Remembering Kim Oswalt

I'm thinking of Kim Oswalt, a dear friend of mine, who died two years ago today. Writing this blog today is my way of remembering her and sharing with readers some photos and memories of the the times I spent with her over the years, starting in the early 90s in Japan.

First, here's a picture of her in 2009, smiling and holding her sweet dog, during a walk we took in Kariuizawa, a small mountain town north of Tokyo.

Kim lived there with her partner, Mima, in a beautiful house. In the early spring of that year Junko and I visited her, enjoying the crisp cool air and the natural beauty around the house. Here's what it looked like from the outside.

And here's what it was like from the inside, revealing a lot about Kim. I spent two happy days there that spring. Note the flowers, comfortable pillows, wide views of nature, art on the walls, a dog in the background, a coat hanging on the door, ready for a walk, planned or unplanned. 

So much beauty in early spring--still the muted colors of winter, but broken by soft greens.

Kim was probably best known as a musician among friends and appreciators of traditional Japanese music. Born in Japan when her family was stationed there by the US Army, Kim spent some of her formative years in Japan before the family went back to the US. After college, Kim returned to Japan, and became one of the few westerners to study the 20-string koto at that time (1980). By the time I met her in the early 90s, she was an accomplished koto player who performed with her fellow musician, Helen Dryz.  I was a little in awe of them both then. Helen played the shakuhachi (Japanese flute), and as a duo, they performed both traditional and modern tunes. One of their concerts is recorded on youtube and it's well worth a listen. Click here (Note: concert begins a minute or so into the video.) They performed beautifully, both then and today, when I listened to their performance once again.

While living in Japan, Kim met Mima Yufu and they became life partners. Several years later, they moved to the US, to Boulder, Colorado, where Kim studied psychology and counseling at Naropa University. During their 10-year stay in Boulder, Kim received a master's degree and began a private practice. Then in 2002 they returned to Japan, and that's when I came to know Kim as a friend. 

We often saw each other at "dyke weekends", periodic gatherings north of Tokyo, where lesbians came together to socialize and share ideas. Kim had an innate gentleness and ability to listen--no doubt fostered by her training at Naropa.  Once, when I was asked to facilitate a session between two members of a group I belonged to--members who had conflict and difficult feelings about each other, Kim talked to me about facilitating strategies, and I was able to create a dialog that worked well. A success all around thanks to Kim. 

Over time we came to know each other better, perhaps due to being relatively close in age (I was 6 years older), sharing an extended lesbian community, and also having an interest in social and political change. As undergraduates, I had majored in political science and she in criminal justice. Her obituary notes that she was a "social activist-minded individual who was passionate about changing the world and worked in the Cuban Refugee resettlement, for fair housing rights for African Americans and with Acorn and Witness for Peace." We talked about many things, such as the peace movement that developed in the wake of Bush's war in Iraq, as well as the challenges facing transgendered people in Japan. Kim worked with members of that community through her private practice in Tokyo. Toward the end of my stay in Japan (2009-10), we started to meet once a month for dinner in Yokosuska, site of a naval military base near Yokohama. Kim had contracted to train counselors enlisted in the Navy. Trains made it possible for me to make the 2-hour round-trip journey from my place in Machida, and I always looked forward to our get-togethers. We both loved Japanese food and good conversation.

Then I returned to the US. Except for a brief visit in Boulder after that, I didn't see Kim again until early 2014--this time in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. She and Mima spent two months there following a visit to Kim's mother in Texas, and I came for the second month of that. We stayed in different places, but enjoyed meeting up before and after massage sessions (by a local practitioner at her home), for art events, and of course for good food and conversation. Here we are on a happy afternoon after a massage and on another at a San Miguel restaurant.

Throughout the time I knew her, Kim bravely faced a major health challenge: kidney disease. She had two transplants over a 20 year period, and when the second one began to fail, hoped to have a third. That was not to be. Kim and Mima returned to the US in 2015, primarily for Kim's medical treatment. On July 31, 2017, at the age of 64, she died in her home in Ashland, Oregon. She had been under hospice care, and from what I later learned, among loving friends who supported her in her final months. 

I think of Kim with a mixture of gratitude and regret--gratitude for the great opportunity to be her friend and regret that I didn't really stay in touch during the three years between our last meeting and her death. It comforts me that she had Mima and her friends close to her, people who could give her the daily love and support that's difficult to give over distance. Today I remember her with love, feeling close to all others who also had the great good fortune to be her friend and who still carry her memory in their hearts.