第七章、美梦

44.

After I receive his Chinese letter, I apologize first that I cannot express myself well in Chinese. Each time when I write to my parents, I do not know what to say. But in fact I like Chinese and the history when I am in high school. I like reading novels, no matter they are classical masterpieces or modern works. He is good at writing both in Chinese and English. Maybe when he is old and have nothing to do, he can write his own biography during his leisure time. Only those who can write something worth to read or those who do something worthy of being written can be memorized by others.

As I ever tell him, I do not think I am superior to him in English, we are almost at the same level. In fact, my English is not that well when I enter university, just in the middle of my classmates. Now I still can remember my first English lesson in college. Our English teacher wanted us to write the reasons that we learn English. I wrote I wanted to have more chance in future. Just for the uncertain future, I spent much time on it, reading the original English novels, listening to the tapes, and I made progress gradually. I never had listening or oral lessons in my middle and high school, therefore at the beginning I cannot understand the teacher well. What's more, I made a big mistake when I took the final test in the first term. The beginning part of the test was listening comprehension, and I never experienced such kind of test previously. I had thought the speaker would read the questions and the four multi-choice answers to us, what I need to do is just to listen and make a choice. I really did not know that the answers were printed on the test paper. When I realized the truth, it was too late, all 20 questions have been skipped. So you could imagine the result. I had to guess all the answers by my assumption. This experience gives me a good lesson, we cannot take anything for granted and I do know my distance with others in English. Since then I study harder. When I take the CET 4, I am the top three of my class; As for the CET 6, I am the best. He is right, no one is clever than others, vise versa. What we need is just the perseverance. Life is like a long distance run, the runners of this match sometimes lag far behind the others for all kind of reasons, only those who make great efforts can reach the finish line successfully.

I begin to prepare for the TOEFL and GRE before my graduation from university. I am a lonely person, having few friends. Especially in the past three years, I just struggle by myself. No one stands beside me and gives me encouragement or suggestion, but I am accustomed to such kind of life. Sometimes I often ask myself whether it is worthwhile, what it means for me, what is the final aim I want to achieve. I do not grasp the exact answer, it's like an obscure dream. Now maybe my dream comes true, but I am lost in the fog again. I have no idea where I will run now. To tell the truth, I do not study hard since I came to U.S., especially in the first two months. I am often confused about the future. So I begin to visit the websites to pursue the long-lost fairy tale. By talking with others, I do feel better, at least I can calm down and recall the old memories.

In the past two weeks, I finished two final tests and two presentations, there is still one left before I can have a one-month winter holiday. Maybe it is time for him to prepare for his final test too. I am not so sure if he only writes some papers or project and does not have to take the test. The American professors like their students to take tests, almost once a month. I still have difficulties in listening to the lessons, there is still a long way to go, but it does not matter, all Chinese students are good at taking tests. I think I perform well. What I am afraid is just the TSE, I do not know if I can pass that. And I know if he wants to prepare for the tests to go abroad, time is more important to him now. But as long as he can fix his aim and make his efforts, success is just waiting for him around the corner. I suggest he can go to the Internet and look through the websites of the foreign schools in his spare time. There are all kinds of enrollment information and the requirements of the schools available there. Some schools even permit application on line, which is really convenient.


45.

He thinks that it doesn't matter whether I am good at Chinese or not. Now I am in America, it is a good chance to enhance my spoken English. But he does hope I can remember Chinese when I go back to China. Then he can have the chance to understand my so-called poor Chinese. He appreciates my perseverance very much, which lead me to the final success. He also has his own way to improve his oral English. Although he began learning it from grade 2 in his primary school, he used to stand on the pawn, in front of the law building each morning before class, reading aloud, making his tongue work smoothly, feeling the sound and air scratch together. He can still recall those diligent days in the four seasons around the year. Now he can benefit a lot from the useful exercises. His classmates often praised him for his pure pronunciation and ask for instructions of English learning from him. They call him a marvelous boy, a smart boy. Is it the truth or just because he is the monitor of the graduate class?

Surfing on net has become one of his daily habits. Of course he is not a net-addict, maybe last year he was. But now it seems usual for him to check mails, read news and listen to the new-issued CDs on net. The most important thing for him is that he can read my email everyday. He does admit that he will feel a bit lost if he can't see those words typed by me, a boy in America, a boy similar to him. He can't help asking himself, ''Do I fall in love again?''

He can understand what I said about my own feeling during those self-struggling days for success, which is the same to him. He can understand my feelings I ever mentioned when I first arrived in America. Last year, he was also caught by loneliness. At that time he found the attraction of Internet and completely fell into it. He does admit that he wastes quite a lot of time and money on the spiritual rejoices. Therefore, he wish I will never step in his former way again. After all, there are something more important we should do than that. Take today as an example, he changes his new coat to make him look more cheerful, then the new day begins. He edits his thesis on PC in the morning, enjoys a comfortable snap at noon. After that, he designs the exam-paper for his lovely students, and now he is here writing me e-mail. He is fulfilled with energy, believing he can arrange everything well to make his days worthwhile.

The winter holiday is around the corner, first comes the Christmas, a typical western festival I can enjoy for the first time. He jokes me whether there is any amazing present for him---a poor little match boy on the street? Since he will improve his English level from now on, there should be some award for a diligent boy like him. As for the biography I mentioned in the last mail, he does not want to write it at present and he asks: “Am I an old boy now? What's more, how could I omit such a main character like you in my story? I'd like to compose my biography with you in the near future. ”


46.

I cannot control myself recently, cannot sleep well yesterday, just thinking the things happened in the past two months. As I ever tell him I am not a talkative boy, I often stay with myself, but I am talkative with him, telling him almost every thing about myself. He ever tells me he is a loser this year. He loses his time, his money and his love. But in my point of view, he is totally wrong. Things are not so bad as he assumed, at least he gets me at the end of the year. I want to be his lover, and I mean what I say. Then there is only one thing left, I think it's time to tell him the truth---I like him from the bottom of my heart.

He is my first boy friend, and I wish it would be the last one. But he is still free, a free bird who can fly around the broad heaven. In my opinion, if one day he loses his interest to me or I cannot attract him any longer, he can leave me at any time. I still remember one lesson I learned, it is about a young girl who is disabled, cannot walk, have to depend on the wheelchair. One day she meets a young boy, who loves her deeply and wants to protect and take care of her throughout his life. But later the girl leaves the boy suddenly forever. She tells him she doesn't want to be a bird in cage, and she prefers to be a flying bird. One month after their separation, she sends the boy a bird feather and leaves one message: If you really love someone, you should let her free first; If you can get it back, it is real love. I do believe in it. As to us, nowadays we two have to finish our study first, he will graduate one and half a year later, that is the summer of 2002. I do not know the exact date that I will graduate. Under normal conditions, I will spend five years to get my PhD, but if everything goes on well maybe I can graduate 4 years later, that is the summer of 2004. I hope the best result is that he could come to USA within the 4 years, as we all know the social and natural environment here are better than those in China. The Americans are more tolerant to us, in some European countries things are even optimistic. I get acquired that the congress of German just passes the law to accept the marriage of homo gender in the past two weeks. But in China, there is still a long way to go, maybe in future he can do something in this aspect as a law professor or researcher. Yet in our lifetime, maybe it's impossible that we can wait for the day homosexual marriage being accepted by the majorities in China. No matter how, if he cannot go abroad I would consider to come back to China after I get my PhD degree. He is courageous to go to Shanghai seeing his first bf, as to this courage I have it too. I still believe, as long as we bear love in mind, we can conquer any difficulties ahead together.


47.

Christmas is just around the corner, I have received invitation from my supervisor. All the students in the lab will attend a dinner party, maybe I can get some presents then. Our department will hold one too, but I have no idea whether I will attend it or not. Since he calls himself a poor match boy in our jokes, I ask him what kind of present he wants to get, no matter how I will try my best to satisfy his requirement. The American people feel like presenting gifts to others, even in the library you can see the Christmas tree is covered with all kinds of cards. In each card there is a message, if you like you can buy a gift according to the requirement of the message then send it to a little boy or a little girl. So if he likes he can send me a message and bring forward what he wants, then I will find a proper gift. As he says if you feel happy I am happy too, therefore I ask him whether he needs some reference books about GRE. I bought many books, sending some to others and there are still several books left at my home. If he needs I can let my parents mail them to him.


48.

第二天,他用中文给我写了一封信, 希望我在提高自己的英文水平的同时也不要忘记练习汉语:

今天比较忙。早上起来继续给我的学生们出考试题，既不能太难，又不要 太容易，所以很是费了一番时间。同学说我其实只要出些名词解释、简答 、论述之类的就可以了，那样批起考卷来比较容易，可我觉得这样很不妥 。于是，我花了很多时间来设计一些与现实生活紧密结合的题目。因为经 济法本身就很实用，我希望学生们能真正地从我这里学到一些有用的东西 ，而不是书本上的枯燥理论。所以，一不小心一天就这样过去了，到下午 时我还在电脑上作最后的修改。当然，考试之前我会再给他们划划重点的 ，这样他们这个春节会过得比较开心，好心情才会有好运气。:)
　
还没有打完考卷，就有同学来找。原来,本 科时的女同学要和一位在上海社科院作访问学者的老美结婚啦，所以请我 们去吃饭。时间真像是魔术师，仅仅两年，曾经的同学就发生了这么多变 化：有的已经结婚，有的忙着出国，有的继续学业，一切都是这样微妙， 这样自然，似乎是预先安排好的，大概这就叫做命运吧。酒桌上觥筹交错 ，欢声笑语，亦有许多人生的感叹。机遇当然是天赐的，可是缺少了自己 的努力，又会有多少幸运和成功呢？
　
今晚，我们喝了很多酒，虽然有一点点晕，还是跑来看你的信。我发现曾 经恋爱的感觉又回来了，只是这次更踏实，更安全，也给了我更多冷静思 考的机会。现在已经是晚上10：35 分了，美国现在是几点呢？网吧里放着零点乐队的歌曲“你到底爱不爱我 ，我不知道该说些什么”。是的，人生又何尝不是这样，有些生命的追问 是需要用心去寻求答案的。不过在这个过程中，最难得的是寻求一种动力 。你讲的那个故事，我很喜欢，也能够理解其中的含义。但是，面对别人 的故事，我宁愿作一个观者。目睹着身边的匆匆过客，品味他们的人生， 从中可以受益很多，也启发出坚守的信心去谱写自己的人生。坐在这里， 聆听着舒缓的音乐，憧憬着未来相逢的日子，心里慢慢地鼓足了勇气。明 天，我会在哪里？
　
呵呵，真得是很晕，不行了，sorry, 不能 再写了。祈祷我明天早上给学生上课时不会睡着吧。:)
　
祝你好梦，好心情!



(to be continued)