A Postcard from Spring
🎶 Spring is coming with sakura petals in her pockets...
My dear friends,
Spring is in full bloom, life is in full bloom. Greetings from the sakura petals that just gently landed on my palms –– a dispatch from Osaka, Shanghai, and various steps along the Kumano Kodo.
Jacob Collier experiences something he calls the Creative Infinity Syndrome: “Creatively, nothing really scares me. But I do think that the amount that is possible, sometimes, is intimidating.” I think I’m in a constant state of Life Infinity Syndrome (in addition to Creative Infinity Syndrome!) –– the jigsaw array of joy, hope, passion, and loss arrive at my door each day in a basket. It could be intimidating at times, but I know that no matter how these emotions wash over me, I will only take them fully with an open heart.
This past month, I’ve felt more of life than I thought was humanly possible. Words are not so helpful, but I will try and let my thoughts ramble in this letter.
During the final gloomy and cold days of winter, it felt really difficult to get out of bed as I was drenched in grief and loss. I fought a nameless urge to cry when I walked around in public. From the outside, I seemed fine. But I felt like I was hiding from something, or was trapped in something in the dark that I can’t quite make out the shape of. Everyone was eager to get somewhere, to prove something. Too many things were happening all at once. I didn’t have time to feel the source of my pain, let alone sit with it and listen to what it screamed at me for.
I was scared to call those I loved because everything felt like bad news. But my friends showed up for me every day even when they, too, were wrapped in wool balls of heartbreak. On the phone, they let me be silent and sad and occasionally hopeful. Some of them made the journey to come see me. One of them refused to hang up the phone until I had booked a therapy session. Amazingly, vulnerability brings the ones I love even closer. Those who stay will stay through all of it.
I started swimming almost every night. On empty roads, I’d drive with the windows down to feel the night breeze and sing along to Talking Heads. There were so many fallen leaves everywhere even though everything looked greener than ever. On the sidewalks, on the car seat, in the cupholders. What’s fresh is never completely new, and what’s old never quite goes away. Everything is in a constant state of passing.
Here’s a quote from Rilke that most beautifully captures the peculiar transition state:
“... Because we are alone with the strange thing that has entered into us; because everything familiar and accustomed is taken away from us for a moment; because we are in the middle of a transition where we cannot stand still… One might easily suppose that nothing had happened, but we have altered the way a house alters when a guest enters it. We cannot say who has come, perhaps we shall never know, but there are many indications that it is the future that enters into us like this, in order to be transformed within us, long before it actually occurs. And that is why it is so important to be solitary and attentive when one is sad: because the apparently uneventful and static moment when our future comes upon us is so much closer to life than that other noisy and accidental point when it happens to us as if from the outside… It is necessary –– and little by little our development will tend in this direction –– that nothing alien should happen to us, but only what has long been part of us… We shall gradually learn to recognize that what we call fate originates in ourselves, in humankind, and does not work on us from the outside.”
–– Rainer Maria Rilke
Borgeby gård, Sweden, 12 August 1904
So I’m learning to sit and listen more. To my feelings and whims. Not in a haste to move on to the next moment, and the one after. Beautiful and worthwhile things are never easy, but they should feel effortless –– in a way that requires hard work but never to battle against the deep convictions I cherish.
By the time I left for Osaka, I was still in the throes of finding strength. Then on my trip, life bloomed around me just like the cherry blossoms that now grace my memories –– the beauty that left me wondering how lucky I got to be alive amidst it all, this transitional phase that one day I will look back and cherish. “How did I so unwittingly transform the joy of living into the great luxury of being alive?” writes Clarice Lispector. The past weeks have been an attempt to answer that very question.
The Courtiols invited me to join them for hanami (花見: flower-watching). They rented an adorable house tucked between the cozy alleys of Osaka. When I arrived, Abigail and Penelope hid behind a utility pole, surprising me with a hug.
The entire city bloomed in pink. And underneath every tree, people were basking in the joy of sharing: tea in ceramic ware, pastries, the lovely afternoon. The flower season lasts merely two weeks. As white and pink petals garnished our picnics, we looked around: it was as if everyone was saying “As life comes and passes, I want to be HERE.” There’s nothing quite like the hanami spirit in Japan –– understanding and cherishing a fleeting moment with loved ones is so infused into the philosophy of life here.
Chris and Tanja breathe their fairy dust of romance into everything they encounter. I wish more people could spend time with them and experience how life can be lived to its fullest. Our conversations meandered into a world beyond as we marveled at everything we saw –– I mean to truly take the time and imbibe every little detail in a world of artistry. When we spotted a playground at an intersection, we’d stop and skid down the slides. Every little flowerbed was full of secrets to uncover. At night, we’d tell stories on tatami by the sakura tree in our room. I felt my brain fog melting away as everything else magically became lucid.
On the day of our departure, we were greeted by Chris with a beaming smile, returned from his morning run. "Do we have a little time before we leave for the train station?" he asked with a grin. "I want to take you to a special place." As we laced up our shoes, he advised us to empty our pockets and travel light. Overnight, pink petals covered the streets and bushes like a soft blanket.
We arrived at an unassuming entrance by the road. "This," Chris announced, "is a secret garden hidden behind the cherry blossoms." He led us into the park, and I held my breath in wonder. Inside the garden, invisible from the outside world, were more trees, paths, and a river. Chris took the girls further into the garden, while Tanja and I chatted on the boardwalk, staring at the ripples in the water and the way the blossoms gently fell.
"Close your eyes," came the whispers of Abigail and Penelope. We obliged, feeling the soft kiss of petals on our cheeks and necks. Tanja removed her hands from her pockets to give us a hug, and a few petals spilled out. "What a lovely thing to find in your pockets," she mused.
–– and every moment of us together was full of magic like this.
This letter has grown quite lengthy, so I will keep the rest brief. There are a million more things I want to write about to keep for myself –– and to share with you. Poetry, stories, essays... more are on their way.
After saying goodbye to the Courtiols, I spent four days “solo hiking” the Kumano Kodo Nakahechi route:
My ryokan hosts hand-packed me a beautiful lunch box…
Following the sound of the wildlife on the trail for so long searching for frogs…
Becoming friends with lovely people along 70 km of trails (How often do we get to walk this much besides anyone in life?). We will surely reunite in other parts of the world.
Taking silly photos in front of every mirror…
Midnight Karaoke with locals. 80s J pop (C pop, and maybe K pop alike?) was hopelessly romantic…
…
At Kii-Katsuura train station, my train departs in 10 minutes and the lady in front of me is taking a long time with the ticket machine. Then the most wonderful thing happens: the staff who’s helping me runs to the platform and tells the conductors to halt the entire train so the lady in front of me could get her ticket without us having to interrupt her. Finally, five minutes past due departure time, it’s my turn at the machine. But the time option no longer shows. The staff runs to his office handwrites a ticket for me and tells me to pay upon arrival.
He dashes to the train with me and waves goodbye until the platform disappears from my sight. Staring out of the window, I mull over what has just happened –– something that couldn’t have happened anywhere else in the world. I’ve never seen or experienced so much humanity, care, and respect so deeply ingrained into how people treat each other. The sun feels so warm and gentle on my face.
…
In front of a small moss-covered oji statue next to the shrine, I place a flower I’ve found along the trail and carried for miles. After gazing at the weathered face for a while, I close my eyes and press my palms together, wishing for the pieces of my life to find their place. Then something jostles my eyes open, the face of the Buddha remains the same and slightly smiling. All at once, I realize how silly it is to wish for something that’s already happening –– everything in life eventually falls into place. I squeeze my hands closer together.
…
Love Theme from Cinema Paradiso performed by a live orchestra at the Rinku-Town train station on my way to the airport. Most people stopped for the rendition…
Beautiful books I read recently:
A Strangeness in My Mind by Orhan Pamuk
Set in Istanbul across decades. The first chapter made me tear up on the subway.
Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet & Selected Poetry
Why? by astrophysicist Mario Livio, an investigation of the anthropology and neuroscience of curiosity
Things I Don’t Want to Know by Deborah Levy, an intimate memoir that explores our relationship with the past and how to set it free
I couldn’t forget about the way Levy paints how she ate an orange in Johannesburg during her childhood:
First I had to find one that would fit into the palm of my hand. So I searched the sack in the pantry for a small orange because the small ones were the juiciest. Then I rolled the orange under my bare foot to make it soft. It took a long time and the point was to get the fruit to yield its juice and not to split. This had to be sensed entirely through the sole of the foot. My legs were brown and strong. I felt so powerful when I figured out how to use my strength on something as small as an orange.
The creativity process to me feels much like opening and eating an orange. A mystic force unknown to me –– the orange travels from far away into my hands and awaits a collaborative opening. Take something that doesn’t feel like your concoction or you have any control over how it happens other than just getting out of the way so it happens, so it splashes all over your canvas kinesthetically. Yes, something is released into the world, juice misting, zesty, beautiful crystal pulps. But then you swallow the whole fruit and it slowly works through your system –– into the heart, and the heart recognizes it with love. (Another one for our “orange collection” @Salma 💕)
Simple Passion by Annie Ernaux
This book will be on my mind forever. Its prose has shown me a different way of experiencing time.
The Official Kumano Kodo Guide I bought from my ryokan host Hiroki
History, folklore, Shinto poetry, maps, field guides of birds, flowers, trees…
Love,
Erica
Absolutely wonderful. I loved the sound-bites - made me feel I was there!