A Fortune in Clamshells?

If I had a thousand dollars to spare, I would have bought it--a thousand dollar lunchbox. It sat on a black lacquer tray inside a glass case. I could hear it calling me, and if I ever win the lottery, it's coming back from Okinawa inside my suitcase.

That kind of box is called a jubako. Ju means layers, and hako (bako) means box. There are three tiny boxes in which fancy food can be arranged. They fit neatly one on top of the other and are covered by a perfectly fitted lid. The boxes are plain black lacquer; the real beauty is in the lid. It is made through a technique known as raden.

Smooth and shiny as glass, but warm to the touch, the lid is also black lacquer. However, it is inlaid with bits of shell that glow like pearls against velvet. The one that captured my heart used bits of abalone shell to depict blue and green flowers and vines. Others used white mother-of-pearl, and they were the kind of objects that, if you have to ask the price, you shouldn't be buying them.

I couldn't look at them without admiring the people who crafted them. What did they use? Wood from a fallen tree. Lacquer distilled from a plant similar to poison ivy. The shells their food came in. That, plus brain power, to figure out how to do the work. That, plus the artistic imagination to make the designs. That, plus a heart open to the potential for creating beauty and value.

Nature plus human beings--what a wonderful pairing it can be!