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[Pollen] #2 - Oh, to be strong like a beetle

Excerpts, notes, and seedlings from the garden

July 31, 2026·on Substack

Is this making sense to you?

Doodle (04/2025)

Golden Dragon Review

I had not eaten all day, and it was already past the time when everything food related closes here on a weekday in Raleigh (leaving only the Cookout/McDonald’s-like options, which I was not quite in the mood for). On a bit of a tight budget and fighting the laziness of a Wednesday night, I reminisced on similar nights from my freshman year of college, when the dining halls had closed, and I needed a break from my studio work.

Back in the days before grand changes, like the Raisin Cane’s opening or that new glass building in the brickyard. Back when campus felt infinite, and I was certain I would never change, that I was final. In those days around this hour, facing my future and just as hungry as I was earlier today, I would frequent Golden Dragon. I would typically go alone. I liked to eat my meal listening to music in a space away from people.

It has been around three and a half years since I last ate here. Maybe four? How wrong I was, yet how incredibly certain and proud. I am nothing like I was back then, but it takes liminal places like these for one to realize what a strange thing it is to change. I wonder if Proust felt something similar over a spoonful of tea-soaked cake; he never had lo mein this good.

I ordered the same dish as I routinely did back then—the chicken lo mein—and for a moment I felt just as sure as before that I am done growing, that I will be young forever. The kind man at the counter took my order diligently, same as he always would no matter how late I came through that door. I wondered if he recognized me, if he was surprised at how different my face looked. It’s as if he had been standing there the whole time I had been gone looking for myself, waiting by the register while the phone rang in the background.

It was empty, I had come in near closing time. Since I came to school here, everyone I knew overlooked Golden Dragon. It’s as if it blended right into the wall of Hillsborough Street, like some strange optical illusion. Unlike them, I found it comforting. Dependable. It didn’t change when everything around me did. It stayed consistent when everything about me didn’t.

I brought my crossword puzzle book with me to solve while I quietly enjoyed my meal at one of the booths, undisturbed by the doubts and questions of the world outside the glass doors. As I worked on the first puzzle, a man came in seemingly frustrated. He appeared tired and irritated, stepping slightly loud and glancing around. I buried my head in my food, hoping to blend in with the orange wall. He turned to me and called me out, so I took my headphones out.

“What is that?” he asked me politely. I responded to him with a shy smile, and he told me it looked good. The man at the counter agreed with me, and we all chuckled when he decided to order it for himself. He thanked the worker when he left and said goodbye to me and another customer who had come in a couple of minutes after him. I hope he enjoyed the chicken lo mein as much as I did.

Another customer came in later with a strange attitude, questioning the worker if he had been the one that had spoken with him on the phone. After some confusion, he confirmed it was him. I felt nervous, since this is not typically a great question to be faced with in food service. The man then said, “Perfect, I want to tip you with my order.” What an interesting guy.

By this point, the floors were being mopped and I had finished my meal. I closed my crossword book, cleaned up, and opened my fortune cookie. I thought about all the Golden Dragon fortunes that came true without me even knowing it. The cookie this time said, “You will soon have the opportunity to improve your finances.”

Places like Golden Dragon don’t try to impress you. They don’t even try to change. Golden Dragon teaches you to judge on more than appearance. It welcomes you in with familiarity, with humility, and asks, “how have you been since you last needed me?” I shared a fulfilling meal at an affordable price with a version of me I have forgotten in the quietness of a Wednesday night.

4 stars only because I was a little bit hot.

Beetle (9/21/2025)

seeds & plants

just because a seed
turns into a plant
doesn't mean it's not a flower

Q61L

I had never seen walls so white. The entire room felt like it was slowly fading away, erasing all of us from existence. The buzzing of the artificial lights became my past and the cracks on the wall blended into a calm nothingness. When I blinked, I watched the pattern of the plaster appear behind my eyelids like lightning forming between clouds.

When I opened them, I smelled the day I played in the snow for the first time. The mask on my face felt colder, and my glasses fogged up. The waiting room felt forgotten, as if it was sanitized entirely from the laws of time and space.

There was a family in the chairs in front of us who opted to appreciate the ceiling instead. When I looked up, they looked down. When I looked down, they looked up. All except for the elderly man, who stared straight ahead at me. He wiggled in discomfort irregularly, but his gaze never left the room. If it weren’t for the windows above him, I would have believed we were lost souls in purgatory, awaiting reason for the rest of time.

Hidden under the drone of electricity, I enjoyed the quiet conversation between the other group in the waiting area. They were whispering to each other, like ancient alchemists discussing magic.

“How are you?” I turned to face the murmur. She was still fidgeting with the small ticket. I shrugged, and she squinted; the masks make you realize just how expressive eyes can be.

Nice to meet you…

There’s something so interesting about seeing someone you haven’t spoken to in a while again. There is a hesitancy, a quiet acknowledgement of the invisible change that you both have gone through since the last time. A momentary acceptance that the version of them you knew is being replaced.