I decided to skip my usual lunch today and instead take a short cherry blossom walk on my way to the station, accompanied by my wife and Anne. With rain forecast for the next few days, it may well be the kind of rain that scatters the blossoms.
Cherry blossoms are, without question, both beautiful and fleeting.
Even though I remind myself of this every year, once the petals are gone, I seem to forget it all over again.
As we approached the second torii gate along the dankazura of Tsurugaoka Hachimangu, I began to feel raindrops on my cheek. I wondered whether my wife and Anne made it home without getting too wet.
The situation in the Middle East remains uncertain.
There was a time when U.S. intervention could bring a certain level of resolution, but today conflicts have grown far more complex, and quick conclusions are no longer possible.
Information flows from all sides, yet what is true is difficult to discern.
Thousands of lives have already been lost in Iran. These are lives that should never have been lost.
The same tragedy continues in Ukraine and Gaza.
Perhaps those we call “leaders” do not act solely out of their own will.
Various forces accumulate, becoming a pressure that is ultimately impossible to resist, leading to the final decision.
Whatever name we give to that structure, similar forces seem to exist everywhere, each moving in pursuit of its own interests.
And yet, the weight of the lives lost behind all of this is immeasurable.
Thinking about it, I cannot help but feel how difficult it is for human beings to make truly independent decisions.
At times, I even find myself wondering whether it might be better to entrust such decisions to something other than humans. But, of course, things are not so simple.
If only we could live like cherry blossoms—simply blooming, and simply falling.
But reality is not that simple.
Watching the first petals begin to scatter, I find myself feeling a quiet, lingering sadness.
Even in full bloom, the world does not feel entirely bright.
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