Tonight, I closed my door, sat in my room and watched the 2024 presidential debate live.

When my daughter’s family of four came home from a walk, I heard my grandson Ben running towards my room, standing outside the door, and calling “Grandma, Grandma”. I opened the door, and Ben ran into my room with two colorful plastic spoons in one hand and a Super Mario Princess Peach plush doll in the other.

The live debate ended quickly.

While walking Ben to the dining room for his dinner, I asked him: “Who bought you the spoons?” “Mom.” I asked my daughter: “You guys went shopping tonight?” My daughter replied: “No, we went for ice cream, and the spoons were from the ice cream.” I couldn’t help but sigh: “Wow, eating ice cream so late.”

Because he ate ice cream, Ben had no appetite for dinner.

After a while, Ben’s friend Mateo and his father along with his younger brother came over to watch Pikachu on the TV together. No one mentioned tonight’s debate. It seems that parents with young children don’t have time to listen to the 90-minute debate.

I went back to my room and thought about how Ben, who was just over two years old, liked ice cream as much as his mother did，which made me remember a memory about her moving from the East Coast to California. In early 1997, in cold West Virginia, I told my three-year-old daughter who loved ice cream: “We are moving to California where we can eat ice cream in the winter.” After hearing this, she longed for California.

More people and scenes of eating ice cream slowly emerged in my mind.

A long time ago, I enrolled in an adult night school in California. During the first class, the instructor asked students to share about their favorite food. The girl in front of me said: “I like ice cream the most.” I followed up with: “I don’t like ice cream because I don’t like cold food. I like rice the most.” After hearing what I said, the girl turned towards me, opened her eyes widely and said in a surprising tone: “Wow, there are people who don’t like ice cream.” When talking about their favorite food, even adults are easily excited. The rest of the classroom was also excited on that day.

In 2016, I sent my daughter to Wurzburg Germany for graduate school, we had a chance to chat while savoring a plate of light yellow ice cream, and I talked about the light yellow ice cream made by my mother in 1982. That year, I was a sophomore in Sichuan Normal University in Chengdu. My mother wrote to me and said that our family bought a Changqing single-door refrigerator. She learned how to make ice cream and made a big jar of ice cream waiting for me to come home to eat during my summer vacation. The memories awakened by the food are vivid. I remember my mother who doesn’t like sweets watching me eat her ice cream with a long lasting smile, in our dining room on Fort Hill, in the hot summer without air conditioning in Zigong. It was a pleasant thing to eat ice cream in summer when I was young!

However, I recently heard an unpleasant story about eating ice cream. A grandma who likes to wear flowery clothes just like me flew to the East Coast this summer to visit her son, daughter-in-law, and grandsons. She originally planned to stay for a week, but the ice cream caused trouble and she only stayed for three days. She and her son’s family of four went to an ice cream shop and she ordered a large size of chocolate ice cream for herself, because she liked sweets very much. She shared some of her ice cream with her grandson, because the boy wanted to try everyone’s. After returning home, the grandma went to the bathroom and noticed from the mirror that there was a line of brown left by the chocolate ice cream on her flowery clothes, which is one of her favorites. She suddenly got angry, felt that her son and daughter-in-law did not take her seriously because they did not point out that her clothes were soiled in the store, which showed that they are tired of her now, so she left early. This story made me want to step into the case, because the grandma said that her son did not know that she left because of the ice cream stain.

I thought about her story again tonight, thinking about our two-year-old Ben who is quick and full of ideas, and someone always has to pay a good attention to him when he goes out; thinking about my daughter, son-in-law and the young parents of our neighbor who have no time to care about tonight’s presidential debate, I guess the son and daughter-in-law in that situation were too busy taking care of two children who probably like ice cream and might not have noticed her problem. I think I will not make the same mistake as the grandma now. Also I think listening to this kind of gossip is beneficial. First, I can be a bystander and comment on it without suffering, and second, I can step into the case to think about and understand the problem more deeply.

In 2016, I sent my daughter to Wurzburg Germany for graduate study. I chatted with her while sipping a light yellow ice cream, a long lasting memory.

In 2021, Julia, one of my alumni from Shuguang middle school in Zigong, invited me to a Chinese Local Tourism Group. I once invited relatives and friends who had never been to Zigong to watch Zigong’s Lantern Show in Boston zoo, a group activity organized by her; I also took part in a lunch gathering at a Chinese restaurant owned by a Zigongian and recommended by her; I followed her journey to visit Gibbet Hill‘s autumn scenery too. I found Julia’s passion towards natural sceneries very attractive, as we are living in the same city that is far from our homeland. I could not help mentioning a discussion of how Robert can attract Francesca after watching the old film “Bridge of Madison County” a few weeks ago. In my opinion, Francesca, a lonely housewife who was far away from her hometown for a very long time, suddenly met a person who knew and really liked her hometown, this was the reason Robert was attractive to her at the beginning.

At 10 a.m. this morning, Julia, four other friends from the tourism group, and I met at the brand-new parking lot of Prospect Hill Park. We climbed the hill along the spacious paved road that was designed for cars but which was closed for cars that were entering now. In early spring on the East Coast, the trees on the hill were still lifeless and the road on weekdays was empty. The six of us. along with a couple who were walking a dog, only eight people and a dog walked on the road. While Lisa and Mary, ZZ and I, Jessica and Julia walked together, we breathed in and enjoyed the fresh air and quiet atmosphere of the well-maintained Prospect Hill Park.

The top of Prospect Hill is a good place to look at downtown Boston. When we climbed to the top, though the sun had not come out, the vision under the clouds was very clear, as the air was very clean and transparent. Standing at the top of the hill, I heard the sharp-minded Jessica sigh: “I feel like I’m in a science fiction blockbuster.” I was surprised because I couldn’t come up with such feeling; I was also delighted because I enjoyed sharing fresh new thoughts among friends.

After enjoying each other’s company for a while and after our muscles had warmed up, we shared each other’s birth years: 1960, 1963, 1964, 1965, 1971 and 1976. Then we complimented each other’s vibrant minds and active bodies, I felt the sincere praise exude a kind of sweetness and collecting it was just like a busy bee. I enjoyed the moment very much. In the United States, we all use English names now, but I like to ask after the former Chinese names of the born-in-60s, because I can understand the meaning of the born-in-60s’ Chinese names. When Lisa said that she now used English name even in China, I joked: “You were very modern then!”

We ran into a friendly Caucasian couple, Mary and John, at the top of the hill. After learning that we were all Chinese, John told us he had read the “A Dream of Red Mansions” and he liked Baoyu. I was very surprised to hear his comment on Daiyu: “She was a goddess.” as I felt the same here. The couple was curious about us too. When they heard Julia said: “I arrived in the United States just over a year.” John and Mary praised Julia: “Your English is very good! Do you like America?” We also learned that John is a lawyer and Mary is a social worker, that they work from home, and that they are on their work break.

While going down the hill on Sunset Trail, I stopped and pointed to a stretch of water in the distance and said, “look, that’s the Charles River.” “Why is the river so wide?” Someone questioned. “It should be the Cambridge reservoir.” “It’s the Cambridge reservoir, a beautiful place in autumn.” “Every time I pass there in autumn, I want to stop and go for a walk. but I could not find the parking lot.” “You can stop under the Cambridge bridge.” All of us focusing on the water in the distance made me understand that the wide water surface was not the Charles River at all. It was memorable!

Accompanied by mature similar age girlfriends, the open natural scenery and intimate chat made outdoor group activities more comfortable. ZZ and I met for the first time. While going down the hill together, we shared the timeline of our first landing in the U.S. from China: she came to the East Coast from Beijing in 1991 and I came to the East Coast from Zigong in 1989. We chatted about the hot topic of a Silicon Valley man which bursted out on March 14. We agreed that many OBC (Oversea-born Chinese) adults are paying great attention to this affair, and the vast majority of ABC (American-born Chinese) youngsters don’t care at all. Then we had a good time chatting about family, marriage and children. When we said good bye to each other, I forgot to give back her bottle of water that I carried all the way up the hill which she didn’t have a chance to drink. Well, we will meet again later.

Little Episodes

1. The science fiction blockbuster scenery commented by Jessica：

2. Chatting with Mary and John at the top of the hill：

3. Unseen views at the top of the hill as we are climbing:

4. Sharing the same passion and road，we are going down the hill：

5. Our joke of “Boundless world” and “Supremacy over all”:

6. The oil film “Bridge of Madison County”

In the middle of February, following my daughter’s request for a dark color, double-layered, knee-length skirt, I made three skirts for her. She liked them all and I was very happy. Last week, while visiting QM (one of my friends in Waltham) for a small gathering, a mother praised my daughter’s short skirt and lamented that she didn’t like to wear skirts, so her daughter didn’t like to wear skirts. It reminded me of my own mother and the dress my mother bought for me. I think children will always have their own new tastes. As a mother, learning to support children’s own tastes would be good.

In my childhood memory, my mother only wore plain clothes and trousers all year round and never wore any skirt. I only saw her in chi-pao in her school-year photos before 1949. Now I think about my mother’s dress code, I guess it’s because my mother, a Communist Party member from a landlord family, was carefully following the “To face the powder and not to powder the face (translated by a famous scholar 许渊冲 from ‘Women are encouraged to love battle outfits more than pretty dresses’)” culture that was very popular at that time.

The era of “To face the powder and not to powder the face” was also my school period from elementary school to high school. In those years, I only wore one or two short skirts and never wore any dresses.

In 1981, at the early stage of China’s “Economic Reform and Open Up”, I went to college and spent four years at the Sichuan Normal University on Lion Mountain, while I and seven roommates living in room 501 of the girls’ dormitory building. The eight college students in room 501 forged a deep friendship. In 1983, one year before the release of popular movie “Red Skirts Is Popular on the Street”, we, the eight girls in room 501, from the Lion Mountain in the eastern suburb of Chengdu, took buses, after several transfers and went to the Chunxi Road Photo Studio in downtown Chengdu to have a photo with the theme of dresses. This photo sealed our vitality in our sophomore year: in the picture, I was wearing Ping’s strapless dress, a glimpse of a girl’s desire to be pretty and the good team spirit of the college students who were born in 1960s China. More than 30 years have passed, from saying goodbye on Lion Mountain, to being distant between the East Coast and the West Coast of the United States, Ping and I are now neighbors in Greater Boston. Fate in life carries deep love between Ping and I.

As a college student, I enjoyed wearing dresses. Since then, I have worn many dresses, but I think my most beautiful dress is the one my mother bought for me after I graduated university and returned to my alma mater Zigong Shuguang high school as a chemistry teacher, in 1985. At that time, Zigong’s trendy fashion clothes were mostly sold on the street between YingXiongKou (Hero Mouth) and Ziliujing District Committee, which was close to the gate of Zigong No. 1 middle school. That place was called Caravan Fashion Street. I often visited there to see fashion clothes and I was especially interested in pretty dresses. One day, I fell in love with a dress on the Caravan Fashion Street, after a few rounds of bargaining with the shopkeeper, the dress still cost more than 80 yuan. In Zigong in the mid-1980s, the monthly salary of college graduates was around 50 yuan. I didn’t dare to spend a month and a half salary on a dress.

That day, after I came back home, I told my mother: “I saw a pretty dress on the Caravan Fashion Street today. Unfortunately, it was too expensive to buy.” My mother saw from my eyes that I really liked it and regretted it, so she went with me to the Caravan Fashion Street and bought the dress for me.

My mother was frugal all her life and wore very simple plain clothes. After retirement, she bought me a pretty and expensive dress that I dared not buy. This dress left a trace that I was well pampered by my family after I started to work.

I liked this dress very much. I often wore it in the USA. This dress inadvertently accompanied me to meet Chen Xiangmei in Washtington DC and President Bush in the old white house.

On the cold February day in Waltham, looking at the snowflakes flying outside the window, thinking about my late mother and the summer dress, I felt my love for my mother and the warmth of my home in Zigong. Today, looking at the dress my mother bought for me more than 30 years ago, I felt the style of the dress is still very modern.

Because of my late mother, my daughter’s pretty short skirt, decades of college friendship，two late celebrities and a dress bought in my hometown came together as one story. This story from a long ago time is like a bottle of private aged wine. Drinking alone, you will be intoxicated by the private family memory; when sharing it, others will smell the richness of history blending around us.

I am thankful for my mother’s love.

Little Episodes

1. 02-18-2019，Waltham is snowing

2. 02-10-2019，a small gathering at QM’s house, my daughter wore the pretty little skirt:

3. Because of my late mother, two late celebrities and a dress bought in my hometown came together as one story.
On April 6, 2018, [Let Me Say] Chen Xiangmei passed away and the Sino-US trade war is in full swing. The intertwining of unrelated events reminds me of the past when I saw Chen Xiangmei in 1991: she organized many Chinese communities to the White House to support China’s entry into the WTO. In the photo, my friend and I visited the White House (July 10, 1991). Now it may be time for civil society organizations to lobby…

On July 11, 2018, [History in Today] on July 10, 1991, several mainland students took the subway from the CUA (Catholic University of America) to the Old White House to participate in the Chinese activity of “supporting China’s entering to the WTO”. Seeing President Bush (Figure 1) and holding a free White House brochure (Figure 2). The symbolic building of CUA outside the experimental building (Fig. 3). May the people finally benefit from the current hot trade war.

On July 10, 1991, I stood in front of the Old White House, wearing the dress my mother bought me and holding a free White House brochure in my hands.

In May 2017, my mother （10-25-1928 to 05-02-2018年）in a quiet and calm happy mood.

4. On May 28, 1983, Photo of college students living in room 501, our sophomore year in college.

5. Popular in the 1960s and 1970s, “To face the powder and not to powder the face” means “Women are encouraged to love battle outfits more than pretty dresses”, origins from Mao Zedong’s “seven wonders · Title photos for female militia”: “valiant five foot guns, the dawn shines on the drill ground. Chinese people have many wonderful aspirations, do not love red clothes and love armed forces.”

On a sunny Friday in the late autumn on the East Coast, the news of life and death coming together made me feel the love across the ocean and recall the help I received more than 20 years ago. Happy Friday has a new meaning, as kindness is fresh and ever-lasting.

Lying in bed in the morning, I opened the Wechat and saw the greeting from my aunt in Zigong: “Hello Jingchuan, your father is all right, please rest assured.” along with a recent photo of my 92-years-old father sitting in a wheelchair in a checkered cotton-padded jacket. The news from my hometown across the ocean in the morning gave my Friday start warmth and sweetness, because I felt my aunt’s love and care.

In the morning, I sat in front of the computer, opened my email and saw Alisa had forwarded two emails about Arlene’s funeral service last night.

I had never met Arlene in person. I met Arlene for the first time at the Zoom party celebrating the 50th wedding anniversary of my doctoral advisor Ronnie and his wife Alisa in July 2021. I saw Arlene as an old, kind and smiling grandmother and thought she was a friend of Alisa, so I didn’t pay much attention to her, until some old friends of Ronnie and Alisa talked about the people and things of earlier VSL period on Zoom and I heard Arlene say, “I’m glad to hear you talking about my Pete.” Afterward, I knew that she was the wife of Professor Pete Macedo, the big boss of VSL laboratory, and a sense of gratitude arose in me. 

In 1994, Professor Macedo and Ronnie gave me extraordinary help when my six month old daughter was very ill with congenital heart disease, which was very expensive to treat and which my international student medical insurance would not cover at that time. I had to quit my job as a research assistant and go under the poverty line in order to apply for social welfare to treat my daughter’s illness. At that time, VSL quickly handled the dismissal procedure to me. A few months later, when my daughter’s condition had improved, VSL allowed me to return to the laboratory to continue to be a research assistant with funding, which was a considerable and stable source of income at that time. When I was under tough times and felt despair, I often thought of the people who helped me during these extremely difficult times. Professor Macedo is one of the people I often think of.

Recalling the help given to me by Professor Macedo more than 20 years ago in 1994, I feel strongly that the people who have passed away and their kindness will last forever. May Arlene and her Pete be happy together ever after now.

I am also trying to become a person who is capable of being kind. I think that’s one of the best ways to thank the people who have helped me.

Little Episodes

1. Happy Fridays in Silicon Valley:
Visiting San Jose Rose Garden(2017)
My pretty red toenails(2017)
A software engineer’s Friday(2016)
A Friday on the beach (2016)
A Friday lunch gathering

2. My aunt’s message to me：”Hello Jingchuan, your father is all right, please rest assured.”

3. About Prof. Macedo and VSL I found on internet:
Pedro Manoel Buarque de Macedo
JULY 16, 1938 – SEPTEMBER 19, 2016

“The VSL, under his leadership, researched and developed methods for the safe containment of disposed radioactive materials, primarily by converting nuclear waste into solid glass using vitrification techniques. VSL’s vitrification, or glassification, of radioactive waste has prevented that waste from leaching into groundwater or soil。”

4. VSL and I
Macedo is a professor in the Department of physics and VSL and the Department of physics shared a four story building. Many of VSL’s research was done by graduate students from the Department of chemistry. At that time, we joked: “chemistry is a panacea, which can be applied to everywhere.”

Red flowering quince in CUA.
My mother’s letter in the 1990s.
Kang once commented: “Your lunch is very greasy.”.
Ru’s husband described how to steam fish in detail.

Half July, Chinese New Year’s Eve, Qingming Festival and Double Ninth Festival are the four major Chinese traditional festivals for the worship of ancestors.

On August 15, 2019 which was also July 15 of the Lunar calendar, I was alone in Chengdu waiting for my high school reunion to be started on the next day. In the afternoon, while wandering around for street food near the hotel, I accidentally walked into Temple Wenshu, a famous Buddhist temple. I saw many people, old and young, burning paper money and incense sticks, kowtowing and bowing in the courtyard of Temple Wenshu, which was already piled with lots of ashes. An old man with incense sticks on his hands told me, “Today is the Zhongyuan Jie, a day to worship our ancestors.” What I heard and saw in the courtyard confirmed that Half July is really a trinity of festivals for Buddhism, Taoism and secular Chinese culture.

After witnessing the whole-hearted folk worship of ancestors in surprise, I also burned paper money and incense sticks, and knelt and kowtowed to pray for peace. In the land of my home province, after a long separation, I closed my eyes and thought of my ancestors. Under the rich ceremony atmosphere, I remember the remote full of love ceremony given to me by my mother and my nanny in the mid-1990s.

In the mid-1990s, while my parents and my nanny Yeyi were in my hometown Zigong, I did my PhD research at VSL in the department of physics at the Catholic University of America (CUA) in Washington, D.C. In that time, e-mail did not exist and my parents and I exchanged greetings and family affairs through overseas letters every month. After my daughter was born, my mother wrote to me in a letter: “Today, your Yeyi (my nanny) visited us and asked for the childhood clothes of you and your bother. Your Yeyi was going to Mountain Emei soon. She planned to hang the clothes on the JinDing (the top of Mountain Emei) for the Buddha’s blessing for a peaceful life for you and your brother.” My mother’s detailed and emotional description of my Yeyi’s love ritual for us touched me very much and I will remember this love forever.

“There is no boundary between life and death in Half July”. My love reverberated between heaven and earth, spreading sweetness and eternity, and enriching my soul. I suddenly realized that one of the driving forces for the continuation and spread of ancient customs is love and family affection.

Little Episodes

1. August 15, 2019. I burned paper money and incense sticks, knelt and kowtowed in the courtyard of Temple Wenshu, worshipped my ancestors and prayed for peace.

2. My shared moment: While witnessing the rich and deep rooted folk ancestor worshipping ceremony, I also burnt paper money, worshiped my ancestors, knelt down and expressed my feelings of thankful and gratitude. Today is my mother’s second Zhongyuan Jie in heaven. May my late mother and ancestors bless us with safety and auspice（2019-08-15-2019).

Recently, I heard a children’s song in my hometown Zigong dialect: “The Zigong dialect is like putting salt into a hot pot. We Zigongians think it’s just right, but you will say it’s a little salty”. I laughed about it for a while and could not help thinking of the white salt in my hometown Zigong and my Zigongian memory about salt.

In the 1970s, after meat, sugar, tobacco, and wine were limited by monthly government issued coupons, soy sauce was also limited, yet there was no limit on salt in Zigong. While mixing salt with water as soy sauce, Yeyi, my nanny, would say: “The color is wrong, but the taste is the same.” Recalling this, I realized that as a child, my taste was not very sensitive. However, my children’s taste was very delicate. I still remember the first time I put sugar in the double cooked pork belly for my son, he immediately felt different and told me that he didn’t like the dish with sugar in it.

In the small shop near my home, the white salt is placed in a large bamboo dustpan with a diameter of about one meter. The salt is always wet because it absorbs the moisture in the air. I often went to the small shop to buy salt. It costs a few cents a pound and I never thought salt was precious.

The first time I knew salt was very precious was in 1974, in the popular children’s film “Shining Red Star”. When I saw Pan Dongzi, the child protagonist in the film, on the way to deliver salt to the guerrillas on the mountain and after passing the White Region guard’s inspection, he lifted his cotton-padded jacket and said proudly to his old friend: “Grandpa, salt!” (he had dissolved the salt into water and poured it into his cotton padded jacket earlier). I could not understand why and how salt could be so precious in the film.

In July 2021, while talking to M, an retired professor of European history, about our origins, I said, “I come from a small city in inland China.”

M professor immediately asked, “I’m curious about how the salt is transported to inland cities in China?”

I asked in surprise, “Why do you suddenly think of salt?”

M professor explained: “I heard that my ancestors in Russia, under the rule of Catherine II in the middle and late 18th century, are a family licensed to transport sea salt to the deep inland of Russia. Edible salt is a rare necessity in the inland. I wonder how sea salt got to small inland cities in China. ”

As soon as I heard it, I said proudly, “My hometown Zigong had already produced well salt 2000 years ago. Zigong, also known as the salt capital, is famous for its prosperity. ”

After circling half the earth and after living for over half a century, I finally understood how salt used to be so important to ordinary people, and why Zigong, my hometown, used to be so important. This once important small city has accumulated a rich cultural history, which is the pride of the native Zigong Salt capital.

Little Episodes

1. “During the Anti Japanese War, Zigong was the city with the highest amount of donations. More than 200,000 Zigongians either donated money and/or bravely participated in the war. Their donation of 120 million yuan ranked first among Chinese cities, surpassing Chengdu and Guangzhou, which made all the Zigongians very proud. ”

The famous Shenhai well, which was dug in 1835, is 1001.42 meters deep and covers an area of about 1500 square meters. It is the first well over 1000 meters deep in the world. It still retains the layout and style of the early 19th century. It is a typical well salt production site in the Qing Dynasty. According to records, salt workers of all dynasties have successively drilled more than 13000 wells in Zigong. ”

2. The inscription of “Resistance and Revival” on Guangguang street, Ziliujing District, in Zigong:

“During the Anti-Japanese War, because sea salt was blocked, the civilian and military supplies of salt in Hubei and southwest provinces of China depended on Sichuan salt, and Zigong was the most important salt supply city. In the spring of 1938, Zigong was ordered to increase salt production and transport with remarkable results. Therefore, Zigong became a key target for the Japanese in an attempt to cut off the salt supply and to shake the will of the Chinese army and people in their resistance of Japan. From October 1939 to August 1941, the Japanese carried out 7 times and 18 batches of indiscriminate bombing on Zigong, causing great disasters to the Zigong people.

The people of Zigong rose up to resist and set a record in the history of salt production in the three years of indiscriminate bombing by the enemy. The salt production increased from 7% in 1937 to 27% in 1941. It effectively smashed the aggressor’s strategic plot to cut off the supply of salt and disintegrate the fighting spirit of the Chinese army and people in the war of resistance against Japan.”

3. In the 1974 popular children’s film “Shining Red Star”, the scene of Pan Dongzi showed his old friend his cotton-padded jacket soaked with salt water:

4. Qingzi, my high school classmate, left a message after I shared this story among my friends: “The story of Zigong, my hometown. The story of an ancient small city with salt flavor and sentimental.”

“Anthropologist Ren Naiqiang believes that the development of human civilization before the 17th century was mostly accompanied by the expansion of the salt road.”

Ruth, the veterinarian of Kara (our cat Princess), is an Israeli poet. Ruth said that she had a talent for writing poetry ever since she was a child. She also told me that poems should be read slowly to sip and taste the beauty of every word in the poem.

In January, when I went to her clinic to buy prescription cat food for Kara, I bought one of her poetry collection books called Cyclamen, I asked her to read me a poem on her book, and also asked her to sign her book for me.

Ruth thought for a moment and wrote for me: “To Jing, To never ending end. Ruth M 01-20-21″

I asked curiously, “What does ‘To never ending end’ mean?”

Ruth said, “Our life will end, and the written words can last forever. We can make life ‘never end’ by writing the stories of life. For example, this collection of poems is dedicated to Jacky, my son’s elementary school teacher who died young.”

After listening to Ruth’s explanation, I understand that “to never ending end” means “without ending”. Ruth’s words: “We can make life ‘never end’ by written the stories of life” stayed with me.

At the end of February, Zhenzhen, one of my high school best friends, mentioned her childhood neighbor friend Xia Ruiqiu in our online chatting group. I immediately remembered Xia Ruiqiu, because she was my classmate in Zigong No. 1 middle school. I remembered she was pretty with sweet smiles.

Thinking of the past in 2011, while preparing for our 30 years high school graduation reunion, Zhenzhen searched and found me who had lost contact with her for more than 20 years and invited me into our high school online chatting group, I wanted to help Zhenzhen find Ruiqiu. I thought it would be a happy story and I would find a long lost friend for Zhenzhen who was far away in Australia, just as Zhenzhen found me nine years ago.

I learned from one of my friends graduated from Zigong No. 1 middle school in Beijing that Ruiqiu became a teacher in a university in Chengdu after graduating from college. Then I reached out to one of my old colleagues in Shuguang middle school back in 1980s, because she is a professor in the same university as Ruiqiu is now. After a long search, my old colleague told me that Xia Ruiqiu committed suicide after a heartbreaking love in 1988.

When Zhenzhen heard this sad news, she sighed, “It is very sad to hear this. She was very smart. She started to swim in elementary school and has excellent physical coordination. I could not imagine her dying in this way!! ”

After learning the news, the friend in Beijing said, “She is introverted… It’s sad! In fact, first love is not necessarily the best! Many young people don’t understand… ”

Although the news was more than 30 years late, I felt that my classmate died so young was just like a flower that had faded before blossoming. I felt very sad and thought for a long time. The catchy “Liberty and love, These two I must have. For my love I’ll sacrifice, My life. For liberty I’ll sacrifice My love. by Sandor Petofi” in the 1980s, has not been questioned, and may have misled some pure souls…

Life is the most precious thing. “We can make life ‘never end’ by writing the stories of life. ”

May Ruiqiu find true love in heaven.

Little Episodes

1. “Cyclamen” poem collection book signed by Ruth, the poet：

2. Our princess Kara is looking at the rain outside the window.

3. “Liberty and love!” by Hungary poet Sandor Petofi

Liberty and love,
These two I must have.
For my love I’ll sacrifice,
My life.
For liberty I’ll sacrifice
My love.

I didn’t know that the star magnolia could be such a huge tree, as I had only seen the petite-sized star magnolia in the Filoli Gardens previously.

In Filoli in the Silicon Valley, the small and thin stems of a short star magnolia tree have long Spanish moss hanging on them. The grayish-green colored lichens growing on them indicates the star magnolia tree is an old slow-growing tree. However, the star magnolia flowers are very delicate and beautiful, they are full of life, contrasting with the ancient moss and lichens on the branches. Standing beside the blooming star magnolia tree, short and aged, I felt its quiet and magical immortal spirit.

One afternoon at the end of March in 2021, I visited the Boston Public Garden and there were very few visitors because of COVID-19. I lingered around a very tall star magnolia tree there, as it was very impressive to me. I stood close to look up at the star magnolia blooming under the blue sky, and I walked away to watch the tree from distances and I saw a golden weeping willow, next to the star magnolia tree, dancing in the strong wind. It was such a beautiful sight, the tranquility and beauty of the metropolis.

Looking up at the very tall star magnolia tree with flowers, the ethereal spirit connected with the star magnolia tree in my memory disappeared. On the contrary, I felt an earthly vigorous connection with the star magnolia tree here. The same plants have very different body structures (very short vs. very tall) in different places, I felt the magic of nature is really infinite.

Looking up at the name tag of star magnolia on the trunk, my attention turned to the scars on the trunks, there are decades of footprints of countless vows of love by a few generations. I felt the scars on the tree trunk are mini-sceneries of wishes for lasting love.

Walking around the huge star magnolia tree, I seemed to ride on a memory high-speed train, enjoying magnolia flowers back in my hometown of Zigong, watching the tall yellow-colored magnolia flowers and the short star magnolia flowers in Filoli garden in Silicon Valley, visiting the magnolia liliiflora planted by the cardinal in 1951 in Mystic Seaport.

“Flowers out of the soil, beauty without makeup.”

Flowers easily pleased their lovers.

Little Episodes

1. In the Boston Public Garden on Monday afternoon, the blooming star magnolia, her tall trunk, and a golden weeping willow in front of her.

Spring travel, Boston Common on a Monday afternoon:
Star magnolia, delicate and in full bloom.
Its scarred trunk recorded countless vows of love.
A few people, strong wind, and good scenery.

2. Zigong salt bureau’s white magnolia is in my memory. Filoli’s star magnolia and yellow-colored magnolia are in the picture.

3. In the spring of 2020 pandemic, my daughter and I often took a one-day tour driving on the empty highway. One day we went to Mystic Seaport, a quiet town, and saw a magnolia liliiflora tree planted by a cardinal in 1951. Magnolia is really noble as my mother told to me when I was little.

I visited the Chestnut Hill Reservoir recently and saw red flowering quinces blooming on the ground along the banks of the reservoir, instead of on bushes as usual. I felt that I had just collected another character of the flowering quince: blooming on the ground. This joy awakened sweet memories about the flowering quince on the East Coast, on the West Coast, and in Zigong (in Southern Sichuan), in the past.

In the early 1990′s, I was a graduate student in the chemistry department at the Catholic University of America in Washington D.C. After I started my PhD experiment research in VSL (Vitreous State Laboratory) , I had to walk across the campus from Maloney Hall where the chemistry department is located, bypass the Mullen Library located in the center of the campus, to Hannan Hall where VSL is located, daily.

Because I just came from Zigong, a place which rarely snows in the winter. I often felt the snowy weather was too much to bear. With cold weather outside and worries of study inside, I often felt frozen to the bone and exhausted in my soul while walking across the campus. On a very cold day, while bypassing the Mullen Library, I saw a bright red flowering quince blooming in the white snow like a flame, and I suddenly felt bright and hopeful in my heart. Since then, seeing the flowering quince blooming in the cold weather, just like seeing an old friend who came to visit me, which filled me with joy。

After graduating with a PhD in chemistry, I became a software engineer and moved to Silicon Valley in 1997. I lived there for more than 20 years.

In Silicon Valley, I saw red flowering quince blooms on the side of the streets and in residential areas very often. Because of the bright red color loaded on entire bushes, I could recognize flowering quince blooms from far away while driving. If I saw the bright red quince flowers in the yard of some not well-maintained neighbors, I would said to myself sentimentally: “This was once a garden filled with love.”

In April 2016, my daughter and I visited Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. On the hill behind the manmade waterfalls in the park, I saw flowering quince blooming not only in red, but also in pink and white. I stayed there watched the colorful flowers for a while with a smile on my face while satisfying my heart.

In the beginning of 2019, after coming to Waltham, I saw only red flowering quince blooms in early spring, but didn’t see the fruit of quince in the fall. As a newcomer to Waltham, I missed Silicon Valley. When I watch flowering quince blooming, I often said silently to myself: “Oh, flowering quince blooms in Golden Gate Park have different colors. Quince fruits in Filoli garden are as big as apples.” I felt that I was rich in terms of flowering quince.

In November 2019, accompanying my 90-year-old father, I went back to my hometown of Zigong. One evening, I visited my high school where I also had my first job as a chemistry teacher and taught chemistry for four years. After I climbed to the top of the hill and stepped into the yard that was surrounded by three-story classroom buildings, I felt this place had not changed. It was the same as it was in my memory in 1986, when I was a teacher here. I also saw a very tall bush with bare branches in the dark, and I immediately recognized this tall bush was the flowering quince bush I knew back in 1986.

Memories flash back from 1985, as a new college graduate on her first job as a chemistry teacher. In 1986, all my classes were moved to the new three-story classroom buildings at the top of the hill. In the new place, I quickly spotted flowering quinces in the brand new garden next to the stairs. Every year, in the early cold spring, while climbing upstairs to my classrooms, I stopped a bit to watch the flowering quince blooming and appreciated her beauty silently. I also felt the quince’s flowers were blessing me silently with their love.

After more than 30 years, I came back to my high school plus my first work place and stood at the same place, alone, in the dark；but I felt my old friend was still here waiting for me. It was a sweet revisit only a long-time flower lover could enjoy.

Little Episodes

1. Quince blooming on the ground in Chestnut Hill Reservoir (2021-04-19)

2. Quince blooming in snow today (04-16-2021)

3. White and pink quince flowers in Gold Gate Park in San Francisco (04-07-2016)

4. A bush of red quince flower on the side of the street in Silicon Valley(2015-02-10)

5. The very tall quince bush with bare branches in the dark，in my high school (2019-11-30)

6. I stood next to the red quince flowers in my high school, a teacher now. (1987).

Because of the global pandemic in 2020, I have not visited my father in China since December 2019.

At the beginning of this year, I told my daughter that her grandfather’s birthday is March 12 and her grandfather doesn’t like anything I send back to him.

As my daughter knew that one of her grandfather’s favorite hobby is writing, she said: “Let me select some of grandfather’s articles on his 公众号 (a brand of personal blog hosted by Tencent which is censored) and make a book as a birthday gift for him, just like the book I made for your birthday.”

I was very happy to hear her suggestion, so we started to download my father’s articles from his 公众号 for my daughter to read and select in January,

I curiously asked her: “You could not understand Grandpa’s articles with your current Chinese reading skill, how can you make a book for him?”

My daughter said: “I could use some translation app.”

She selected more than 30 articles out of more than the 150 articles published on her grandfather’s 公众号. She categorized the articles into four sections: Writing (文)、Government (辖)、Labor (工)、and Family (家). She used her grandfather’s birthday 03-12-2021 to date the book. She chose a picture of her grandfather in his youth as the book cover. She titled her grandfather’s first book “Cumulation Over the Time (日积月累)”. She also wished her grandfather good health in order to write more articles this year on the birthday card she wrote for him.

My daughter purposely choose her grandfather’s poem dated 05-03-2019 as the last article in the book. She explained to me: “I think this poem is grandfather’s way to remember my late grandmother.” (my mother passed away on 05-02-2020)
Turning into smoke flying to heaven
Ashes into a box after cremation
7th-day-memorial five times ceremony
Remembering on birthday and death-day
Memories fade over time
Mentioning sometimes would be normal
Later great-grandchildren would ask
Who are the old people in the picture on our wall?

I was so touched by her thoughts: “I am sure your grandfather will be very happy to read his own book.”

My daughter dedicated an entire week to finalize the book: picking a font, designing the book cover, and arranging for publication. She printed out 6 copies of her grandfather’s book, one for me, and rest of the five copies were sent to her grandfather after the Chinese New Year (02-11-2021).

Good things are a long time in coming, the birthday gift to her grandfather was on hold at Chengdu custom since 03-03-2021.

On March 12, 2021, my daughter and I wished my father happy birthday over the phone and chatted with him. My father said to his granddaughter: “The book you made for me is the best gift.”

Though, my father could not hold his own book on his birthday, I took pictures of his book and shared with him over the internet, so my father could see how his own book made by his granddaughter is look like, hope this bring him a virtual joy.

The cover of the book

The cover and the first page of the book:

The four sections

Writing (文)：

Government (辖)：

Labor (工)：

Family (家)：

The last page of the book

Grandfather’s pome remembering late grandmother：

Turning into smoke flying to heaven
Ashes into a box after cremation
7th-day-memorial five times ceremony
Remembering on birthday and death-day
Memories fade over time
Mentioning at times would be normal
Later great-grandchildren would ask
Who are the old people in the picture on our wall?