Prose

Everyday Book

Wen 丨 An Ning

A

It's still spring, and the weather is suddenly hot.

But when you're sitting in your room, it's still cool. Read by the window, I often wear a sweater, but also outside the thick coat, to sit. The sunshine all over the northern land, even the clouds seem to be afraid of heat, disappeared only some fuzzy edge. The poplar flakes were flying in the sky, and took advantage of the gaps between people's breaths, scrambling toward the nasal passages. The air became congested and dense for a while.

The flowers, a little less patient, stood lazily in the sun; if there had been a little shade, they would all have run over for a moment. Luckily, there is a wind, but the wind in the north of the border at this moment is also warm and sticky. When you walk on the road, you always hope that it will rain and filter out all the flakes from the air, leaving only the moist breath for you to breathe.

Although there is no rain, the sky is still a clear blue. Just far away from the edge of the sky is dense heat, sunlight, hot air constantly shaking, as if the furnace jumping flame in the endless burning.

Auntie was scrubbing in the kitchen, with an occasional cough or two. A bird stood in the sun-dappled elm tree outside the window and gave a hollow chirp toward the sky. The chirp about shook the clusters of clouds, so I turned around and another cluster changed in front of the window. They looked a little more ethereal than the previous ones, like juxtaposed honeysuckle flowers, stretching indefinitely in the clean air.

I was immersed in the undisturbed silence, and suddenly realized that such a beautiful moment was the eternal beauty I had been seeking. It has nothing to do with the size of the house, nothing to do with the judgment of outsiders, nothing to do with vanity and comparison, nothing to do with jealousy and calculation. It is only related to my inner peace. Like a river, no matter how many people have stopped for it, it only flows toward the far away and never stops. There is no sorrow or joy, it is an endless eternal emptiness. I was overwhelmed with happiness in my heart because of this moment of silence.

I think of a wild cat I saw in a large peach tree forest on the outskirts of the city, walking in the clearing between two rows of peach trees with its head held high, its fur shining in the sunlight leaking through the gaps between the trees. This large lush peach forest is like its kingdom, and the rows of peach trees are solemn soldiers' formations. The wind blew through the forest, the leaves clattered, like a soothing sonata. The wildcat walks alone like that, not caring about the clamor of the world, not caring about the cars whizzing by on the road, not caring about the prey, and not caring about tomorrow. In its noble soul, there is a free flowing river.

At that time, a heavy rain has just cleaned the whole world. The mountains are dense in the rain and mist, as if floating in the misty mid-air illusory castle. Near and far the trees, in the wet air, full of poetry and sadness, silent. I asked the driver of the car, the green color of the mountain, in the end, what kind of color? Answer: Cyan is a color between blue and black. I gazed out the window, suddenly want to become a deep green color, into the rolling hills.

As night fell, the city was covered in rain, and looked more and more quiet. The scent of flowers wafted through the air, and someone with an umbrella walked slowly along the road, in no hurry. The rain wet the girl's skirt and feet, street lamps cast a dim light, the girl's shadow fell on the gray brick floor, there is a love thin.

Another memory of an afternoon, standing by the window with a friend watching the rain. The rain pounded on the windows, making a snapping sound. The whole city was quietly bathed in rain. The hustle and bustle of the cars and horses was filtered by the rain and faded away, as if the sound was coming from the distant sky, where thick, dark clouds were surging. This is the vast sky of the northern border, where every cloud is close at hand and within reach.

My friend and I were gazing at the changing clouds while we were chatting. How many years do you have to travel in your life before you can meet someone who will gossip with you for a while, or someone who will watch the clouds together, or listen to the rain together, or ride a boat together, or take an umbrella together?

Perhaps it will be a long, long time. Maybe that person is always on the way.

Two

Noon, take Alsana to pay the heating bill.

The payment station was at the end of an old neighborhood nearby, so we walked down a long alley holding hands. There was no wind, the sun was bright and shining, and there was a comforting warmth on our shoulders. It was a weekend, and the nearby elementary school campus was empty, with not a single soul in sight. Almost all of the people I met in the alley were old people, with their hands behind their backs, hooking their waists, slowly wriggling in the sunlight, as if they were lazy cats. Stores are also sparsely populated, a stationery store, only an old woman to guard, Alsanne saw a glance at the door shelves full of a tank of colorful pinball, so excitedly walked in, let me use WeChat for a dollar coins, thrown in the slowly cranking handle, there will be a mysterious orange colored ball from the hole slipped out.

We also saw a small courtyard with a hidden door, and quietly opened the door and walked inside with our cats. No one was in the yard, only sunlight spilling over the tiny coffee table and wicker chairs. A sparrow hopped about on the wall. An old man's voice spoke from the room. We walked around and snuck out again, catlike, and brought the door shut silently.

Just outside, we saw an old man on a bicycle, carrying a glass case of sugarplums, pass us by.

Mom, sugarplums! Arsanne shouted at me.

The old man, obviously aware that a deal was about to be struck, gave a long, deliberate yell: "Sugar - gourd - roulade -

Hey, sugar gourd! I hesitated for a few seconds and shouted at his back.

The old man immediately stopped the car and watched us walk past with a smile. This time the payment was more convenient than buying pinball, and the business was completed by scanning the QR code directly against the glass case. The old man also carefully wrapped a napkin around the bamboo skewer of the candy cane and handed it to an excited Alsanne.

As we ate our sweet and sour candy canes, we walked slowly into the toll booth at the end of the alley. As soon as we entered, I suggested that in this day and age, you should pay your bills online for the convenience of your residents. A middle-aged man smiled and said: this large area of the old people live in the majority, we are in order to facilitate the use of the Internet will not be able to use them.

A few moments later, a middle-aged woman came in and chatted about how she planned to eat ribs for lunch today.

I listened to the joke: your family has money, now listen to who said eat ribs, I think this family has a good day.

Thinking about the recent soaring price of pork, prices soared, we all laughed.

Alsanne also watched curiously from across the room and laughed with us. Suddenly it seemed that this traditional face-to-face way of doing things had more warmth between people than the cold internet. Perhaps, all the old, old, slow way of life, has its own wonderful warmth.

After dinner, take Alsana downstairs for a walk. A building next to the neighborhood, said to be a high cadre building, a small garden on the first floor, race like a family than a family to talk about. Taking advantage of the night, Alxana and I pushed open the hidden doors one by one, and tiptoed in like cats, taking a look at the moonflowers still cowering in full bloom under the dim moonlight, and bending down to sniff the cold petals. The small onions, cabbages, cucumbers, and tomatoes, all already showing their decay in the fall. A tiny, unknown bug crawls quickly past our feet and disappears into the silence of the vegetable beds.

There was a family, with curtains drawn with rich flowers, sitting on the couch in the living room, watching TV. Like hosts, Alxana and I walked silently around their yard, enjoying the brand-new gym equipment one by one. The moon hung in the cool night sky, casting whirling shadows across the earth. The wind also painted in the moonlight, letting the dappled shadows of the trees fall on the old walls, the closed windows of the stores, the parked cars, and the blurred concrete floor. Everything is silent. The sound of children running in the wind is exceptionally clear, with the coolness of moonlight washing over them, slowly rippling out.

In one corner, Alsana and I found an ancient elm tree that had grown in a wall. About the master who built the wall also coveted its shade, and in the blazing sun suddenly moved with compassion, sandwiched it between the red bricks and concrete as part of a wall. So, it will be evenly sprinkled on both sides of the wall, turning itself into a surprising ink painting.

Mom, let's buy a first-floor house, too, and I'll have a little garden, like Grandma's home on the prairie, and we'll grow vegetables and flowers, and have a puppy and a kitten and rabbits, and at night we'll sit in the yard and watch the moon. After walking through these beautiful silent gardens one by one, Arshana said to me warmly.

Yes, in a few years we will buy a house with a garden too. For now, let's start by moving the weeds from the roadside into our vases. With that, I cut some dried dogwood, and from next to the trash can, I opened a bouquet of flowers that had been thrown away, and a still lush water hyacinth was waiting for us to take it home.

Three

Rarely look at the circle of friends, and even deliberately do not look, because it feels like a Pandora's box, every time you open to see the end of the original calm heart will be like a mess of hemp, trivial, vulgar, pulling not clear. Those who feel quite good in real life, either because of vanity, jealousy, or boredom, together with their own food, drink, daily whereabouts, complaining and whining, like a long-winded chatter pushed in front of you, feels like a disaster, can not avoid. I'd rather be quiet, bask in the sun, listen to the wind, look at the pedestrians, but do not want to be swept by the sea of "sun" and "show" swept and drowned.

Just a few moments ago, my friend took a screenshot of a woman's circle of friends that we *** with, and sent it to me. This is a real-life dress is very simple, appearance is even more common to let you simply can not remember the person. So much so that I just saw the photo sent by my friend and asked absently: who is this person? Bright-eyed, small and attractive, looks like some twenty-something small "Netflix".

I laughed and couldn't help but curse the person who created the beauty software, which allows a woman to wake up without washing her face, wrapped in a solid-colored old blanket, and shoot a face of style. In reality, the woman who sends excessive beauty photos, obviously has a crooked old lady's mouth, long unkempt hair in the dry hair, mixed with a little gray hair, dressed in a medium aesthetic, usually see each other, never want to look at more than a couple of eyes. But a few selfie photos, but directly to the five features are PS to family members do not know, pointed melon face, is the bright red cherry mouth, bright as a baby's eyes, pure as a young girl's smile, so that these photos also attracted her ex-husband's curiosity, asked if she is not tossed to go to the plastic surgery.

Open another long time no contact with the acquaintance of the circle of friends, I saw him every day are busy, sometimes for the star of the scandal and people argue, sometimes for a national event worry to anxious, sometimes for the price of goods worried about the people. In short, he is a decent intellectual with profound knowledge, broad vision, broad-mindedness, and a wide range of books, as seen through his circle of friends. However, I am familiar with him, is another look: criticizing women covet material, but he borrowed money to buy expensive luxury goods, but also borrow women's money; two children at home, but only to give birth to not raise the children thrown to his wife to go around; criticizing the people of the country a swarm of people rushed to buy a house, but they are due to listen to the word of the people, borrowing money to buy a house to invest in the results of the cheating, and get to tear down the east wall to make up for the west wall of the embarrassment of the day.

There are also deaths in the circle of friends. A few days ago, another acquaintance in the WeChat accidentally died. This is the third person who died in my WeChat circle of friends. With this deceased gentleman can not be counted as friends, but often met on some occasions. I have also complained about him to my friends because he always made passionate speeches on various occasions, and even composed poems for people in public, thinking that he was so out of fashion, and even with some literati's foolishness and naiveté. Over sixty years old, still childlike in love with vanity, and always sends the words of personal creation already posted in the circle of friends, or the news of receiving honors, and then sends it to everyone in a group. So many times, I was disturbed by group messages and wanted to delete him. He is old, no longer needed by society, everyone sees him, they treat him as an elder who no longer has much utility; but he, however, can not let go of the past halo, hope to continue to stay in those lively life.

Soon, his workplace sent out a nostalgic article on the public number, and in just a few hours, 50,000 people clicked on it. The messages from those acquaintances presented every side of him to the crowd. His parents, his siblings, his sons and daughters, his wife, were all known to the world. Even his inability to afford a car, his humble study, and his child-like obsession with the published word, such unknown fragments, were exposed to the public by his untimely death.

I suddenly feel a little clamor, said to a friend, when I unexpectedly died, the world will be so I write a public article, attracting countless people who know or do not know to come in to like it? If that is the case, it is really terrible. My friend lamented: I don't know at that time, can there be any way not to let the world know the news of my death? I'm not sure if there is a way to do that, but I'm sure there is a way to do that, and I'm sure there is a way to do that.

No, I will not follow the wind to write those who are ten thousand people commented on the memorial text, I want to put my friend quietly in the heart, forever in memory, rather than write in the noisy circle of friends, only lively night, will be mercilessly left behind. I think so.

Four

Late in the afternoon, I heard my friend Ari mention her giant baby-like second brother. Her second brother and his wife are both thirty years old, but they have no boundaries in the world. The couple left their two children with their parents and didn't see each other for a month. When they first chose to drive the bus route, they specifically stuck to the stops near the house that Ary rented, in order to get off work, both of them can eat and drink for free at Ary's house. Ary originally thought they came once or twice just, do not want to, they live is a year, completely here as their own home, Ary can not drive away. When Ary accused them of not caring about the child, they also argued that it was good for the elderly to take care of them, and that they were safe. Ary said, you never take them to the city to play once, the child can not see mom and dad, then why give birth to them? I don't want to, they soon "pipe" on, really will bring the child, only, is brought to the home of the Ary.

Fortunately, Ary bought a very small house, just enough for a family of three to live, so not long after the renovation, Ary rushed to move out of the original rented house, and clearly told the second brother: in the future, unless it is raining and windy, do not come back here to dabble in the food, I have my life, you should have your ......

After listening to Ary's life troubles, I rushed to the TV station to record a round-table interview for a party. As soon as I entered, I saw the director, scheduler, and floor manager all shouting at the top of their lungs, their throats so dry that they could hear the sound of hissing and burning inside. Director gray hair, is a gentle and modest-looking old man, but the furrowed face, but written for a party overworked fatigue and weariness. He kept walking around, communicating with the guests who had just arrived, his tone calm and sincere. But I was sensitive to the fact that under the calm water, there was a volcano that was about to erupt, stirred up by the clamor and agitation. Even one or two of his white hairs trembled slightly under the bright lights.

The assistant director is a sturdy young man, obviously more energetic than the director, but his voice is also muffled, and I can see that the overworked man has long been exhausted, and the wheels are always squeaking to a halt. So when a group of amateur square-dancing amazons, who could never figure out where to stand on stage, he roared: Auntie, please listen to me now! The whole audience was silent, the face smeared with red rouge amahs stood there sardonically, like a trained schoolboy, the atmosphere did not dare to take a breath.

I only stayed for a while, and was a little annoyed by the tense atmosphere. But a few moments later, I heard a bang and saw a pen fly up in the air and land on a round table full of photographers, pilots and sportsmen. A female groundskeeper in a man's vest cocked her head to avoid the crumbs of the ballpoint pen, before lowering her head guiltily. The director's roar pierces the high-decibel music and crashes into the eardrums of everyone in the audience. The last bit of patience left in the director's heart finally blew up in a flash because of what the young housekeeper had interjected during the guest recording.

Sitting quietly in a stunned silence, I suddenly remembered a meter-long eel I once saw at the Maritime Museum, hiding motionless in a crevice of the reef so narrow it could only hold a fish. If it weren't for the fact that its jaws were twitching slightly as it breathed, and its half-squinted, occasionally blinking eyes, one would have thought it had no signs of life. Oceanarium staff said that the eel fish life expectancy can be as long as three or four decades, in front of this eel fish like hibernation, in the Oceanarium more than a dozen square meters of the small world has survived for sixteen years, counting the establishment of the Museum of the Oceanarium oldest. I heard that this kind of eel fish is even lazier than a turtle, except for eating, almost refused to waste a tiny bit of extra energy. I was amazed at its ability to tolerate the environment. How did it survive the endless darkness of 16 years? This is not an ocean where it can do its work, it doesn't have to hunt for food, it doesn't have to avoid predators, it just has to stay in the cracks of the rock. But what is the difference between that and being in prison? This kind of life, far more than the ocean with the enemy of the fight, more need to be strong power to deal with.

I think of a Swedish eel reported in the news that, after being unintentionally thrown into the bottom of a well by a young boy, lived there until it was 155 years old before it died peacefully. Humans always arrogantly think that they are the master of this earth, but very often, we often do not have a fish more able to fight against the long boring time, and with a powerful stillness, to deal with the trivial troubles in the floating red dust.

Five

In middle age, worries are like dust, floating in mid-air every day.

Friend A Yuan new department head to engage in a small circle, they are Dinks, they look down on the birth of a second child A Yuan, that it is her so unprofessional housewife, delayed the reform of the college plan, so desperately to divide the class to her, she worked hard, but because too much of the intellectuals, do not know how to sneak around and be isolated. So Yuan, while missing her old director who had just retired and allowed her to breathe freely, planned to jump ship to another college. Like me, she bought an old, shabby, small school district house, simply because she followed the advice that it's best for a two-child family to buy a school district house and fix it up. But she is not like me, but also invested money to renovate the first rental, she let the house dilapidated, empty, thinking of waiting for the children to go to school, they go to live on a live, the day to use up and then resold.

The new house, which has been rented out for the past two years, is not only a place to live, but it is also a place to live for your children, as well. Her parents have been in poor health for the past two years, so she's switched from flying around the world to fall in love to flying around the world to be with her mother at the doctor's.

As for her parents, they're in the middle of their lives.

As for me, I'm often hit hard by reality. I was talking to Yuan about these troubles when suddenly the downstairs tenants knocked on the door, saying that in front of the neighborhood sunbathing Abba can not stand up, let us hurry to assist home. So we scrambled to find a wheelchair, and with the help of a few kind old people, we helped him into the house. Although I knew that patients with microcephaly would eventually lose their mobility and be paralyzed in bed, I still felt sad when I saw that my father, who had lived with us in the city for nearly six years, was slowly becoming such a "discarded" person, thinking that people are really useless when they grow old and that it is a blessing from God to be able to die painfully without burdening their children. The first thing I want to do is to get rid of all the people who are in the world, and I want to do that.

In the middle age, we feel that we have to use up all our energy in order to make a living. But for those who have lost the freedom of movement of the elderly, perhaps just a trip to the restroom, will exhaust all the strength and dignity of life, in order to finally arrive at the place ten meters away. In this world, everyone is busy living and dying, never stopping, just like the rotation of the planets in the universe. Perhaps, this is life.

When I was eating, I heard my lover mention that a famous professor in our school, who is only forty or fifty years old, died of a myocardial infarction yesterday due to a long time staying up late to do scientific research. Thinking of the professor's life countless honors, spend endless subject funds, receive endless allowances treatment, can not help but a sigh of relief, thinking of death is really ironic, said to take away who, with more halo and money is also categorically not change. Just last month, a local writer, fifty years old, also died of a cerebral hemorrhage. The reason is that he drank too much alcohol on weekdays, I remember once he attended a certain training course, just twenty days, he helplessly told me that he drank twenty games of wine, and every day he drank more wine than water. The world is not taking away such either desperate or life-sacrificing people, and who will it take away?

Such a thought, massaging the knee joints because of sitting every day and often feel cold, can not help but spine cold, thinking that it is better to love yourself more.

Another memory of a person who once belittled me and pulled the plug on me, a few days ago, I saw that person walk over on campus, and I still smiled and took the initiative to go up and say hello, as if nothing had ever happened between us.

When I go about it this way, I find a more open heart, full of compassion, sympathetic to the struggles, jealousies, and dilemmas of human beings in the world. There is a silence in my heart, as if a bird skimmed the surface of the deep blue sea in the sunlight and then disappeared into the pale clouds.

People's lives, will meet all kinds of people, some people instantly become confidants at first sight, some people will never like, some people met once, never want to reunite. But think of some let me have no good feelings of people, may be after a lifetime will never meet, perhaps tomorrow he disappeared from this world, become dust, can also forgive this in the world may be tortured people, give him a smile and forgiveness. It is like admiring the dust dancing in the sunlight, knowing that they will return to the earth, and then they will be happy for this moment of dancing.

In the evening, I heard a rumble of thunder outside my window, opened the curtains, and looked up to see the dim light of the sky, knowing that a heavy rain was coming. I was overwhelmed with peace, turned off my cell phone and computer, and began to read one night in middle age, squeezed daily by worldly cares.

(Excerpted from Hundred Flowers Continent, Issue 2, 2021)

Author's Introduction

An Ning is a member of the Chinese Writers' Association (CWA), a native of Shandong. He has published 25 works. Representative works: Our Disappearing Country Life, Plants Forgotten in the Countryside, The Countryside Idler, Migration, Silence on Earth. He has won various awards, including the First Chinese Young Writers' Award, Ding Ling Literary Award, Bing Xin Prose Award, Ye Shengtao Teachers' Literary Award, and Inner Mongolia Solonga Literary Award. He has published more than 4 million words in People's Literature and October.