Yanwen’s blog

Wednesday morning I went to meet a high school classmate also in Beijing now. We haven't seen each other for over 40 years. We all have become an old version of ourselves.

As she showed me around her apartment, I noticed some unpacked furniture. She told me they were pictures packed during the apartment remodeling.

The sign of this packing brings back the memories of an old family acquaintance. They moved from New York to Florida in 2021. We went to see them right before the move. They packed plenty of collections and treasures collected over 30 years of their New York life.

I thought at some point in our lives we'd better start downsizing and focus on enriching our life's experience. These collections are 身外之物 (shēn wài zhī wù): materials not inherently ours, that we will have to relinquish eventually. We are like travelers, getting lighter as we have covered a large part of our journey.

Of course, the collection over one's lifetime means also emotional value, apart from monetary one. I once kept the clothes that my children wore when they were babies. Understandably, it's a challenge to part with them.

Every time I am facing the dilemma between keeping and letting go, I always find some comfort and confirmation in considering what Mao Zedong left behind for his family. Nothing in terms of materials.

Yesterday evening, while walking outside with my kid sister, we talked about my meetings with high school or college classmates in China. She told me she seldom went to such gatherings. It's boring because there's not much to talk about with them. People are about the same, more or less.

While I don't go to every one of them, I do enjoy and need some. I told her, meeting people is part of a healthy retirement lifestyle that we should embrace.

Baby brains thrive in many ways with abundance of outside stimulations. Imagine the damage to a baby mentally and emotionally if he were well-fed and clad but were by himself all day long, in a room without human interactions. A deprivation I would consider a crime against humanity!

On the other hand, following the use or loss rule, senior folks' brains shrink faster due to lack of social interactions.

Habits follow the-more-the-more rule, such as, the more you avoid human interactions, the more you feel dreadful about meeting people, the more you prefer being locked in by yourself. This is not good for our brains.

My sister mentioned a gathering during the Spring Festival where the host, after slurping down too much alcohol, started 吹牛逼 (chuī niú bī) bragging. People either 吹牛B or 装13 (zhuāng shi san) pretending at the gathering. It's a waste of time sitting there.

Change your way of looking: this is a super entertaining stage in which people perform without masks. You can't get this free entertainment at home. You can observe, participate, make comments, have fun, or directly tell them to stop bragging or pretending. Get real. Be positive.

去伪存真 (qù wěi cún zhēn), remove the falsehood and keep the truth. The first time I heard of this was long ago from my father. I don't think I understood it at that time. Not until much later after I heard it again from my mother did I gain a better understanding of its meaning.

The year 1967 saw the birth of a small secret group of Red Guards in Beijing, which was said to distribute leaflets against Premier Zhou Enlai. This group was later labeled 5.16 Anti-revolutionary Conspiracy Clique. 

In 1970 the central government issued an official order to capture and eradicate all the 5.16 anti-revolutionaries. It was an era when people were overzealous in answering the call from the above against the anti-revolutionary. There was an over surplus of self-righteous revolutionary fervor burning around, witnessing the young and the stupid of the highest level.

As the result, throughout the country, thousands of thousands of people were thus labeled, arrested, loss of freedom, undergoing persecution, interrogations in isolation, supervised labor and public humiliation. Plenty of them didn't survive the process.

My father worked in Tianjin Mayoral government at that time. Thousands of people were rounded up for interrogation in Tianjin. From the beginning, my father insisted on seeking truth when going through each person. In the end, all were quickly sent home because of my father.

Today I think of my father's words every time I see someone appears to be 装逼 (zhuāng bī), meaning: pretending. The two words are not coherently connected. It doesn't matter as long as I make the connection in my head.

My sisters and I often talked about how we were raised. Our parents knew almost nothing about parenting. They raised us according to their own belief and century-old traditions, simple and straightforward, honest hard work. And mostly following this belief, 万般皆下品，唯有读书高 (wàn bān jiē xià pǐn, wéi yǒu dú shū gāo), nothing is as lofty as study.

My youngest sister is a natural dancer. She doesn't need a teacher. She moves every part of her body gracefully, effortlessly and beautifully with the music, even today. When she was a little girl, she danced everywhere and our neighbors all admired her performance. Someone told my father, send her to a performance art school. There was a privileged institution called Eastern Dance and Singing Group under Tianjin mayoral administration. My father could send her there but he said no.

In old China, people in entertainment industry held low social esteem. I think back in my father's mind, he believed that entertainment was not a reliable profession, or not for decent people.

People of our parents' generation believe that with decades of life experience they know better than their children. With that, naturally they should make decisions for the children.

Since we all turned out great, they must have done something right, even though my sister spent her whole life working at a state-owned bank, an iron-bowl that she never enjoyed. On the other hand, it's not even a relevant concern whether or not you enjoy your job.

My father joined the army when he was a teenager. He pretty much grew up in the army. His book collection consisted mainly of books by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Mao Zedong.

At the beginning of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) there was plenty of chaos everywhere in China. In 1967, the central government decided to take over the control of local governments by the army. The policy was called 三支两军 (sān zhī liǎng jūn): army supporting the leftest masses, the industry, and agriculture, and army taking the control of local government. That's how my father started working at Tianjin mayoral government, approximately in 1968.

I noticed that our bookshelf started swelling up with many other books since then, history and other classic books like Shi-Ji, Chun-qiu-zhan-guo and plenty of other interesting books.

During the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guards confiscated from many innocent families untold pieces of cultural artifacts and books that were considered feudalistic or bourgeoisie or anti-revolutionary in content. 

Perhaps the Red Guards threw their loots into the local government. Perhaps my father got some of his books from his office. 

There must be plenty of other interesting artifacts and treasures but he only brought home some books. Imagine that.