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The flight back from Oaxaca seemed to take forever, but I fear it was only Judith’s disgust with me that made it seem interminable. Anyway, we got home and life returned to normal, or even better than normal, even supernormal, if there is such a word. I told Judith I was sorry about the comments I made about her parents and the Day of the Dead celebration, and she apologized for her brazen flirting with that good-for-nada bullfighter. Then, in an effort to cement our new-found bond, Judith enrolled us in an origami class. “Oh great, I thought, “my marriage has been reduced to folded paper.” But now that I’ve been in the class for a few weeks, I must admit that I love it. Origami is amazing and beautiful.
The name origami was coined in 1880 for the words oru (to fold) and kami (paper). It started in the first century AD in China. (I thought it started in Japan, but Judith quickly pointed out the error in my thinking.) They say that’s when paper making started, and
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with paper making came paper folding. The Chinese developed some simple forms, some of which survive to this day. Buddhist monks brought Origami to Japan in the sixth century AD. It caught on quickly throughout the culture: paper was used in architecture and in many everyday rituals. Many of the earliest designs have been lost, since there was nothing written down about origami until 1797 with the publication of the Senbaduru Orikata (How to Fold One Thousand Cranes). The Kan no mado (Window of Midwinter), a comprehensive collection of traditional Japanese figures, was published in 1845.
Origami flourished in other parts of the world, as well. Arabs brought the secrets of paper making to North Africa, and in the eighth century AD, the Moors brought the secrets of Spain. The Moors, devoutly religious, were forbidden to create representational figures. Their paper folding was a study in geometry. After the Moors were driven out
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