Spring is subtle in Los Angeles, but more noticeable in northern L.A. I think it’s because northern greater Los Angeles comprises the San Fernando and other landlocked limbs of our fair metropolis. This means that the climate is more like a desert - colder nights and mornings, violent winds and hot, dry days. In fact, I could feel the change in weather come on by the dryness of my hands. But I bikeride, which could a reason rather than a sympton.But spring is here, and it came on so quietly that I wouldn’t have noticed but for the sakura trees. Sakura, meaning cherry blossom trees in Japanese, bloom in the spring, and it was heartening to feel a change in weather by the measurement of a sakura’s blossoms.

How do I describe the magic of a sakura tree? They take your breath away, blend the line between eternity and mortality and are always surprising. Every year, they amaze, give hope, brush away the depression of winter and make the year seem really new. Brand new like little pink flowers clustered close on a brush, trying not to get shaken off by the wind. Yes, I’m a poet. How are you?

On Tuesday, a sakura tree surprised me with its existence by my office. I was walking during lunch, enjoying a very blue sky, a very green moutain line and then, suddenly! I was standing under a sakura tree. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to enjoy all its splendor so the very next day I took my lunch and had a little, solitary hanami of my own.

There is nothing more beautiful than a sakura tree against a vibrant, blue sky. That is, unless you count a sakura tree at night, lit by candlelight. Or, a sakura tree on a lukewarm day….. You get my meaning, I assume. But no matter what your reason is for sitting under a cherry blossom tree, in the end, they refresh, reenliven and wipe a slate clean. And this is why I have started my new blog today, under the blessing of spring.

I have long considered starting a professional, travel blog that skates the line between job and hobby. Let it’s grayness live long and happily. I have also long considered writing under a “professional name,” which is why friends will note that this blog is written under a pseudonym. I have my professional reasons: androgynous name, easier for readers to pronounce and etc. But I also find that writers like wearing a veil and staying hidden behind their work. I am not any different.

And really, that’s how I felt under the cherry blossom tree. My thoughts and me guarded in a falling veil of pink petals. Where was time? Where was my office? Was lunch over? Who knew. Who cared? I was starting anew.