Be happy, if not, be crazy Be happy, if not, be crazy

AI-generated translation.

Around the middle of the year, I thought this would be my year of exes: my ex department, ex team, ex boss O, and ex S. Later, reality proved that I had been too pessimistic. Heaven is still fair, after all: if it trips you in one area, it will compensate you in another.

Just as I never imagined I would get caught in what was said to be the biggest reorganization in twenty years, I also never imagined that Boss O would pull off a dramatic reversal at the very last moment — just when everyone thought he would stay, he decided to leave with us. It was early September in Miyun. After we came down from a hike, he sent the rest of us back to our rooms and kept only the DM people behind to say something. Devi and I felt sourly excluded, until AGL pushed open the door with red eyes and said, “Ruixin, I’m jealous of you. He’s going with your group.” For a moment I thought I had heard wrong. Then once I realized it was true, I almost became jealous of myself. That night we drank in a pavilion on the mountaintop. Fireflies flickered in and out of the bushes around us. The girls from DM cried so hard. AGL said, “Even though I’ve never had my heart broken, I feel like I’m going through a breakup right now.”

I think I could understand how she felt. Some things may be expected, but when they actually arrive all at once, they can still catch you off guard. I have always believed that as long as two people do not differ too much in their basic worldview, affection will naturally grow if they spend enough time together. But there are only so many years in a lifetime; whether you get the chance to spend that much time with someone depends on fate. I always felt that S and I had a lot of fate between us — otherwise how could we have had so many intersections over the last nine years? But recently I began to suspect that what had accumulated over those years was perhaps only habit rather than love. Otherwise, ten thousand reasons not to would never outweigh one simple “I want to.”

I was discussing this idea with MJ while we were walking on Xikang Road in Tianjin. He has read essays for more than ten years and has always dreamed of visiting Baihua Literature and Art Publishing House in Tianjin. He said that now he no longer likes the content in those books as much as before, but still persists out of habit. I said then what is the point? If it is a habit you no longer like, you might as well stop.

I told him about all the places I had been that year: Tianjin in April, Anhui in May, Seattle in July, Qingdao in August, Miyun and Tibet in September, Jinan in October, Bo’ao in November, Singapore in December, and Bangkok in January. After hearing that, he said, “You can’t go on like this. It’s too crazy.” “I don’t want to either…” Before I could finish, he went on earnestly: “I understand. I know you’re hurting. But there are some things you can’t avoid. You have to go through both the good and the bad. You should give yourself some time to quiet down and do some things properly and completely…” After returning from Oxford, he had become much gentler and not nearly as easily irritated as before. On the contrary, I had become the one who would slam down the conversation and walk off whenever things did not click — usually on topics related to marriage — and somehow every conversation between us would unconsciously converge there, so I became irritable more and more often.

Later I reflected that the reason I did not dare talk about marriage and children was that the whole thing felt impossibly difficult — harder than training my abs or holding a cello recital. Only then did I realize the aftereffects of dropping old habits had started to show: I had become deeply insecure. ZB seemed to have noticed long ago, and for a while he kept telling me: You are good. Don’t rush. If it isn’t the right person, two people can be lonelier than one. And then there was Uncle AC. When I said “I feel I am not good enough,” he shot back, “no, you are too young to know yourself.” One night GR, who is religious, told Zhu-jiejie and me that God made every person different, and yet we have always been taught to be like everyone else. If you keep lacking confidence and always listening to others, how can you ever become yourself?

Another knot was my parents. Maotou said that seeing the relieved look on friends’ parents’ faces after they got married made him feel guilty, and I felt the same. A few days ago Meizha recommended a very touching post on the BYR forum called “After Writing These 100 Things.” A younger student from the class of 2006 wrote about the little details of life with her ex. The only thing that really pierced my heart was when she said that when they were together, her mother cried because she was afraid her daughter would suffer. Then when they broke up, her mother cried again and asked, “Is it really impossible now?” I told Meizha that sounded exactly like my mom — except that my mom would add one more line: “What can I do for you two?” Am I too sensitive? The moment I hear those words, I feel a deep ache. Breakups and reconciliations are normal, aren’t they? Why do you all get so emotionally invested that I end up feeling so uneasy and guilty? ZW is already the mother of two, with a harmonious family and a successful career. She told me she still has two recurring nightmares: one is not being able to finish reading before an exam, and the other is breaking up and sitting by the roadside worrying about how to explain it to her mother. You see, that kind of shadow follows a person for life. So even though I understand that their worry comes from love, I still deliberately avoid talking to them about these things. One time in winter, Boss O and I discussed whether people should lie. I said that sometimes white lies are necessary — for example, when my parents ask how I’ve been and I’m actually going through something difficult, I still say everything is fine, because even if I told them, there is nothing they could do except worry. He thought for a moment and said, “Well then you lose an opportunity to build a closer relationship with your parents.” I reflected on that and felt it was probably true. And besides, my little tricks are easy to see through, which only makes them worry more.

This year I started especially loving Li Zongsheng — yes, I am always late to these things. After going to hear him live at Capital Gym in winter, I came away feeling that older men can be unbelievably charming: relaxed, witty, completely at ease. Maotou corrected me by saying not all older men are like that, because that is Li Zongsheng. GR, who claims to have “listened to Li Zongsheng for a lifetime,” said that if you made a movie, you could play his songs from beginning to end, because every song is a story. I could not agree more. What’s the Logic of Love could practically serve as the summary of my year:

Actually, living alone isn’t all that bad Sometimes there’s just a little sadness I think others probably can’t even tell But loneliness really does make me ache Still, I try to make myself let go With you, I don’t know whether it has become habit or love The feelings I once insisted on Do they still remain? This season is clearly about to pass And my spring still hasn’t come Why don’t you just turn away And let me face the problem myself You try not to leave a trace As you tell me the logic of love The thing you think is worth striving for Is the distance between the two of us Oh, this season Has finally left me with something worth remembering

Over the past year I slowly found the rhythm of my own life, and learned to rest peacefully inside it. After all the sorrow, I believe even more firmly that the kind of person I am will determine the kind of person I will meet in the future.

And when I think carefully, there were still many moving things worth remembering: the wedding of Shizhang and Teacher Zhang, and all the little partners who helped prepare it; AGL, my soul mate, who criticized my lack of initiative; reunions with Qizi, GR, Long-jiejie, and Zhu-jiejie; Xiao Huiping suddenly exploding with energy after a madman stole our rice dumplings in Hongcun; Uncle AC constantly asking whether I was hungry whenever we traveled; the Virgo boys in Qingdao who nearly missed the train while carrying bags of beer; the driver at Namtso who still said he would cook something tasty for me even after I lost my temper; ZB and D waiting for me by the Golden Coast pool until the very end; YF taking me to a stripper club and telling me how he met Xiao D; splashing around with GR in the rooftop pool at night while listening to Li Zongsheng and making wishes on airplanes in the sky as if they were shooting stars; Addy’s arm reaching toward me when I was panicked underwater in Pattaya…

In the new year, I want to keep trying to become an interesting person. Besides continuing with running, cello, and abs — and hopefully finally making the skydive I failed to do this year — I also hope to have chances to go to new places and meet new people. And if not, that is okay too. The full set of Duku is already sitting on my desk. As long as my world can keep getting bigger before it begins to contract, that will be enough.