The wisdom of tree rings // BK Love Letter, October 2025

Greetings from the canyon, where the air is slowly shifting to a crisper and fresher whisper of autumn. We took a morning walk with Mango through the fog this morning. The mist was so heavy with moisture that it felt like I was swimming through an imaginary river. It was glorious:) Southern California’s season is not as evident as those in Japan or Germany, but if we stay in the stillness for a little while, the full expression of the evolving cycle is right in front of us.

After I shared the last month’s love letter, “Planner Season Reframed,” I received many lovely emails in response. Thank you for taking the time to write to me and share what was important to you. What stood out to me was our collective longing to truly experience the last few months of the year, rather than rushing through them. And I felt that too.

I am nearing the end of my current notebook, which I started using last December, right after the holiday. The pages are thick with months of writing, painting, collaging, and holding what felt important to me at each turn of my days this year. A few of the pages are tabbed with worn-out monthly index tabs, bent and soft from being shoved inside my Mini Shoulder Bag, which we co-designed with ateliers Penelope to accommodate the A5-size notebook just right (but clearly didn’t think of the extra space I needed for those poor monthly tabs). Accordion notebooks from two trips we took this year are glued inside, making the notebook extra thick. Even with a sturdy hardcover wrapped around it, the pages burst with my effort to capture and transform the invisible force of nuances, vignettes, and the witnesses of everyday life into something tangible that I can hold. Kids commented that if they look at my notebook from the side, the pages look like tree rings… and that is so true. Each page warped uniquely, yet in harmony with other pages - together they make a sturdy stump with beautiful tree rings.

There is a certain feeling that can only be felt when we nurture something over a long period of time - maybe similar to watching kids grow up? It is full of love, admiration, and bittersweet nostalgia, which also creeps in with the knowledge that everything will come to an end, generating a new cycle of growth. I hold a similar feeling when I pick up my nearly filled notebook. The outside cover is full of battle scars, coffee stains, and stickers I’ve collected from various places along the way, and inside is full of time-earned tender lessons. It started as a blank slate, just like any other brand-new notebook full of hopes and opportunities, and it now has its own personality and life with an inevitable “last page” to be filled in the near future. It is priceless.

It’s interesting to watch today’s culture, which often celebrates the newness of everything. We are bombarded with messages that acquiring the newest and looking the youngest is somehow a status symbol of our wealth, quickly forgetting and often dismissing the authentic inner beauty that comes with time. It is true that it takes patience to watch something grow. Having and using the same old thing might not feel as exciting as getting a new version that is shinier and screams with more features. But once we experience the joy of holding something that has the expression and wisdom of tree rings, literally or figuratively, I am pretty sure that it will be hard not to want to experience it again and again.

So many “yes’s” to sinking into the quieter and more introspective months of autumn and enjoying the truly unique view which we can only enjoy after walking the path we took this year, both inside the notebook and in the world around us.

We can’t buy time no matter how wealthy we are financially… but we can experience this moment if we choose to, wherever we are.

-wakako

always a metamorphosis in progress...

Topanga // October 7th, 2025

P.S. What is one old and wise object you have around you? If you feel open to sharing, please shoot me an email. I love hearing stories about artifacts with a story.