Novel, money, music, coca cola, humanity, Razer Blade laptop, if, for a moment of time they exist, they're eternal. But what's everything opposed to what I see and smell and perceive, who I am but a manifestation of law? Questions, I've always had questions. At the first year of middle school, I encountered a girl called Jiangnan. She uses a peculiar type of medication to regulate her period. I fell in love with her. Lying in the bed of my now demolished home, I wondered what she's thinking. Is it about me? Does she love me? Oh acnes I must tackle. Will she let me take picture of her with my long lost Symbian Sony Ericsson smartphone? But as soon as she confide to me that she too has a crush on me, why the hell did I so ruthlessly deleted everything about her? She told me what I won't be loving her after graduation. She's right, the pursuit itself is everything I've ever desired. I'm accused of being an introvert, a desperate weirdo, the most handsome person in class no.4. But that all has passed. Like my sister, like her daughter, like her granddaughter who may or may not exist; like Symbian and her; like the books I read and the words I write; like me.
Although I notice drastic difference between how do I look now and how did I look like in the photograph, I did not, ever witness how it actually changes. I replicate and savor, and sadly notice the remote distinction of life. The floor cracks when my mom walks on it; the floor cracks when I walk on it. Yet it doesn't know a thing, nor does a pair of slippers - a slightly curved surface when they're bought, and the wide circle they're now. Nothing in life is more or less real by having been well portrayed. They're equally real, and unreal.
People don't like bankruptcy. When I first hear that one of my will-be colleges is in danger of going bankrupt, I wavered. But the wonton shop between the back door of my primary school and my grandma's house was closed 2 or 3 years ago. The owner moved to a new place in Hangzhou to continue her business. To me, it means the wonton shop is bankrupt. She used to say that my mom started to eat there before I was born and even during when I was in a uterus. The tie between her and my family seems strong. A mutual friendliness, no, something more than just friendliness occur whenever I grab a coin and a grandma to patronize. But she's gone. And I'm sure as hell for the rest of my life I won't be seeing her at all. She's great. She's got dedicated extracurriculars, she should go to Harvard. And the flair at another wonton shop, has even begun to intimidate me. My 80-year-old grandma brought me there, at the corner of an old street, to eat her favorite dish. She's 80 and got daughters making tons of money. And all she can think of during a day is a bowl of wonton, cost 2 yuan 5 years ago, and 12 now. She appears totally socialist in an increasingly capitalist city. She didn't resist, she acknowledged that she'll be outdated eventually. She doesn't need sympathy. She likes congee and wonton and chitchat, and I give her sympathy. I'm the misfit, not her.
