春分

Day and night level out again, around the twenty-first of March, and this one is also a public holiday. There is an お彼岸 here too — the same grave visiting you read about at the autumn equinox, six months and twelve chapters ago.

The difference is what everyone is actually watching.

前線 is the meteorological term for a weather front — the line on a map where one air mass meets another. Japan applies it to cherry blossom.

The 桜前線 is tracked and forecast like weather, because it behaves like weather: it starts in Kyushu in late March and moves north at roughly twenty kilometres a day, reaching Hokkaido in May. Broadcasters run nightly maps. People plan travel against it.

What's being forecast is a **week**. Cherry blossom is worth this much attention precisely because it doesn't last — full bloom to bare branches in about seven days, and one bad rain shortens it. The forecasting exists because missing it means missing it for a year.

The kana

Eight, and one pair worth pausing on.

**マ and ム** are two strokes each, and both are a corner with a line. マ's second stroke comes down through the corner; ム's runs along the bottom and flicks. If the shape closes at the bottom it's ム.

ミ is three simple strokes — much easier than み ever was. And モ is the same two-bars-and-a-hook idea as も, minus all the curve.