ode to spring

what the seasons bring

In the city by the Bay, there are no seasons. The parks and the trees are verdant even as the sun loses its grasp on the days, as darkness extends for far too long. The temperature barely changes, and the warmest days come randomly throughout the year, mainly in September and October. After five years, I had forgotten about seasons.

When I traveled, I would meet seasons piecemeal — a week of winter here, a few days of summer there. But this was not a true experience of seasons. I would soon return to my unseasonal city, to the consistency of the cool fog and endless greenery. The pain of a frigid winter day stood in isolation, a short vacation from my invariable reality. These were glimpses of seasons without the completion of the cycle. There was nothing to be learned from these brief moments; I was unchanged by the experiences.

I moved to NYC on one of the coldest weeks of the year in February and wondered if I had made a mistake. The cold cut through layers, created new sensations along my skin, altered the experience of leaving my home. I learned to wear a scarf and carry gloves and a hat, figured out which combinations of clothes would keep me warm enough without letting me overheat while walking. Time passed, winter lost its strength. But the cold wouldn't go away, returning on sunny days weeks later, even as we began to glimpse moments of warmth here and there. It didn't feel that bad in the moment, but there was a lethargy brought on by the cold. I had become slower, tired.

One day, the world was an explosion. Every tree seemed to have transformed overnight, the sun shone in ways that felt impossible, and jackets were left on hangers for once. Along the streets and in the parks, tulips were painted shades of red, yellow, white, purple. Streets lined with trees were an array of green and white and pink. These words fail to describe what these colors looked like, felt like. Imagine the first man to see a hummingbird, the first to hear a mockingbird's mimicry. Imagine a ripe mango from a fridge on a hot summer day, a glass of ice water coated in condensation. I had never seen a green this green, a red this vibrant. For months, all I had come to know was the tired brown of the dormant trees, the unending grays of concrete and asphalt. Color was a revelation to eyes thirsty for anything new. My brain felt supercharged by the new, my body filled with energy.

In San Francisco, the soft animal of my body turned to equanimity by the muting lack of seasonality. I would feel good, but never much worse or much better. The consistency was grounding, but removed the possibility of change. In the land of seasons, my animal self was able to rest through the winter and finally emerge as its most realized self. When I say animal, there's no derision; animal like a proud German Shepherd, animal like the crooning northern mockingbird, animal like something of the Earth and its cycles. In the cold, part of myself hibernated under all of those layers, and like the animals and like the trees, I became something different.

The sun's rays and the blossoming trees unearth the child within me, old and new. There is memory in the changing seasons: the joy and excitement of summer's approach as a kid, an end to monotony, bird songs and the names that I learned when I was 12 years old — the American robin and northern cardinal, blue jay and mourning dove. It's a sort of homecoming to feel the spring again. I act in ways that feel childlike, but are unlike who I was as a child. I hold an insatiable desire to look at the many flowers, to always be in motion now that the days feel longer, to connect with the flora and fauna of the city, the Earth.

I sit on the edge of the East River and watch the sun dip behind the skyscrapers. The water dances in every direction, light of all colors rebounding across the changing surface. It's warm enough to be outside for this now, and the park is filled with people taking photos of the coloring-book sky, finally able to enjoy it. This is another cycle: the daily descent of the star into the sea, each time slightly different. And in the waning light of the day, I, too, am made anew.

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💧 Drops of the Week 💧

• ALBUM - Flora by Hiroshi Yoshimura - another record by my personal GOAT of ambient music

• POEM - “The Danger of Wisdom” by Jack Gilbert - We learn to live without passion. / To be reasonable.