spring Archives

A Meditation on Textures, balcony addition

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This summer, I thought up a recurring photo series—a thorough examination of the textures and materials on my balcony. After the recent outdoor renovation we did, I’ve been thinking a lot of the elements that make up tactile surfaces. In the summer, we all tend to be outside in the warm weather and sunshine, and I’m no exception. When I’m on my balcony, I find myself pondering how everything has its own physical fabric in this world, and begin to eagerly examine and study the textures I see.

There’s something artistic about all the finishes that come together to form my balcony. From the rough stuccoed ceramic of the pots that hold the plants, the wood grain in the furniture, the weave and textile of the cushions, to the painstaking pattern and braiding of the area rug; all these textures come together to form my own outdoor oasis. A place of respite, escape, and fresh air—surrounded in nature and the textures that comprise it.

Spring Night Sunset

The river was quiet tonight, the kind of quiet that isn’t empty but full—full of distance, full of the day finally letting go.

Spring Night Sunset is a simple title, but the sky didn’t feel simple. It spread out in soft smoke and lavender, then leaned into pink and orange as if it were remembering something. The far ridge sat black and steady, a single shape holding the whole scene in place. Out on the Hudson River, the water took on the color of whatever the sky offered—muted at first, then slowly brighter, then calm again.

There’s a certain patience in these evenings. The world doesn’t announce the change from day to night; it just slides into it. You watch for a while and realize you’ve stopped thinking about anything else. The surface of the water goes on moving, but it feels like it’s moving less for you than for itself.

What I like most about a spring sunset is how it makes familiar places feel newly made. The shoreline, the distant lights, the last bit of warmth in the air—everything looks the same and still feels different. For a few minutes, it’s enough to stand still and let the color pass through.

Hudson River Spring Sunset, and then darkness. Not sudden, not dramatic. Just the day folding up and putting itself away.

Kyoto Sake Spring Water

There’s a kind of quiet you only notice when you stop long enough to hear it. In Kyoto, spring water feels like that—steady, clear, unhurried.

This little bamboo spout and wooden basin look simple at first glance, but they carry the patient rhythm of a place that has been doing the same small thing for a long time. Water gathers, spills over, and starts again. The bamboo troughs line up like tools put away carefully after use. Even the cups feel like they’re waiting with purpose.

I keep thinking about how certain places “live alongside you.” Not by demanding attention, but by staying consistent. Spring water is like that. It doesn’t try to be anything more than what it is, and somehow that’s exactly what makes it memorable.

Kyoto sake begins here, long before the tasting notes and labels—before the conversations at a counter, before the warm glow of a lantern on a side street. It begins with cold, clean water moving through wood and stone, meeting a bucket, then disappearing again.

Standing in front of it, you can feel the world get a little larger and a little calmer. Just enough to remind you that the most ordinary motions—pouring, filling, flowing—are often the ones that hold the most history.

Spring Beach Time 1989

Spring beach time, 1989: not quite summer, not quite anything else. The sand is still cool enough to register, the wind sharp in that early-season way that keeps adults zipped up and kids unfazed.

In the photo, my mom walks along the packed shoreline holding my hand. I’m about a year and a half old—still learning balance, still trusting that the ground will mostly behave. A red sweatshirt is tied around her waist like a practical marker of foresight. She carries a weekend bag, the kind you pack when you don’t yet know how long you’ll stay or what the weather will decide. Behind us, tire tracks cut clean parallel lines, evidence that the beach has already been crossed, flattened, crossed again.

The best throwback photos aren’t dramatic. They look like errands. A walk. A hand held without discussion. Forward motion without a destination. The details date it—the haircut, the sandals, my small late-80s outfit—but the feeling isn’t stuck in a decade. It’s the ordinary certainty of being guided across uneven ground before you know how to do that yourself.

Spring at the beach was never about swimming. It was about arriving early, when the shoreline was still half-awake, and letting the day remind you how to be outside.

A picture doesn’t bring the past back. It just proves it happened. Sometimes that’s enough.