hezatown

I want to feel what the cedars feel, and I want to know what they know

2025-02-01 permalink

From Who Am I? Psychological exercises to develop self-understanding:

When the human world disappoints, it’s not unusual to turn to nature. But what specifically is it about nature that offers us consolation?

To the stoic philosophers of ancient Roma, it was the idea of inevitability - so explicit in the natural world - that appealed; the tide has to rise and fall according to the phrases of the moon; the bough of the tree has to bend when the wind blows; the lion has to hunt the gazelle. The swallow has to migrate. The laws of nature are fixed by forces no-one chooses but to which everything must submit. It is a strange relief to remind ourselves that broadly the same kind of inevitability applies to our own lives as well.

During the Tang dynasty, the Chinese poet Bai Juyi as he got older felt increasingly excluded from what he called ‘the world of youngsters’: he turned instead to nature for companionship. In one poem he writes:

Turning my head around, I ask a pair of rocks:

‘Can you keep company with an old man like myself?’

Although the rocks cannot speak,

They promise that we will be three friends

He sought out oddly-shaped, exposed rocks that had been dramatically weathered and eroded: time had made them more interesting.

In what ways, similar or different, does nature appeal to you?

…

I long to be in nature, because my eyes long to see far and wide. I long to be met by the smells of the forest. I long for the river to splash its body onto me. Does it cool my sweaty skin, does it jolt me awake with its freezing needles?

I suppose it lies in the never ending variation of sensations. The complete opposite of the horrors, the torture, of the white classroom. The never ending uncontrollable variations. How it is all just there, all the more beautiful precisely because no one has arranged it according to their own purposes. It is… natural.

Just like writing when it flows directly from the heart. Just how unplanned encounters are the most magical ones. How unplanned adventures stay with us forever. How cities and neighborhoods grow over time, gradually winding farther and farther into each other.

Love is a wild thing

2025-02-13 permalink

It’s funny how you can never quite predict the things you will miss after leaving somewhere. It appears enough weeks have passed since my departure for me to begin to notice the things I subtly miss about the life I lived in Hawaii. Surprisingly, I miss the campus dining hall. There wasn’t really anything special about the food for the most part, but man, I miss having all those devilishly salty French fries for so many nights a week.

…

I know, I know. Sorry I haven’t updated in a while. I’m surprisingly busy for an unemployed person :(

I have actually been going outside. I did Stough Canyon trail a while ago. I had done it once before, but I was miserably hot and sleep deprived and grumpy on that day. I realized the trail was much prettier than I recalled. I experienced awe and even a little bit of euphoria. My hiking buddies are way too fast for me though, I always feel like I’m gonna die D:

^Me romanticizing random junk and also snake!

I don’t have a car, so I tried taking the train to Laguna. It was fun! I recommend it. The Metrolink is better connected than I had realized. Just take the OC line from LA Union Station to Laguna Niguel/Mission Viejo :D I chose to Uber from the station to the beach though, cause it would’ve taken forever to take the bus.

I was happy to do a little day trip by myself. I’ve really grown to appreciate solitude lately. I paid attention to the pleasantly chilly wind in my hair, and the excitedly singing wind in my ears. The adventurous smell of the ocean, the rocks and sand rough against my fingertips, and the cliffs proudly announcing where we were: “California, bitch!”

I listened to my world.

The beach at Crystal Cove State Park might actually be the most beautiful one I’ve ever seen. I’m completely in love. I chose to drag a friend there later the same week :3

Oh the things you did

2025-02-14 permalink

Hola.

Someone asked what camera I use. The asnwer is that I mostly use my iPhone 8 camera (I know, my phone is basically vintage at this point). My pictures look the way they do because I almost always use the app Tezza to edit them. It has a ton of fun vintage filters ^^

…

I’ve been having trouble falling asleep the last few days. So I listen to this playlist over and over:

For some reason those particular songs in that particular order help me get really snuggly and fall asleep. Also, enough for you and 1 step forward, 3 steps back are two of my favorite songs of all time.

Let’s all say a fun fact about ourselves

2025-02-20 permalink

I’m not sure who the people are who read this blog are, other than my friends, but according to the stats, every now and then there’s quite a few of you. I’d love to hear who you are, where you’re from etc :3 You can either use the email in the side bar or shoot me an instagram dm~

I’ll go first! By doing some kind of more detailed self introduction, or like fun facts about myself. Let’s go:

1. I grew up in Sweden. My mom is Swedish and my dad is from California. Growing up, I always identified more with being American than Swedish. A lot of my earliest and happiest childhood memories are of family trips in California. There is nowhere else in the world I feel as happy and rooted and as much like myself.

I ended up moving here as an adult at 26. Well, more like I was here on a trip and ended up just not leaving… haha. I had a remote job at the time I could easily do from anywhere in the world, so it just kind of ended up like that. Later leaving to go to grad school in Hawaii for two years and often getting homesick was really how I realized how at home I feel here. Finally being back again feels like a sigh of relief. I really can’t imagine living anywhere else, so hopefully I will never have to leave again.

2. You often hear people talk about how time moves more quickly as you age. This has not been my experience. Compared to my teens, my twenties have felt like lifetimes and dynasties. This is probably because I’ve spent them moving around so much, living in five different cities around the world: Yokohama, Sapporo, Stockholm, Los Angeles, and Honolulu. These have been very interesting experiences I’ve learned a lot about the world from, but also full of longing and yearning and friends becoming scattered around the world.

3. I was very strong and healthy as a child, but ever since I was around 15 I’ve been sickly and struggled a lot with my health. Around then was when I developed asthma and ever since then it feels like I’m almost never at 100% and it seems like there’s almost always something wrong with me. Allergies, difficult periods, stomach problems, throat infections, random bout of anemia… You name it :( As one of my closest friends put it, I’m “always on the struggle bus”. I’m fragile :((((

4. As a child I was a huuuge bookworm and would go to the school library pretty much every day. During summer break when the school library was closed, I would always walk to the closest public library. I had a long period during and after Covid when I almost stopped reading for pleasure completely, but since this past summer I’ve been back at it with a vengeance.

Some of my favorite books include the Dragonkeeper series by Carole Wilkinson, The Poppy War series by R.F. Kuang, and Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi.

5. I’m a big fantasy nerd in general and love the Lord of the Rings movies and animated shows like Avatar: The Last Airbender and Netflix’s She-ra and the Princesses of Power (EVERYONE who likes fantasy and/or animation should watch this show!!).

6. Among the ones mentioned above, my favorite tv shows are Scrubs, Euphoria, The Glory, The Bear, Bojack Horseman, and Friends :)

7. I’m a huge fan of Hong Kong cinema. Two of my favorite movies of all time are In the Mood for Love (artsy painful love and yearning) and Love on Delivery (batshit crazy kung fu comedy). I spent several years learning Cantonese (the language spoken in Hong Kong), but I didn’t have the energy for it anymore once I started grad school. Hopefully I’ll get back on it once I feel less mentally burnt out :) I’ve only been to Hong Kong once and that was almost ten years ago now, so I really hope I can visit again soon! I know it’s changed a lot though :’(

8. I have a huge interest in fashion. I enjoy watching fashion commenters on youtube like Mina Le and ModernGurlz, reading books about fashion history, going to fashion history museum exhibits, observing what trendy people around me are wearing, etc.

9. Bubble wrap always reminds me of my dad. One day when I was a kid, I was playing with it and popping the bubbles. My dad saw me doing it and said hold on, let me show you how to do it. Then he showed me more efficient ways of popping them. Or something like that. The memory’s not super clear. But to this day, bubble wrap makes me happy.

10. My number 1 favorite pastime is probably spending time in nature and I’m almost always planning my next hike :D

^Wiliwilinui Ridge Trail on Oahu

I was going down but I was doing it with you

2025-02-21 permalink

I read through some of my old posts from last year. I wrote a lot about being burnt out. I read and I thought, “Gaaaah, rest bitch!!”. So I decided that I will now be a frivolous woman who reads books and goes to parties.

Currently, I am reading Water Moon by Samantha Sotto Yambao. It’s kinda silly but really cute and whimsical. I would recommend it to anyone who likes Studio Ghibli or the unpredictability of the spirit world in Avatar: The Last Airbender.

And this is me at a party last week:

It was my friend Sica’s birthday party HAPPY BIRTHDAY SICA!!!!

We played a weird game called Tokyo Highway.

It did actually start to look kind of like Tokyo after a while, haha.

I was really excited to see physical newspapers thrown on people’s driveways. For some reason it had not occurred to me that that’s still a thing.

What else?

I have spent a significant amount of time crying over all the national park workers that have been fired. I always meant for this blog to just be a little thing I did for fun and creativity, and never had the intention nor the desire to write about politics. But some things just cut too deep. There are very few things in this world I love as much as the US national parks. And once they’re gone, they’re gone. Fragile ecosystems that would take hundreds of years to recover. This all feels like a cruel joke.

I’ve been thinking a lot about elementary school lately. Before I was overworked and fragile, before I even knew what national parks were, or had ever had to care about politics. I played video games at my friend’s house. I read Eragon, Harry Potter, Dragonkeeper… Wrote stories about a tomato named Tomato. Spent recess on the swings. It was simple. It was fun. I was strong, I was healthy.

What the fuck happened?

How did that happy kid end up this worn out and fragile? How did the world become this dark and scary since then?

Zelda. Dead or Alive. Super Smash Bros. Potter Puppet Pals. That weird internet game where you drew lines a guy went down on a sled. A swing that was actually a dragon named Everest. The package of butter that was a dragon egg hahahah omg.

I did my favorite trail in LA earlier this week. I’ve mentioned it before. Fryman Canyon trail in Wilacre Park. There isn’t really anything that special about it. It’s easy. The views are alright. There’s always a bunch of fit people there working out. I just like it. It’s simple. It’s ordinary.

It got chilly as it got darker outside.

I went to Malibu Creek State Park yesterday. There was barely anyone else there. The wind was soft and kind. It was so peaceful. I did the Malibu Lake trail, but turned back before I reached the lake, cause I was starting to feel uneasy about being all alone in the wild with no one else around. There were lots of little side trails to explore on the way back.

I sat on a rock. No cell signal. I heard the stream babbling, frogs croaking. I saw the birds in the sky, the sun against the rocks. A child was playing on the bank of the creek. I was there by myself. No one was nagging me that they wanted to leave. It was nice. It was so nice.

I found some plastic garbage someone had left behind. I picked it up and put it in my pocket. A tiny thing, but at least I did one thing.