Beauty Finds A Way

Isn’t it weird how flowers can shift your whole mood just by existing? There’s something about flowers that just instantly brighten your entire mood and makes the world feel better. There must be a scientific explanation for that.

I went to Kyoto in early April 2023, hoping to finally see the cherry blossoms in full bloom. But by the time I got there, most of them were already gone. Just bare branches and a few petals left behind on the pavement and floating on the canal. I could’ve just sulked (okay, I did for a bit), but I kept walking. And that’s when I started noticing other flowers, not the cherry blossoms I came for, but different ones. Small, blooms growing out of sidewalk cracks, tucked along fences, or just randomly planted around. They weren’t the main event, but they still made me stop and look.

I saw tulips lining the sidewalks and a single dandelion growing from a crack in the pavement. It looked so out of place, but also like it had a purpose. It made me smile a little. Then I saw a white flower that looked like bells hanging in clusters that made soft sounds whenever the wind blew. I thought it was Lily of the Valley at first and turns out it is but just a different version from what I knew. It looked like a dream I forgot I had. The flowers were so vibrant and healthy that I thought they were fake at first.

It made me think of the seeds I left sitting back home in a drawer. Still unplanted. Still waiting. Just like parts of me, maybe…

In that moment, I thought to myself how nice would it be to have a home surrounded with different kinds of flowers and plants. Pots on every windowsill, vines hanging from bookshelves. But that’s going to have to wait for a while because I don’t think I have a green thumb yet. Like, how do some people do it? Is there a course I need to take so plants don’t just die on me? Haha. Maybe I should take up a gardening job to unveil the secrets. But seriously, wouldn’t it be amazing to be surprised by beauty in the most random places?

And maybe that’s the lesson here: You don’t always get what you came for. But sometimes, what you do get is something that means more? A new perspective, an idea or an epiphany.

What it is about flowers? they just bloom and I’m over here getting emotional. For what? You’re literally a plant.

Maybe because they reminded me that even how ugly and overwhelming the world is, you can still find beauty in it. Like that dandelion I found growing from a crack on the pavement. So small and stubborn. It didn’t have much yet it still bloomed so beautifully.