inwardly. It was during this time that the Shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa found a crack in one of his treasured tea bowls. In hopes of getting another bowl to replace it, he sent the bowl back to China, where it had been made. However, no replacement could be found, and the piece was returned damaged. Rather than throwing it away, Yoshimasa ordered his craftsmen to find a better solution. This is said to be the beginning of kintsugi in Japan. In Japanese, kin means gold, and tsugi means joining together.

The kintsugi method uses urushi, a plant-based resin, which becomes gilded with gold and silver. This mixture is then applied to the break lines, but rather than hiding them, they are embraced as part of the object’s story: before and after. By undertaking this type of restoration, kintsugi extends the life of an object in its imperfection. With its cracks and their repairs, the object becomes whole. The repaired cracks are now connected to care, healing, and hope. Beauty is interpreted in its imperfect form. Kintsugi represents both permanence and impermanence since pottery does not decay but is fragile and easily broken. It honors the passage of time and a sense of continuity through its repair. This metaphor symbolizes frailty but also resilience and restoration.

I realize that kintsugi is more than restoration alone; it is also a physical manifestation of memory: each golden crack is a visible record of what I have lived through. The scars that are sometimes not just physical link my life to its history. Thinking of my scars inspires me to see my imperfections as what makes me unique. The mended cracks become living memory, testimony to my journey through damage and restoration.

Wabi-sabi reminds me that beauty is transient, impermanent, and incomplete. Together, kintsugi and wabi-sabi encourage me to celebrate memories as an inseparable part of existence. I understand our fractures and imperfections as an integral part of our memories. Our memories connect us to who we were and who we are: broken or mended, whole or fractured, always evolving and unfinished.

Just as a bowl is enhanced by the gold inserted into its cracks, my life is shaped by those who come into it. Some of these encounters last forever; others make a fleeting appearance and never return. Even fleeting encounters leave an impact—often subtle and only discovered later, sometimes never noticed at all.

I think of sifting sand to catch tiny specks, capturing the beauty of these fleeting moments. I respect incompleteness and imperfection as signs of life, and identity as never static. Like a cat that has forgotten its home, I keep searching for a place where I might be truly understood. Those who share, or even briefly cross paths with my multiple lives help me in this search, often unbeknownst to me and even to them. I share my memory’s patchwork quilt, stitched by remembrance.