I’m back in the college town and some things just doesn’t feel right.
Everything is perfect, even the weather. A bit too perfect. Sunny Sunday afternoon, clusters of people hanging out in outdoor restaurants decorated with hanging plants and shiny tiles; bikers gathering and bbq in the park chatting and singing. Smiles on faces. I almost get excited when I saw a dead squirrel on the neatly cut grass. Yes I’m looking for the familiar foul smells and dirty corners. Familiarity, or is that something of an illusion from the past too.
Seeing the bikers, now I wonder where my bike is now. Bike never get killed. One summer I left my bike out for three months and later it’s still ridable. It was on that bike when I was robbed by gun point in this park. But I was never afraid of anything. In the late night darkness I almost felt I live with a special purpose.
Maybe that was just loneliness I didn’t want to accept, my therapist would say. That at some point you fit into the shape of it.
I’m sitting on this particularly nice bench next to the gigantic robotic library, in front of which I used to have a picture of me holding a stack of paper for my best dissertation award. The only thing I remember was that stack of papers meant so much to me. Everyone I knew from the old days have left, and the quad is empty in the summer. I remember this annoying pre-med Asian kid from my first year writing class, who told me that if I walk across the campus without people saying hi to me then I’m a failure. On that very day, crossing this very patch of grass, I started to wave to people. And I have lost contact with all those people I waved at too. I don’t even write in English any more.
The familiarity didn’t kick in until I saw a Chinese guy walking by. Head down fixed on his phone. This is what I was looking for. The past me. I walk pass monuments of my past, backtracking the exact time point I start to be this depressed, in a true Laconic fashion. Second year party? The Premed kid? I have to admit, no. I was happy. I was happier. I was enjoying what I later understood as the white people standard of freedom. I didn’t appreciate it enough then. I’ve lost it all.
Now this is the block where a younger kid from my department got murdered. I lost two nights of sleep hearing the news.
There was a period of my life when I had no fear of anything, danger, harm, even loneliness. I wear my dad’s old jacket and stroll around midnight. Moon shine on the snow glowing yellowish under streetlights. I was, as a matter of fact, very young.
9.19 在读的这本书让我想起久违的一种阅读体验:太真实而细腻的陌生坏境叙述导致的迷茫。我可能习惯了读稍微有点脱离现实的抽象的文本,再读(尤其是美国/欧洲具体地方风俗)的文本有点不适应。让我想起之前试图读John Updike的Rabbit Run的感受,就是感觉可能描写的东西应该非常relatable但是我就是完全无法relate。想起这个来,顺藤摸瓜找到了Updike的短篇A&P,这是高中时候一个老师让我们读的“美国高中阅读材料”,很巧的是我搜索出来的第一条网页也确实是美国高中的读本,这篇就给我一种强烈的supposed to be relatable but can’t relate to it的感受,其实是很难受的,我对美国和美国文化打心眼里还是有排斥,夹在西海岸移民团体/学生团体/tech工人团体里不觉得,阅读的时候又被提醒了这一点
9.19 读过《Small Things Like These》 关注的社会问题很有意义,社会问题从平静的小镇日常生活背后慢慢浮出来。但是我觉得主角的整个故事线都比较一般,结尾也比较unresolved,我看书评说是现代狄更斯,确实有点那种比较直白的道德/人性讨论的感觉
9.19 怎么说呢,一方面我一直在努力使用正版,另一方面现在3ds卡带真的贵,有些游戏本身就没有电子版(有也不打折),二手卡带完全没有像ps2/ps3/psp那样便宜,甚至还变贵了(所谓“收藏价值”,当然了我这种2022年入3ds的人也是part of the problem),三张带盒子的二手卡带加上运费大概80多刀,完全不是小数目。时之笛我玩的时候用的是gamestop买的卡带,没有盘盒感觉怪怪的,就这样还20刀呢。对于比较熟悉的塞尔达系列买了正版卡,但是对于不太熟悉又不知道会不会好玩的游戏,真的没办法下狠心跟收藏的人抢卡带
Six o’clock already I was just in the middle of a dream I was kissin’ Valentino By a crystal-blue, Italian stream
But I can’t be late ‘Cause then I guess I just won’t get paid These are the days When you wish your bed was already made
It’s just another manic Monday I wish it was Sunday ‘Cause that’s my fun day My I don’t have to run day It’s just another manic Monday
8.17 今天在听Yellowcard,可能是每次毕业前就会想起来听Yellowcard,也可能因为正巧黄卡要临时重组演出推送给了我。总之,我听着always summer和ocean avenue感到无限伤感,”We were both 16 and it felt so right”,感到好窝心怎么回事。如果真的重组了,好像再去听一场
8.18 Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star (Sonic Youth) 真的很难给Sonic Youth的专辑们拍个喜爱顺序,这张专辑的噪音真是绝了