I Think I Stole a Little Joy in the Park

00:01 I heard this is the best time to see the cherry blossoms.

00:06 Actually,

00:10 I haven't gone to parks much lately.

00:12 But I wanted to see the blossoms,

00:15 so I made a trip to the park.

00:18 I didn't invite any friends, either.

00:21 I went by myself.

00:25 While I was wandering around the park,

00:29 I felt...

00:31 How do I put it?

00:33 I really don't have

00:37 enough words to describe

00:39 what I did during those few hours.

00:43 But some things I came across

00:46 made me want to say something about them.

00:50 For example, when I first went in,

00:52 I saw a fake dinosaur.

00:57 And that fake dinosaur

01:00 could move.

01:01 It also made dinosaur sounds.

01:05 I looked at it

01:07 and stared for a long time.

01:10 I don't know what I was staring at.

01:11 Maybe I was wondering,

01:13 how will it move next?

01:17 What sound will it make next?

01:20 And when the children nearby saw

01:23 the dinosaur hanging high in the air,

01:28 how would they act

01:31 as they observed this public display?

01:38 I didn't see that many children

01:41 staring at the dinosaur.

01:43 But there were some children

01:45 who pointed at it and told

01:47 their family all sorts of things.

01:52 Then,

01:54 as I walked through the park,

01:56 I noticed it had quite a few bridges.

01:59 But they didn't always lead anywhere.

02:02 I mean,

02:03 some led to places with no path.

02:07 I say there was no path

02:09 because when you tried to cross,

02:12 the way ahead was blocked.

02:14 You couldn't reach the next area.

02:17 So you could only stand on the bridge

02:20 and look at the view below,

02:23 or the scenery farther beyond it.

02:30 The park also had a Ferris wheel.

02:38 Seeing it reminded me of

02:42 a time back where I was born.

02:47 I went with friends

02:49 to another park, I think.

02:53 Actually, I probably wasn't with friends.

02:56 I was with the child of someone senior to me.

03:00 I took the child to ride the Ferris wheel.

03:05 At the time, I was very afraid of rides

03:10 that drop from high up in the air.

03:16 But we chose

03:19 a roller coaster,

03:21 so I went on it with him.

03:22 He really loved rides

03:25 like Ferris wheels or roller coasters.

03:29 Wait, no.

03:30 Oh, right.

03:31 He really wanted to ride

03:33 an exciting roller coaster.

03:35 But he was only eight years old,

03:39 so I couldn't let him go alone.

03:42 So

03:43 I went on it with him.

03:45 Luckily, that ride

03:48 wasn't especially intense.

03:51 It might have seemed intense locally.

03:54 But maybe because of

03:57 the local economy or development level,

04:01 or maybe something else,

04:02 anyway, compared with roller coasters

04:06 in other major cities,

04:07 that ride

04:08 really wasn't as intense.

04:10 It reminded me of my first roller coaster

04:15 with a friend in another city.

04:20 When I got off,

04:22 my head was spinning

04:23 and my legs were weak.

04:24 My friend helped me away from the seat.

04:28 When I reached somewhere I could sit,

04:33 I actually lay across a stone table,

04:36 or was it a stone bench?

04:38 for a very long time.

04:39 I was so dizzy.

04:42 You don't even want to use your phone.

04:44 You can only lie there, eyes closed, and rest.

04:49 Wow, that feeling really

04:52 stayed with me.

04:54 But while I was wandering in this park,

04:57 the Ferris wheel I saw

05:01 was there around sunset.

05:03 Behind the Ferris wheel,

05:05 there was a beautiful sunset.

05:07 So when you looked that way,

05:09 you just thought, wow.

05:13 How do I describe that feeling?

05:19 It felt joyful,

05:20 but not overwhelmingly so.

05:23 It was a calm kind of joy.

05:26 And in front of the Ferris wheel,

05:29 or really, in front of me, flowers covered the ground.

05:34 I forget if they were tulips.

05:38 I forgot.

05:40 Anyway, the flowers were before me,

05:42 and beyond them, the Ferris wheel turned.

05:46 Oh, when I mentioned the Ferris wheel,

05:49 I forgot something.

05:50 As for rides that spin in circles,

05:55 I'm very afraid of them.

05:56 Because I...

05:57 Maybe my cerebellum isn't developed or something,

05:59 but I can't go on rides that spin for a long time.

06:03 For example, if I just

06:05 spin around once for no reason,

06:07 I get dizzy too.

06:11 Maybe it has to do with how my body works.

06:14 I don't really know the details.

06:17 Then I came across another bridge,

06:21 one that I personally really liked.

06:24 It wasn't the bridge itself I liked,

06:26 but standing on it

06:30 and taking in the sunset,

06:33 along with the green trees

06:36 on both banks below.

06:39 The sun at the time

06:42 was about to set.

06:44 When the evening light fell on the water,

06:48 the colors on the water were beautiful.

06:52 And also,

06:54 because the sun hadn't

06:56 dropped completely below the horizon,

07:00 the trees along the banks

07:02 cast their reflections

07:04 onto the water.

07:07 When you photographed the reflections,

07:11 you could clearly see,

07:13 wow, those are trees.

07:16 But the resulting picture

07:18 looked almost like an oil painting.

07:21 When you looked at the photo, you thought,

07:25 this really looks like an oil painting.

07:28 And it was a photo of the trees' shadows.

07:33 There were also some tour boats

07:37 moving across the lake.

07:43 So I could capture

07:45 the angles among the boats, trees, and the two riverbanks,

07:52 or catch moments of symmetry,

07:54 to take something a little spontaneous,

08:00 an interesting photo.

08:02 And I felt

08:03 that in those moments on the bridge,

08:06 I was happy too.

08:08 That happiness didn't come from

08:10 having a friend beside you,

08:13 talking about everything before you,

08:17 or how you had composed a shot around

08:20 the boat, the light and shadows,

08:23 the distance between the riverbanks,

08:26 and the viewing angle,

08:28 waiting for the moving boat to bring it all together in a photo.

08:34 Or from showing them the photos you took.

08:37 It wasn't the joy of wanting to share.

08:40 It came from being in that setting

08:43 and thinking, wow, this is...

08:49 It felt like stolen happiness.

08:53 Then, as the sun gradually set,

08:59 I slowly reached the cherry blossoms.

09:03 Earlier in the daytime,

09:05 I'd also passed a grove of cherry trees.

09:08 But in that little grove,

09:11 there were so many people.

09:12 Almost everyone was taking pictures.

09:16 Some had even

09:18 put on full makeup

09:20 and come there almost as if

09:22 for a personal photo shoot.

09:30 Of course, I also saw people spread blankets on the ground,

09:35 sit there, and talk with others.

09:38 Next to that cherry grove,

09:40 there was also a little river.

09:43 Some people sat by it,

09:45 watching the water and talking.

09:49 Now, back to the cherry grove I passed

09:53 after the sun had set.

09:56 What surprised me most

09:58 in that cherry grove

10:02 was that the grove's

10:05 designers or managers

10:08 had put up some lights.

10:12 What kind of lights were they?

10:15 Electric lights?

10:17 Decorative lights?

10:18 Anyway, lights of that sort

10:21 hung from the cherry trees.

10:24 Against the night sky,

10:28 they glimmered.

10:32 The park staff had also hung

10:36 lanterns from the cherry trees,

10:40 along with wind chimes.

10:43 The lights

10:45 would come on for a while,

10:48 then go dark for a while.

10:52 And the wind chimes,

10:53 when the wind blew,

10:54 made a clear, beautiful sound.

10:59 So when you passed the cherry grove,

11:04 you saw the colors of the lights.

11:08 You saw the lanterns glowing.

11:11 You heard the wind chimes.

11:13 And you heard people in the distance.

11:19 Some were singing,

11:22 some were talking,

11:24 some were taking pictures,

11:25 and some were doing all sorts of things.

11:30 When you were in a place that seemed noisy

11:34 but somehow wasn't that noisy,

11:39 did you feel calm inside,

11:42 or did it feel loud?

11:44 I don't know.

11:45 But in that setting,

11:47 most of my attention

11:50 was drawn to the cherry trees, or the blossoms.

11:54 I thought

11:57 the wind chimes, the lights,

11:59 and the lanterns

12:01 were so, so beautiful,

12:04 especially at night.

12:09 When you took out your phone for a photo

12:14 and lowered its

12:17 light sensitivity,

12:19 the result looked really beautiful.

12:23 Then I came to a small path.

12:26 That path

12:30 had almost no lighting.

12:34 But on a path like that,

12:38 you didn't feel unsafe.

12:41 This was

12:43 a very, very large park.

12:45 When you suddenly came to

12:47 a stretch with no lights,

12:49 you didn't feel unsafe.

12:52 You just felt

12:55 as though everything was quiet

12:57 and you were all alone.

12:58 It felt very peaceful

13:01 and comfortable.

13:02 I don't know why.

13:04 Next, I passed through

13:06 a small, dense grove.

13:10 The park's managers seemed

13:13 to have turned that little grove into

13:18 something like a light and sound show.

13:21 There were specially designed lights

13:27 and sounds.

13:30 You could see the light

13:33 falling across the trunks and branches.

13:39 You could also hear

13:43 pleasant sounds.

13:45 Most of those sounds were music.

13:48 But with sound, light, and shadow

13:52 all coming together,

13:54 when you looked at the grove,

13:56 you just thought, wow,

13:59 this is really interesting.

14:04 At that point,

14:06 my whole trip through the park

14:09 was almost over.

14:11 By the time I left the park,

14:14 it was completely dark.

14:16 It was probably sometime after eight,

14:19 maybe close to nine,

14:24 or maybe after seven.

14:26 I forget.

14:26 Anyway, it was April.

14:35 I actually rerecorded this audio.

14:37 Near the beginning,

14:40 I may have said "recently."

14:42 But that "recently"

14:44 was actually quite a while ago.

14:47 Even so, when I think back,

14:49 many scenes still feel vivid

14:53 as they flash through my mind.

14:57 I may have said before

15:00 that many deep conversations

15:03 happen on benches in parks.

15:07 But I think

15:09 what I want to say now is

15:10 that many

15:14 less-than-deep conversations,

15:16 or conversations that don't need to be deep,

15:23 when they happen in a park,

15:26 can also bring a lot of happiness

15:29 and be very meaningful.

15:30 When your future self looks back

15:33 on that time,

15:36 it can still feel valuable and meaningful.

15:41 Just like when I think back on that time,

15:45 I think, wow,

15:47 I should make time soon

15:50 to take another walk in the park.