This weekend I took a quick impromptu trip to Washington DC with my mom and sisters. We made it into a girls trip since my dad and brother couldn’t make it and unfortunately, the blooming of the cherry blossoms wait for no one. My friend Kerri lives in DC and said they were supposed to be in peak bloom through this weekend and by George, they were! We went at the perfect time too because she texted me today saying the rain just washed away a lot of the blooms this morning when she went down there for a walk. Originally we were going to visit during Easter weekend so it's a lucky thing we shifted our plans a few weeks earlier. We were also in luck because the weather this weekend was absolutely gorgeous! Perfect temps and beautiful sun.
I also stumbled upon and discovered the Cherry Blossom 10 Mile Run by accident while waking up early this past Sunday morning to get some cherry blossom photos in before the crowds got worse. My runner’s high is telling me to sign up for next year’s race. How beautiful would it be to run through all the blooms?! My mind is telling me yes but I’m sure I’ll file this under “Things I’ll Regret at 5am” while waiting for the race to start next year.
The last time my family and I were in DC together was almost 17 years ago. I remember my dad used to wake us up randomly at 5am and throw us in the car and not tell us where we were going. We’d sleep the whole way there and wake up around noon in DC. And then he’d make us walk all around the monuments and parks and trails. Again like most of my prior posts recollecting these memories, as a child, I didn’t appreciate any of this. As a kid, you’re like “WTH, why did you wake me up to go take pictures with flowers in a weird city so far away? I want to go back to bed.” But now I look back on the photos and am happy to have them.
It’s funny because in the movie Memoirs of a Geisha, there is a lesson about cherry blossoms and I feel like it rings so true.
I actually went to Japan two years ago to see the cherry blossoms but unfortunately they were not in bloom just yet when I went. Meanwhile in the past two years since, during the same time I went (end of March, beginning of April), they have been in full bloom! Watch, the next time I try to visit for cherry blossoms again, it’ll bloom too early or too late for the dates I select. Unfortunately Japan is not something I can just jetset on a whim with my schedule where I currently work. BUT, for a more local trip, DC is the closest thing and much easier to run off to, even for a weekend.
But the point is, life can be as ephemeral and unpredictable as the cherry blossoms blooming. We must enjoy it and make the most out of it because in a blink of an eye, it can become nothing more than a dream. It serves as a reminder to not take life for granted. And to wait for nothing. And in the grander scheme of things, we must not waste our time waiting for things to come to us, but rather live it, with no regrets so we can say we lived life the best we can.
Of course, as a child you don't grasp this, hence I didn't appreciate the trips my parents made with us at the time. But as I get get older, I realize how much I didn't appreciate and now am making up for it. As a child, you think you have all the time in the world. You think you will live forever. How bittersweet to grow up and discover this is not the case.
As I grow older, I’ve been trying to spend more time with my family, sharing with them my favorite things and adventures. I'm trying to bridge my family time with my hobbies. I’m lucky in the essence that they’re very supportive of me, despite how different we are in style, taste, and personality. They’re also very patient and supportive of my modeling too, which I never expected but really appreciate that they do. They come with me to shoots, watch and hold my bags and fix my hair and other out of place details . Without question or even me having to ask. I always tell them feel free to wander off and do their own thing but they choose to wait patiently for me while I do my thing. It’s really sweet. It makes me really enjoy spending time with them when we do get the chance to sync all our schedules up. We’re trying to coordinate another family vacation together hopefully for next year.
My mom is funny too. Openly to us over the weekend, she complained of how much we made her walk through the National Mall and all the monuments. She’s got her own medical issues but she’s also not very active so the distance we walked was a little hard for her to keep up. But I also want her to get more active to improve her own health. I’ve actually been trying to get my entire family to take baby steps towards improving their overall health as well. But regardless of her complaints, she had a great time. How do I know this? As I fell asleep in my room in the hotel with my door closed, I could hear her in the common room area on the phone with her sisters. Asian moms will never tell you to your face what they think of you, for fear of blowing up your head. It’s also a ploy to try and keep you humble and grounded. You only find out how they really feel by what they say to other people. And she was bragging to her own sisters how proud she was of all her daughters. How we took her out this weekend and took care of everything for her and how she didn't have to pay for anything or lift a finger. After all those years of raising us, she felt she did something right in bringing up girls that care about each other and their mother, and still wanted to spend time with another. She was so happy about how we planned it all out and took care of the details. To my face, my mother only complains about how much of a disappointment I am to her, between my weight gains/losses, lack of a grand child for her and not growing up and being a proper adult, but behind my back my mom does take notice. She proudly shows our photos to her friends and family. She tells them about how well we take care of her. Even if she'll never say it to my face, I'll take it. I'm glad my mom is enjoying herself and her time with her kids. Despite how crazy she drives me sometimes, I enjoy showing her my world and providing her with new experiences. She worked hard all her life raising us and sacrificed so much so that her children would have a better life. So this is her time to just enjoy life.
And despite how old you get, there's still something new to see and explore and discover. My parents showed us as much of the world as they could as we grew up, so now I'm returning the favor with my siblings in bringing them to all new places for them to see and experience that they never got to do because they were too busy and selfless being parents and working hard to provide. My parents are not in the greatest shape either, with each having their own health issues that come with increasing age. So the time that we do get to spend with them, I truly cherish. You never know how much time is left with your loved ones, so don’t live as if you can put things off or wait around. Seize the moment, put in the time, invest in your loved ones so that you have the memories. I’m glad my parents did this for me as a child and I can only hope to return the love tenfold being their daughter.
Here’s to making new memories celebrating life, through new updated DC photos with my family.
