Thoughts from Beijing

I've just came back to Eugene on Sunday. I'm still dealing with jet-leg, but it's not too bad. Here's some writing I did when I was at home, mostly depressing (I basically write only when I'm depressed, hehehe...). Maybe some words sound too harsh. It's not what I really mean to say. I was in a very bad mood. Anyways, enjoy...


Prediction
08/29/2006 4:52pm

The show of my family has never stopped. I assume a big show is coming up soon. I heard that this time, it would be a big production with a fantastic team of actor and actress. Even though the posters haven’t been published, some rumors have been passed out. People said the show would be as powerful as hurricane and earthquake. Today, when I was walking on the street, I heard the leading actors practicing on the 5th floor. I didn’t want to disturb them, so I stood down stairs to listen. The theme is basic about a family of three. The father works at a place far away from home. The mother always fights with him because she thought he couldn’t take care of the family. The daughter just came home from another far away country. She visits home every summer. Since the family is always “on fire”, no one wants to be together with each other. The mother warns if father comes home, she’ll disappear and never come back. The father shout that he doesn’t care, he just wants to spend some time with the daughter. On the other hand, the daughter is on the edge of turning crazing. All she wants to do is to run away from her parents. But she also understands if she breaks up the relationship with her family, her life would be very difficult in the future. So, the three of them play a very complicated game with each other. Each with a different purpose in their twisting heart, no one knows who will be the next winner. Maybe all of them will be destroyed.

That’s the story of my family. When I came home from my grandparents’ place, I heard my mom yelling on the phone to my dad. Our downstairs neighbors probably heard the fight too, because they turned up their TV volume really loud. Mom said if Dad comes home to see us, she’d kill herself. I could probably understand that since I truly believe that they don’t fit together. But there’s something she said that really hurt me. She thinks Dad not coming back to see me off at the airport wouldn’t be a problem. She still sees me as a child, and child doesn’t have heart-breaking problems. I was standing outside our door and listening to her “great speech”. I really wanted to kick open the door and grab her head to knock it on the wall like how it appeared in my dreams. There could never been a person who’s more selfish then her. Why she doesn’t understand that, because of her, more than five years of fear and hate has been planted deeply in my mind. My biggest wish is to make her disappear. No matter how well she acts in front of me, she still discus me. I’m sorry, Mom, I hate you.

I start to realize I don’t know my dad at all. What is he thinking? What’s his plan? Is he on the right track of what he’s doing right now? Even though I don’t want to think about this, but will he be able to support me financially till I graduate from college? I feel my life is always in control of someone else. I have no idea what’s going to happen to it. I know that my thought is very narrow minded, but I have to make a lot of money in the future. That way I can make a lot of people shut up and get out of my life.




My Old Piano
08/26/2006 7:10pm

It took me a lot of effort to uncover my old piano and played it again. The sound of the piano was really ugly. Even though the keys are just slightly out of tune, it feels like they are trying to saw my ears off like sharp knives. I didn’t want to play my old piano at first. I was afraid it would ruin my beautiful memory of my childhood with the piano. I spent so much time with it when I was a little girl. To me, it was my best friend who understands me the most. But finally I played it, because I know that I have to admit to the fact that things change through time. No, I should say, I’ve changed too much. It’s impossible to avoid growing up. The piano is still the same old one. It has always been slightly out of tune. But I’ve played much better ones, like a 9 feet grand piano. It’s painful to see my most precious thing is no longer attractive to me. My piano still shines in my memory, but I need to turn to a new page and look for new values in my life.

I like to go through old stuffs. I don’t know why I’m attracted to history and memories so much. I went through the old pictures of my family again. A lot of people on the picture are no longer in this living world. But they still look so real on the picture. Sometime I wish time would freeze at one moment forever. But I have so many moment I want to keep fresh, such as when my mom took the 3-year-old me out to the park downstairs to enjoy the afternoon sunshine in winter, or when the audience claps for me after my piano performance, and maybe when I fell asleep in the arms of my someone while we watch movies on Friday nights.

我想我可能是一个很胆小的人。不然为什么会如此依恋回忆呢？也许我是因为害怕未来太多的变数才变得多虑和抑郁。只有记忆是无法改变的，是安全与准确的。我很想知道神为什么赐予我这样一个敏感又不自信的灵魂，在他刚刚创造我的时候似乎并不满意他的手笔，我生长得过于快乐了，于是他又特意为我量身定做了很多“磨难”，使我终于成为现在这个样子，我想他应该也是终于满意了吧。。。可是神哪，你知道我有多想像正常人一样自由的生活吗？我只想用简单的眼光来看待这个世界，然后勇敢的去做我想做的事情。我只怕我的“深思熟虑”有一天会毁了我的。你究竟是安排了怎样的生命给我呢？

I have a lot of “instant thoughts”. But I’m not fast enough to write it down or tell someone else. Maybe only God knows what I’m thinking. I believe he will guide me safely through my life.



Away From My world
08/15/06 4:09pm

People always say that home is the most important place for everyone. We call those who wonder around streets with a “need help” sign “homeless” people, but never “ houseless”. According to my Human Context professor, home is a complicated term. It’s not just a place for us to stay. Our memories, emotions, in general our lives started from home and hopefully will end at home as well.

Home is a place you feel most comfortable with and where your heart would be. It doesn’t have to include family sometimes. Time passes and people change. I realize when I come back to visit that hometown is no longer my home anymore. Even though two year is not a long time, but it feels like that I’ve been away for centuries. The houses and trees are still the same. People gather under shades and play mahjong like they always do. But I see different things. I smell gunpowder in the air every second. People seem like they can’t live without hating each other. Maybe it’s just how their world works. But I don’t belong there and I will never understand the logic of it.

My someone always say that it’s a good thing for me to be with my family for a while. But really, I’m just doing my responsibility, like how he does it. Chinese are always proud of our culture that we are strongly bounded to our family. But I feel most of the time that the bound isn’t from our heart. It’s more of a prison of our tradition where we lock ourselves in. If you ask a Chinese why he loves his family, he would say, “because he’s my father and she’s my mother”. That isn’t love. That’s just a responsibility, a payback of our dept.

I used to love my family very much, so much that I can’t even describe with words. After all these years of fighting and quarrelling, I feel live has played a big joke with me. I woke up from my dream and realized that everything is so far away from what I used to believe. I know if my parents, especially my dad know what I’m thinking, his heart will break into pieces. But I can’t live for others. Nothing is perfect. I can’t avoid disappointing people sometimes. Unfortunately, my family might be the people who disappoint the most.

Life is so interesting. As I’m typing this page, my parents are sitting next to me and watching TV. They would probably never understand what I’m thinking. I don’t want them to know about it either, because it’s like a bomb we plant together. If it goes off one day, the power would be even stronger than those planted on the airplane going to the States. I don’t want to be the trigger of this bomb that can go off anytime. I wish I were waken up a little earlier from my dream. Then I wouldn’t be so confused about what’s happening to me but so clear about what I’m doing right now.

To my special someone, I miss you. I wish tomorrow when I open my eyes, I would be in your arms again. Are you missing me? Would you dream about me sometimes? I need your help to calm me down and support me. I promise I won’t hurt myself again. Please wait for me to go back and face this strange world together.

Lord, please be my guide and keep me safe.