life is a garden ➿ and the roots are all touching
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oct 6, 2025
on my lonely!
last week i was asked if growth felt lonely. i thought about it. the question was so direct it threw me off.
1) i realized growth was sometimes really lonely!
2) i was shocked by the realization!
3) i felt relieved to place the looming melancholy i felt into a definition-container of loneliness!
4) i felt at a loss about what to do!
5) i realized i couldn’t do anything about it, that the only way was through!
i started wondering if maybe lonely wasn’t the right word. isolated? forlorn? i couldn’t figure it out.
i understand art and music best when i can’t find the right words. people are pushed to make things when we can’t quite find the language.
every fall i always return to duster’s stratosphere album in full and a playlist of the same five sad songs:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
“lonely” is a sentiment familiar, often felt as i sat in my various childhood bedrooms, holding feelings of wanting-to-be-somewhere-but-not-knowing-where-to-go. i didn’t even know where i could go; that was yearing. i know the word for that now.
an over-emphasis on identity discourse in the 2010’s led me to believe that this loneliness came from migration trauma, that immigration and it’s effects were central to my narrative. though migration is a part of my story, an undeniably foundational event in the formation of my psyche, i never felt it captured my feelings in full. i knew a ton of kids that had also come from japan to hawai’i. i felt distance from their stories, their lives. i didn’t even feel the same as them, really.
things i considered as contributions to my “loneliness”:
and as much as these things are probably true, i think as more time goes on... i find that the “loneliness” comes when...
★ i feel distance between a truth i am exploring and the built enviornment around me
★ i feel the resistance from what i seek + dream to build with the systems already in place
i think it is okay to feel lonely sometimes, as long as you remember you aren’t alone in these feelings.
i don’t feel as overwhelmingly lonely in petty ways as i once did. i’ve stopped equating being alone to loneliness a decade ago. i turned my view outwards, outside of my self, and that did wonders! as i express often, i feel connected to things: i feel connected to humanity and the natural world. i reach out instead of wallowing, i make and move when i feel stuck. i live best in a flow. though, sometimes, i just can’t help but to feel it.
i feel lonely when i am exploring new ways of being. i feel lonely when i want to show love to someone who is overly cautious. i feel lonely when i am being overly cautious. i feel lonely when i leave desires unfulfilled. i feel lonely when i am growing into a new self. i feel lonely when i trust myself in a decision i’ve never made before.
lonely happens when i want to make sense of something that can only be defined retrospectively. everything needs time.
dokusho, dokushi
we are born alone, die alone
do bugs get lonely? i used to often wonder as a child. i’d see an ant walking alone, a distance unfathomable to my large-in-comparision bipedal body. i’d wonder where it’s family was and if they knew how to get back.
i put my stuffed animals together in groups and pairs because i didn’t want any of them to feel lonely. i now understand this as a projection of my own loneliness. i didn’t want anyone or anything, alive or not, to feel the way i did.
i support the dreams of others because i know how lonely it can be to have one. i know how isolating it can be to have an artistic practice that you have to be accountable for. you move through the world in a way that makes little sense to most: you have to say no to things, be disciplined, say yes to things that feel questionable to others, and ultimately, trust your gut in a world that wants to delude you in a belief that there is a Right Way To Do Things.
realizing your dreams can bring up feelings of loss. growing into the person you want to be can mean growing apart from friends you’ve always known, growing apart from a version of you that others have come to love. this can bring up feelings of betrayal from others who cannot metabolize your growth. walking on a new path means departing from an old one, mourning the future you had built up in your head; maybe it wasn’t as good as the one you’re building now, but that doesn’t make it any less disorienting.
loss is complicated and i’ve had a lot of it. i intellectually understand it’s weight and the grief. i know we are losing things we don’t even realize on the daily. it is different when you tangibily see it; i have become acutely aware of this loss in recent weeks. this weight brings discomfort, like rocks in my chest.
i am standing on a road i’ve been walking for a while now, one that i have been walking without really looking back. i realize my legs are tired, that i need to rest, so i take a seat. i am sat and looking at the distance i’ve come. the road is the same but the town unrecognizable. even the air feels different from all that i’ve known. i am seated and noticing things for the first time, noticing how long my hair has gotten, my nails. a new freckle appears on my arm. i notice the soles of my shoes worn, fades in my jeans that weren’t there before. i am seated and am far from where i started. i cannot see the old town i came from, and thank god, because if i could see it, i might have walked back.
on my lonely!
last week i was asked if growth felt lonely. i thought about it. the question was so direct it threw me off.
1) i realized growth was sometimes really lonely!
2) i was shocked by the realization!
3) i felt relieved to place the looming melancholy i felt into a definition-container of loneliness!
4) i felt at a loss about what to do!
5) i realized i couldn’t do anything about it, that the only way was through!
i started wondering if maybe lonely wasn’t the right word. isolated? forlorn? i couldn’t figure it out.
i understand art and music best when i can’t find the right words. people are pushed to make things when we can’t quite find the language.
every fall i always return to duster’s stratosphere album in full and a playlist of the same five sad songs:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
“lonely” is a sentiment familiar, often felt as i sat in my various childhood bedrooms, holding feelings of wanting-to-be-somewhere-but-not-knowing-where-to-go. i didn’t even know where i could go; that was yearing. i know the word for that now.
an over-emphasis on identity discourse in the 2010’s led me to believe that this loneliness came from migration trauma, that immigration and it’s effects were central to my narrative. though migration is a part of my story, an undeniably foundational event in the formation of my psyche, i never felt it captured my feelings in full. i knew a ton of kids that had also come from japan to hawai’i. i felt distance from their stories, their lives. i didn’t even feel the same as them, really.
things i considered as contributions to my “loneliness”:
- frequent moving, placelessness
- absent fathers: did it matter if i was in their lives or not?
- migration, multiculturalism
- queerness, not orienting to exclusively girlhood or boyhood
- listening to emo music in the tropics
- just generally being fifteen years old
- wanting to wear Big Pant when everyone was still wearing Skinny Pant
- other important and dumb shit
and as much as these things are probably true, i think as more time goes on... i find that the “loneliness” comes when...
★ i feel distance between a truth i am exploring and the built enviornment around me
★ i feel the resistance from what i seek + dream to build with the systems already in place
i think it is okay to feel lonely sometimes, as long as you remember you aren’t alone in these feelings.
i don’t feel as overwhelmingly lonely in petty ways as i once did. i’ve stopped equating being alone to loneliness a decade ago. i turned my view outwards, outside of my self, and that did wonders! as i express often, i feel connected to things: i feel connected to humanity and the natural world. i reach out instead of wallowing, i make and move when i feel stuck. i live best in a flow. though, sometimes, i just can’t help but to feel it.
i feel lonely when i am exploring new ways of being. i feel lonely when i want to show love to someone who is overly cautious. i feel lonely when i am being overly cautious. i feel lonely when i leave desires unfulfilled. i feel lonely when i am growing into a new self. i feel lonely when i trust myself in a decision i’ve never made before.
lonely happens when i want to make sense of something that can only be defined retrospectively. everything needs time.
dokusho, dokushi
we are born alone, die alone
do bugs get lonely? i used to often wonder as a child. i’d see an ant walking alone, a distance unfathomable to my large-in-comparision bipedal body. i’d wonder where it’s family was and if they knew how to get back.
i put my stuffed animals together in groups and pairs because i didn’t want any of them to feel lonely. i now understand this as a projection of my own loneliness. i didn’t want anyone or anything, alive or not, to feel the way i did.
i support the dreams of others because i know how lonely it can be to have one. i know how isolating it can be to have an artistic practice that you have to be accountable for. you move through the world in a way that makes little sense to most: you have to say no to things, be disciplined, say yes to things that feel questionable to others, and ultimately, trust your gut in a world that wants to delude you in a belief that there is a Right Way To Do Things.
realizing your dreams can bring up feelings of loss. growing into the person you want to be can mean growing apart from friends you’ve always known, growing apart from a version of you that others have come to love. this can bring up feelings of betrayal from others who cannot metabolize your growth. walking on a new path means departing from an old one, mourning the future you had built up in your head; maybe it wasn’t as good as the one you’re building now, but that doesn’t make it any less disorienting.
loss is complicated and i’ve had a lot of it. i intellectually understand it’s weight and the grief. i know we are losing things we don’t even realize on the daily. it is different when you tangibily see it; i have become acutely aware of this loss in recent weeks. this weight brings discomfort, like rocks in my chest.
i am standing on a road i’ve been walking for a while now, one that i have been walking without really looking back. i realize my legs are tired, that i need to rest, so i take a seat. i am sat and looking at the distance i’ve come. the road is the same but the town unrecognizable. even the air feels different from all that i’ve known. i am seated and noticing things for the first time, noticing how long my hair has gotten, my nails. a new freckle appears on my arm. i notice the soles of my shoes worn, fades in my jeans that weren’t there before. i am seated and am far from where i started. i cannot see the old town i came from, and thank god, because if i could see it, i might have walked back.
as always, email me with thoughts:
ayaka333takao@gmail.com
ayaka333takao@gmail.com
last edited 10/6/25