My Father's Suitcase


The following article from New Yorker is another good article about one's father. I read it and like it a lot.


MY FATHER’S SUITCASE
by ORHAN PAMUK
The Nobel Lecture, 2006.
Issue of 2006-12-25 and 2007-01-01
Posted 2006-12-18

Two years before my father died, he gave me a small suitcase filled with his manuscripts and notebooks. Assuming his usual jocular, mocking air, he told me that he wanted me to read them after he was gone, by which he meant after his death.

“Just take a look,” he said, slightly embarrassed. “See if there’s anything in there that you can use. Maybe after I’m gone you can make a selection and publish it.”

We were in my study, surrounded by books. My father was searching for a place to set down the suitcase, wandering around like a man who wished to rid himself of a painful burden. In the end, he deposited it quietly, unobtrusively, in a corner. It was a shaming moment that neither of us ever quite forgot, but once it had passed and we had gone back to our usual roles, taking life lightly, we relaxed. We talked as we always did—about trivial, everyday things, and Turkey’s never-ending political troubles, and my father’s mostly failed business ventures—without feeling too much sorrow.

For several days after that, I walked back and forth past the suitcase without ever actually touching it. I was already familiar with this small black leather case, with a lock and rounded corners. When I was a child, my father had taken it with him on short trips and had sometimes used it to carry documents to work. Whenever he came home from a trip, I’d rush to open this little suitcase and rummage through his things, savoring the scent of cologne and foreign countries. The suitcase was a friend, a powerful reminder of my past, but now I couldn’t even touch it. Why? No doubt because of the mysterious weight of its contents.

I am now going to speak of the meaning of that weight: that weight is what a person creates when he shuts himself up in a room and sits down at a table or retires to a corner to express his thoughts—that is, the weight of literature.

When I did finally touch my father’s suitcase, I still could not bring myself to open it. But I knew what was inside some of the notebooks it held. I had seen my father writing in them. My father had a large library. In his youth, in the late nineteen-forties, he had wanted to be an Istanbul poet, and had translated Valéry into Turkish, but he had not wanted to live the sort of life that came with writing poetry in a poor country where there were few readers. My father’s father—my grandfather—was a wealthy businessman, and my father had led a comfortable life as a child and a young man; he had no wish to endure hardship for the sake of literature, for writing. He loved life with all its beauties: this I understood.

The first thing that kept me away from my father’s suitcase was, of course, a fear that I might not like what I read. Because my father understood this, too, he had taken the precaution of acting as if he did not take the contents of the case seriously. By this time, I had been working as a writer for twenty-five years, and his failure to take literature seriously pained me. But that was not what worried me most: my real fear—the crucial thing that I did not wish to discover—was that my father might be a good writer. If true and great literature emerged from my father’s suitcase, I would have to acknowledge that inside my father there existed a man who was entirely different from the one I knew. This was a frightening possibility. Even at my advanced age, I wanted my father to be my father and my father only—not a writer.

A writer is someone who spends years patiently trying to discover the second being inside him, and the world that makes him who he is. When I speak of writing, the image that comes first to my mind is not a novel, a poem, or a literary tradition; it is the person who shuts himself up in a room, sits down at a table, and, alone, turns inward. Amid his shadows, he builds a new world with words. This man—or this woman—may use a typewriter, or profit from the ease of a computer, or write with a pen on paper, as I do. As he writes, he may drink tea or coffee, or smoke cigarettes. From time to time, he may rise from his table to look out the window at the children playing in the street, or, if he is lucky, at trees and a view, or even at a black wall. He may write poems, or plays, or novels, as I do. But all these differences arise only after the crucial task is complete—after he has sat down at the table and patiently turned inward. To write is to transform that inward gaze into words, to study the worlds into which we pass when we retire into ourselves, and to do so with patience, obstinacy, and joy.

As I sit at my table, for days, months, years, slowly adding words to empty pages, I feel as if I were bringing into being that other person inside me, in the same way that one might build a bridge or a dome, stone by stone. As we hold words in our hands, like stones, sensing the ways in which each is connected to the others, looking at them sometimes from afar, sometimes from very close, caressing them with our fingers and the tips of our pens, weighing them, moving them around, year in and year out, patiently and hopefully, we create new worlds.

The writer’s secret is not inspiration—for it is never clear where that comes from—but stubbornness, endurance. The lovely Turkish expression “to dig a well with a needle” seems to me to have been invented with writers in mind. In the old stories, I love the patience of Ferhat, who digs through mountains for his love—and I understand it, too. When I wrote, in my novel “My Name Is Red,” about the old Persian miniaturists who drew the same horse with the same passion for years and years, memorizing each stroke, until they could re-create that beautiful horse even with their eyes closed, I knew that I was talking about the writing profession, and about my own life. If a writer is to tell his own story—to tell it slowly, and as if it were a story about other people—if he is to feel the power of the story rise up inside him, if he is to sit down at a table and give himself over to this art, this craft, he must first be given some hope. The angel of inspiration (who pays regular visits to some and rarely calls on others) favors the hopeful and the confident, and it is when a writer feels most lonely, when he feels most doubtful about his efforts, his dreams, and the value of his writing, when he thinks that his story is only his story—it is at such moments that the angel chooses to reveal to him the images and dreams that will draw out the world he wishes to build. If I think back on the books to which I have devoted my life, I am most surprised by those moments when I felt as if the sentences and pages that made me ecstatically happy came not from my own imagination but from another power, which had found them and generously presented them to me.

I was afraid of opening my father’s suitcase and reading his notebooks because I knew that he would never have tolerated the difficulties that I had tolerated, that it was not solitude he loved but mixing with friends, crowds, company. Still, later my thoughts took a different turn. These dreams of renunciation and patience, it occurred to me, were prejudices that I had derived from my own life and my own experience as a writer. There were plenty of brilliant writers who wrote amid crowds and family, in the glow of company and happy chatter. In addition, even my father had, at some point, tired of the monotony of family life and left for Paris, where—like so many writers—he had sat in a hotel room filling notebooks. I knew that some of those very notebooks were in the suitcase, because, during the years before he brought me the case, he had finally begun to talk about that period in his life. He had spoken about those years when I was a child, but he had never discussed his vulnerabilities, his dreams of becoming a writer, or the questions of identity that had plagued him in his Paris hotel room. He’d spoken instead of the times he’d seen Sartre on the sidewalks of Paris, of the books he’d read and the films he’d gone to, all with the elated sincerity of someone imparting important news.

When I became a writer, I knew that it was partly thanks to the fact that I had a father who spoke of world writers much more than he ever spoke of pashas or great religious leaders. So perhaps, I told myself, I would have to read my father’s notebooks with my gratitude in mind, remembering, too, how indebted I was to his large library. I would have to remember that, when he was living with us, my father, like me, enjoyed being alone with his books and his thoughts—and not pay too much attention to the literary quality of his writing. But as I gazed so anxiously at the suitcase he had bequeathed to me I also felt that this was the very thing I would not be able to do.

Sometimes my father would stretch out on a divan, abandon the book or the magazine in his hand, and drift off into a dream, losing himself for the longest time. When I saw this expression on his face, which was so different from the one he wore for the joking, teasing, and bickering of family life, when I saw the first signs of an inward gaze, I would understand, with trepidation, that he was discontented. Now, many years later, I understand that this discontent is the basic trait that turns a person into a writer. Patience and toil are not enough: first, we must feel compelled to escape crowds, company, the stuff of ordinary life, and shut ourselves up in a room. The precursor of this sort of independent writer—one who reads to his heart’s content, who, by listening only to the voice of his own conscience, disputes others’ words, and who, by entering into conversation with his books, develops his own thoughts and his own world—was surely Montaigne, in the earliest days of modern literature. Montaigne was a writer to whom my father returned often, a writer he recommended to me. I would like to see myself as belonging to the tradition of writers who—wherever they are in the world, East or West—cut themselves off from society and shut themselves up in their rooms with their books; this is the starting point of true literature.

But once we have shut ourselves away we soon discover that we are not as alone as we thought. We are in the company of the words of those who came before us, of other people’s stories, other people’s books—the thing we call tradition. I believe literature to be the most valuable tool that humanity has found in its quest to understand itself. Societies, tribes, and peoples grow more intelligent, richer, and more advanced as they pay attention to the troubled words of their authors—and, as we all know, the burning of books and the denigration of writers are both signs that dark and improvident times are upon us. But literature is never just a national concern. The writer who shuts himself up in a room and goes on a journey inside himself will, over the years, discover literature’s eternal rule: he must have the artistry to tell his own stories as if they were other people’s stories, and to tell other people’s stories as if they were his own, for that is what literature is.

My father had a good library, fifteen hundred volumes in all—more than enough for a writer. By the age of twenty-two, I had perhaps not read them all, but I was familiar with each book. I knew which were important, which were light and easy reading, which were classics, which an essential part of any education, which forgettable but amusing accounts of local history, and which French authors my father rated highly. Sometimes I would look at this library from a distance and imagine that one day, in a different house, I would build my own library, an even better library—build myself a world. When I looked at my father’s library from afar, it seemed to me to be a small picture of the real world. But this was a world seen from our own corner, from Istanbul. My father had built his library mostly on his trips abroad, with books from Paris and America, but he had also stocked it with books bought at Istanbul’s foreign-language bookshops in the forties and fifties.

In the seventies, I did begin, somewhat ambitiously, to build my own library. I had not quite decided to become a writer; as I related in my book “Istanbul,” I had come to suspect that I would not be a painter, as I had hoped, but I was not yet sure what path my life would take. There was inside me a relentless curiosity, a hope-driven desire to read and learn, but at the same time I felt that my life was in some way lacking, that I would not be able to live like others. Part of this feeling was connected to what I felt when I gazed at my father’s library: that I was living in the provinces, far from the center of things. This was a feeling I shared with everyone in Istanbul in those days. There was another reason for my anxiety: I knew only too well that I lived in a country that showed little interest in its artists—whether painters or writers—and offered them no hope. In the seventies, when I took the money my father gave me and greedily bought faded, dusty, dog-eared books from Istanbul’s old booksellers, I was as affected by the pitiable state of these secondhand bookstores—and by the despairing dishevelment of the poor, bedraggled booksellers, who laid out their wares at roadsides, in mosque courtyards, and in the niches of crumbling walls—as I was by their books.

As for my place in the world: in life, as in literature, I felt, fundamentally, that I was not “at the center.” At the center of the world, there was a life that was richer and more exciting than our own, and, like all of Istanbul, all of Turkey, I was outside it. In the same way, there was world literature, and its center was far away from me. Actually, what I had in mind then was Western, not world, literature, and we Turks were certainly outside it. My father’s library was evidence of this. At one end of the room, there were Istanbul’s books—our literature, our local world, in all its beloved detail—and at the other end were the books from this other, Western world, which bore no resemblance to ours, a lack of resemblance that caused us both pain and hope. To write, to read, was like leaving one world to find consolation in the otherness of another, in the strange and the wondrous. I felt that my father had read novels in order to escape his life and flee to the West—just as I did later.

Books in general, it seemed to me in those days, were what we picked up to escape our own culture, which we found wanting. And it wasn’t only by reading that we could leave our Istanbul lives and travel West; it was by writing, too. To fill those notebooks of his, my father had gone to Paris and shut himself up in a room, and then he had carried the notebooks back to Turkey. As I gazed at my father’s suitcase, it seemed to me that this was part of what was causing me disquiet: after working in a room, trying to survive as a writer in Turkey for twenty-five years, I was galled to see my father hide his deep thoughts in this suitcase, to see him act as if writing were work that had to be done in secret, far from the eyes of society, the state, the people. Perhaps this was the main reason that I felt angry at my father for not taking literature as seriously as I did.

In fact, I was angry at my father because he had not led a life like mine—because he had never quarrelled with his life, and had spent it happily laughing with his friends and his loved ones. But part of me also knew that I was not so much “angry” as “jealous,” that the second word was more accurate, and this, too, made me uneasy. I’d ask myself in a scornful, angry voice: What is happiness? Is happiness believing that you live a deep life in your lonely room? Or is happiness leading a comfortable life in society, believing in the same things as everyone else, or, at least, acting as if you did? Is it happiness or unhappiness to go through life writing in secret, while seeming to be in harmony with all that surrounds you?

But these were ill-tempered questions. Wherever had I got the idea that the most important measure of a good life was happiness? People, papers—everyone acted as if it were. Did this alone not suggest that it might be worth trying to find out if the opposite was true? After all, my father had run away from his family many times—how well did I know him, and how well could I say that I understood his disquiet?

So this was what was driving me when I first opened my father’s suitcase: Did my father have a secret, an unhappiness in his life that I knew nothing about, something that he could endure only by pouring it into his writing? As soon as I opened the suitcase, I recalled its scent of travel and recognized several notebooks that my father had shown me years earlier, though without dwelling on them for long. Most of the notebooks I now took in my hands he had filled when he was in Paris as a young man. Although, like so many writers I admired—writers whose biographies I had read—I wished to know what my father had written, and what he had thought, when he was the age I was now, it did not take me long to realize that I would find nothing like that here. What disturbed me most was when, now and again, in my father’s notebooks, I came upon a writerly voice. This was not my father’s voice, I told myself; it wasn’t authentic, or, at least, it didn’t belong to the man I’d known as my father. Beneath my fear that my father might not have been my father when he wrote was a more profound fear: the fear that, deep inside, I was not authentic. If I found nothing good in my father’s writing, if I found him to have been overly influenced by other writers, I would be plunged into the despair that had afflicted me so strongly when I was young, casting my life, my very being, my desire to write, and my work into question. During my first ten years as a writer, I had felt these anxieties keenly, and, even as I battled them, I had feared that one day I would have to admit defeat—just as I had done with painting—and give up writing as well.

So these were the two things I felt as I closed my father’s suitcase and put it away: a sense of being marooned in the provinces, and a fear that I lacked authenticity. For years, I had, in my reading and my writing, been discovering, studying, and deepening these emotions, in all their variety and their unintended consequences, their nerve endings, their triggers, and their many colors. Certainly my spirits had been jarred by the confusions, the sensitivities, and the fleeting pains that life and books had sprung on me, especially as a young man. But it was only by writing books that I came to a fuller understanding of the problems of authenticity (in “My Name Is Red” and “The Black Book”) and the problems of life on the periphery (in “Snow” and “Istanbul”). For me, to be a writer is to acknowledge the secret wounds that we carry inside us, wounds so secret that we ourselves are barely aware of them, and to patiently explore them, know them, illuminate them, own them, and make them a conscious part of our spirit and our writing.

A writer talks of things that we all know but do not know that we know. To explore this knowledge, and to watch it grow, is a pleasurable thing; the reader visits a world that is at once familiar and miraculous. When a writer uses his secret wounds as his starting point, he is, whether he is aware of it or not, putting great faith in humanity. My confidence comes from the belief that all human beings resemble one another, that others carry wounds like mine—and that they will therefore understand. All true literature rises from this childish, hopeful certainty that we resemble one another. When a writer shuts himself up in a room for years on end, with this gesture he suggests a single humanity, a world without a center.

But, as can be seen from my father’s suitcase and the pale colors of our lives in Istanbul, the world did have a center, and it was far away from us. I know from experience that the great majority of people on this earth live with the same feeling of inauthenticity and Chekhovian provinciality, and that many suffer from an even deeper sense of insufficiency, insecurity, and degradation than I do. Yes, the greatest dilemmas facing humanity are still landlessness, homelessness, and hunger . . . but today our televisions and newspapers tell us about these fundamental problems more quickly and more simply than literature ever could. What literature most needs to tell and to investigate now is humanity’s basic fears: the fear of being left outside, the fear of counting for nothing, and the feeling of worthlessness that comes with such fears—the collective humiliations, vulnerabilities, slights, grievances, sensitivities, and imagined insults, and the nationalist boasts and inflations that are their next of kin. . . . Whenever I am confronted by such sentiments, and by the irrational, overstated language in which they are usually expressed, I know that they touch on a darkness inside me. We have often witnessed peoples, societies, and nations outside the Western world—and I can identify with them easily—succumbing to fears that lead them to commit stupid acts. I also know that in the West—a world with which I can identify just as easily—nations and peoples that take an excessive pride in their wealth, and in their glory at having brought us the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and modernism, have, from time to time, succumbed to a self-satisfaction that is almost as stupid.

So my father was not the only one: we all give too much importance to the idea of a world with a center. Whereas the impulse that compels us to shut ourselves up in our rooms to write for years on end is a faith in the opposite, the belief that one day our writings will be read and understood, because people the world over resemble one another. This, as I know from my own and my father’s writing, is a troubled optimism, scarred by the anger of being consigned to the margins. The love and hate that Dostoyevsky felt toward the West all his life—I have felt this, too, on many occasions. But if I have grasped an essential truth, if I have cause for optimism, it is because I have travelled with this great writer through his love-hate relationship with the West and I have beheld the world that he built on the other side.

All writers who have devoted their lives to their work know this reality: whatever our original purpose, the world that we create after years and years of hopeful writing will, in the end, take us to other, very different places. It will take us far from the table at which we have worked in sadness or in anger; it will take us to the other side of that sadness and anger, into another world. Could my father not have reached such a world himself? Like the land that slowly begins to take shape, rising from the mist in its many colors like an island spied after a long sea journey, this other world enchants us. We are as beguiled as the Western travellers who voyaged from the south to behold Istanbul rising from the mist. At the end of a journey begun in hope and curiosity, there lies before us a city of mosques and minarets, a medley of houses, streets, hills, bridges, and slopes—an entire world. Seeing this world, we wish to enter it and lose ourselves in it, just as we might in a book. After sitting down to write because we felt provincial, excluded, marginalized, angry, or deeply melancholic, we have found an entire world beyond these sentiments.

What I feel now is the opposite of what I felt as a child and a young man: for me, the center of the world is Istanbul. This is not just because I have lived there all my life but because, for the past thirty-three years, I have been narrating its streets, its bridges, its people, its dogs, its houses, its mosques, its fountains, its strange heroes, its shops, its famous characters, its dark spots, its days, and its nights, making them a part of me, embracing them all. A point arrived when this world that I had made with my own hands, this world that existed only in my head, was more real to me than the city in which I actually lived. That was when all these people and streets, objects and buildings seemed to begin to talk among themselves, interacting in ways that I had not anticipated, as if they lived not just in my imagination or my books but for themselves. This world that I had created, like a man digging a well with a needle, then seemed truer than anything else.

As I gazed at my father’s suitcase, it occurred to me that he might also have discovered this kind of happiness in the years he spent writing. I should not prejudge him. I was so grateful to him, after all. He had never been a commanding, forbidding, overpowering, punishing, ordinary father. He had always left me free, always showed me the utmost respect. I had often thought that if I had, from time to time, been able to draw on my imagination, whether in freedom or in childishness, it was because, unlike so many of my friends from childhood and youth, I had no fear of my father. On some deeper level, I was able to become a writer because my father, in his youth, had also wished to be one. I would have to read him with tolerance—to seek to understand what he had written in those hotel rooms.

It was with these hopeful thoughts that I walked over to the suitcase, which was still sitting where my father had left it. Using all my will power, I read through a few manuscripts and notebooks. What had my father written about? I recall a few views from the windows of Paris hotels, a few poems, paradoxes, analyses. . . . As I write, I feel like someone who has just been in a traffic accident and is struggling to remember how it happened, while at the same time dreading the prospect of remembering too much. When I was a child, and my father and mother were on the brink of a quarrel—when they fell into one of their deadly silences—my father would turn on the radio, to change the mood, and the music would help us forget it all faster.

So let me change the mood with a few sweet words that will, I hope, serve as well as that music. The question we writers are asked most often, the favorite question, is: Why do you write? I write because I have an innate need to write. I write because I can’t do normal work as other people do. I write because I want to read books like the ones I write. I write because I am angry at everyone. I write because I love sitting in a room all day writing. I write because I can partake of real life only by changing it. I write because I want others, the whole world, to know what sort of life we lived, and continue to live, in Istanbul, in Turkey. I write because I love the smell of paper, pen, and ink. I write because I believe in literature, in the art of the novel, more than I believe in anything else. I write because it is a habit, a passion. I write because I am afraid of being forgotten. I write because I like the glory and interest that writing brings. I write to be alone. Perhaps I write because I hope to understand why I am so very, very angry at everyone. I write because I like to be read. I write because once I have begun a novel, an essay, a page I want to finish it. I write because everyone expects me to write. I write because I have a childish belief in the immortality of libraries, and in the way my books sit on the shelf. I write because it is exciting to turn all life’s beauties and riches into words. I write not to tell a story but to compose a story. I write because I wish to escape from the foreboding that there is a place I must go but—as in a dream—can’t quite get to. I write because I have never managed to be happy. I write to be happy.

A week after he came to my office and left me his suitcase, my father paid me another visit; as always, he brought me a bar of chocolate (he had forgotten that I was forty-eight years old). As always, we chatted and laughed about life, politics, and family gossip. A moment arrived when my father’s gaze drifted to the corner where he had left his suitcase, and he saw that I had moved it. We looked each other in the eye. There followed a pressing silence. I did not tell him that I had opened the suitcase and tried to read its contents; instead, I looked away. But he understood. Just as I understood that he had understood. Just as he understood that I had understood that he had understood. But all this understanding went only as far as it could go in a few seconds. Because my father was a happy, easygoing man who had faith in himself, he smiled at me the way he always did. And, as he left the house, he repeated all the lovely and encouraging things he always said to me, like a father.

As always, I watched him leave, envying his happiness, his carefree and unflappable temperament. But I remember that on that day there was also a flash of joy inside me that made me ashamed. It was prompted by the thought that maybe I wasn’t as comfortable in life as he was, maybe I had not led as happy or footloose a life as he had, but at least I had devoted mine to writing. You understand . . . I was ashamed to be thinking such things at my father’s expense—of all people, my father, who had never been a source of pain to me, who had left me free. All this should remind us that writing and literature are intimately linked to a void at the center of our lives, to our feelings of happiness and guilt.

But my story has a symmetry that immediately reminded me of something else that day, bringing with it an even deeper sense of guilt. Twenty-three years before my father left me his suitcase, and four years after I had decided, at the age of twenty-two, to become a novelist, and, abandoning all else, shut myself up in a room, I finished my first novel, “Cevdet Bey and His Sons.” With trembling hands, I gave my father a typescript of the still unpublished novel, so that he could read it and tell me what he thought. I did this not only because I had confidence in his taste and his intellect; his opinion was very important to me because, unlike my mother, he had not opposed my wish to become a writer. At that point, my father was not with us, but far away. I waited impatiently for his return. When he arrived, two weeks later, I ran to open the door. My father said nothing, but he immediately threw his arms around me in a way that told me he had liked the book very much. For a while, we were plunged into the sort of awkward silence that often accompanies moments of great emotion. Then, when we had calmed down and begun to talk, my father resorted to highly charged and exaggerated language to express his confidence in me and in my first novel: he told me that one day I would win the prize that I have now received with such great happiness. He said this not because he was trying to convince me of his good opinion or to set the prize as a goal; he said it like a Turkish father, supporting his son, encouraging him by saying, “One day you’ll be a pasha!” For years, whenever he saw me, he would encourage me with the same words.

My father died in December, 2002.

(© The Nobel Foundation, 2006. Translated, from the Turkish, by Maureen Freely.)

Good books list

I believe that reading good books opens one's eyes and deepens one's mind.

"How to read a book" says that good books are normally verreadable since authors wrote those books for ordinary people. I realized it is true when I read Milton Friendman's "Capticalism and Freedom".

I eager to digest more good books. Here are a list of good books people recommended:

• 100 best books from National Review


• The Hundred Most Influential Books Since the War (TLS)

I envy the ones who can thnk well, and always want to be one of them. Reading lots of books may not transform me into a good thinker, but at least, I can peek how other thinkers think and benefit from watching them.

--peter
http://lishihwei.googlepages.com/home

Economist

I finally subscribed to Economist magazine, the one I really enjoy reading.

Through out reading lots of good articles together with writing regularly, I hope that my English writing would be better in the coming 2007.
--
--peter
http://lishihwei.googlepages.com/home

Piano

Costco is promoting pianos. There are ten or so pianos and an old saleswoman. The saleswoman looked ordinary, nothing special. I never really paid attention to that saleswoman.

Last night, I went to Costco and there were not many people there. The old saleswoman was playing piano herself. Oh, piano sounded so great especially when the sounds come from that old lady's ordinary-looking fingers. The sounds seem from the heaven. I stopped by the pianos, closed my eyes, listened and wondered whether I could play piano as well as she does---I almost believe that I could, if I ever knew how.

How lucky she is to be able to play piano, so when she is angry, she can play angrily; when happy, play happily; when sad, play sadly. I padded away from those pianos with envies and griefs.


--
--peter
http://lishihwei.googlepages.com/home

Last night, I told Anbo "Crabs and the Monkey", a Japanese folk story. I found the story on-line. I read the story aloud to Anbo when Anbo looked at the story on screen. In this way, I hope that Anbo could pick up Chinese words quickly.

I am like a professional storyteller, who can mimic all kinds of voices in the story. Listening to my story, one can easily depict the scenes of the story in his mind, so Anbo was very into the story. After my story, Wenlei told Anbo a story about elephants. Her dull and flat voice simply can't attract Anbo. Anbo ran away from her after 30 seconds.

I am very proud of myself. Apparently, Wenlei needs more practices and I shall give her more opportunities.

Practice makes perfect

Indeed, practice makes perfect. Let me tell you why I say so.

Somehow, Anbo's favorite story is "Three little pigs". He often 'begs' me to tell him this story. Well, actually, I already told him
this story more than one hundred times. To be honest, I myself is very bored to death by this story already -- after repeatingthe same story
one hundred times, I no longer need the story book---like a recorder, I can forward, rewind, stop, pause and play the story at anytime.

I decided to have fun with myself, too. I grow the story a little bit everytime when I repeat the story to Anbo. First, I added lots of details to the story.
For example, I explained why building a brick house needs sand, water, concrete and bicks, and how to build a brick house from these raw material. Second, I will ask for Ambo's opinions.
So, there are some interactions bewteen me and my son. Third, when I told the story, I tried to use different words to describe.

Yesterday, I found that my story attracts not only Ambo, but aso his mother. Wenlei was angry at me as usual, but I saw her burst into laughes when I told Anbo how the big wolf was trying to
touch the pigs' trembling curly tails.

Well, the success of 'three little pigs' indicates that I hardly get away from these pigs in the near future.

I am very depressed

I am truly depressed.

In these months, my lives changed dramatically---I work from home and I no longer access to
lots of convenient facilities, like fax machines, copy machines, .. etc.
The problem is that people around me did not think so.

For example, I am asked to mail a package attached with a photocopy of my green card. Gods knows
how difficult it becomes -- First, there is no copy machine at home, nor at post office. Then when I get to the
local library and get a copy of my green card there, the quality of the result is not acceptable for the machine
there is a piece of junk.

To get a copy of my green card, I spent more than one hour and I still can't get it done. I used to finish
all of these in a second. I was happy to manage to collect all the data, fill out all forms and what other people need
to do is just to sign their signatures, which I can't do for them. A concrete example is when I tried to apply
for green cards.

Last night, I asked a simple question: "Why don't you have make a copy of my green card for me?" I was blasted
off by a very rude shout -- "You hold your own green card a treasury and no body else can touch it ! "
No, the answer is off the topic and is an attack. I would give out my card if I was asked "Can you give me
your card for I want to make a copy of it when I make my own."; however, that never happened.

To be fair and to have a good balance, it is true that almost all of the forms are done and what I need to is to sign my signature except that I spend 20-minute to search out the form, re-fill out the page 7, print the page, and replace the wrong page for
an error I pointed out days ago. That is OK and I thank for all of efforts for putting all of these together. I just feel very very
depressed when I spent two hours outside and can't get my copy of green card. Not even to mention mailing out the package.




--
--peter
http://lishihwei.googlepages.com/home

"How to Read a Book"

I must say that my reading skill in English is in the elementary level by the standard in "How to Read a Book", by M. J. Adler. But, I am
in the way to improve it. Just finish skimming the very inspiring book in an environment full of obstacles. Come to know the book through reading "Code Complete", by Steve McConnell, that I stopped in the middle. I will resume reading "Code Complete" next week.

Hope to find and digest more valuable books that lift up my knowledge, improve every aspect of my live and complete me.

One day, I hope that I can answer who I am and why I am. That would be the goal why I read -- read to find myself.

Early morning walks

For three days in a row, I have had pleasant early-morning walks. In these fifty-minute walks, I listened
to Harry Potter from my iPod. I listened to Harry Potter, so I can make up Anbo some stories at night.

Through telling Anbo stories, I realized that I myself am not very creative. Vary sad, but very true. I am
a very good imitator, but a lousy creator. Well, that is fine, as long as one can truly recognize and accept
what one really is, one can still make great achievements out from one's limited talents.

Anbo is developing his own appreciation on beauty. Recently, he often criticised my drawings.
Eve rytime, when I took short steps and came up lousy drawings, he noticed and demanded redrawing.
It is really interesting to observe a child's growing.

I was searching for 24-style Tai Chi Quan online, but ran into this article. The article uses Tai Chi Quan as medium to describe the author's relationship to his father.

太極拳 文/張輝誠

張輝誠爸爸說：「這拳法是咱門張家老祖宗一路傳下來的，傳到你大陸上的爺爺，你爺爺再又傳給我，你要學不會，怎對得住張家列祖列宗？」於是，每天黃昏，我爸一回到家，便領著我迎著餘暉走出庄外，到田間的農路上打拳。

我打小就跟著父親學太極拳，這其實沒什麼好說嘴的，像這種慢吞吞的動作，只適合我外公學而已，我小時的那群玩伴，哪一個不是風靡九月十五大拜拜在我們蔥仔 寮古安宮前請來的露天電影裡頭的成龍，成龍和裡頭白頭老翁使得虎虎生風的不是蛇形刁手、螳螂拳，就是鷹爪、醉拳，動作又快又狠，肌肉厚健剛強，舉手投足充 滿英氣，那像太極拳溫溫吞吞，小家子器得很，所以我們這群小毛頭老是在三合院前的空地比劃著電影裡的身段、手勢 －當然，這得瞞著我父親才行。

「那些都是個不入流的外家功。」我爸經常在早晨教我打拳時，聽我說成龍怎樣怎樣的時候，就這樣訓斥著。練太極拳不是一件多樂的差事，我爸要求極嚴，開拳前 的暖身動作一點都不得馬虎，光是躬拳轉體、彎腰觸地、大甩手、前踢、前蹬、外翻圈踢、內翻圈踢，就足足折騰了半個小時，一回下來早就大汗淋漓、氣喘吁吁。 這還只是開場白而已，接下來就得蹲弓形、紮馬步，表面上看起來是練基本功，實際上和上課竊竊私語被老師罰到教室後半蹲沒什麼兩樣，唯一不同的是，半蹲可以 亂蹲，馬步可不許亂紮，我爸要求馬步要如樁入地，穩如磐石，但又要靜裡寓動，如蓄滿的水庫可隨時一瀉千里，奔騰發勁，說得自然比較簡單，一旦我雙腳與肩同 寬紮馬下去後，我爸就靠過來，要我仔細著收進小腹，把重心放在大腿上而不是落在膝蓋，然後叫我再蹲下去一點，這種姿勢只要過了一分鐘，大腿上的肌肉便開始 自行亂竄舞動起來，我臉上表情也隨之猙獰，身子不由得歪七扭八，我爸這時候就會在一旁氣定神閒地說：「馬步紮不好，學什麼都是空的！」然後就看他好整以暇 的蹲完十五分鐘的馬步，臉不紅，氣不喘。

爸爸又要我練拳了

後來，我爸從軍中退下來，回來和我們一起住在蔥仔寮的外公家，白天就在附近鄉鎮接做板模零工，那時我才剛學會背書包排路隊走路到山內國小讀書，照理說父子 倆白天應當無暇練拳才是，說也奇怪，我爸可不這麼認為，儘管他幹完一天粗活回到家早已疲累不堪，卻還是堅持要教我練拳，反正就是不准我一日荒廢拳課，他 說：「這拳法是咱門張家老祖宗一路傳下來的，傳到你大陸上的爺爺，你爺爺再又傳給我，你要學不會，怎對得住張家列祖列宗？」於是，每天黃昏，我爸一回到 家，便領著我迎著餘暉走出庄外，到田間的農路上打拳，說打拳其實還不是蹲馬步，我打小蹲馬步蹲了幾年，蹲久了竟也蹲出一點心得，這馬步要蹲得久蹲得讓我爸 說聲好，不外就是兩個小要訣，其一是股跨間須柔中帶勁，勁中夾柔；其二是腳板要如千鈞頂，頂住全身。這怎麼說呢？剛開始大腿肌不是像汽水一樣畢波起泡胡顫 亂蹦嗎，可時間一久，抖顫的力道漸次減弱，轉而像波浪一樣在腿肌上運行，這時候只要一放鬆，全身便輕盈起來，一施力，股間就充滿勁道，這時候著力點便由大 腿轉向腳底，由腳底支撐全身，由股跨負責發勁。我蹲完馬步後，我爸這時候拍拍他的大腿和手臂，對著我說：「你要記住，這股肱是人的兩大彈簧，所有的勁道都 是從這裡發出。」然後站直身子說：「今天再教你一個新的樁法，叫仆步樁。」我爸把五個手法身形串在一塊兒練，左右對稱各五個號令，一是側推掌下弓步，二是 換手推掌單吊腳，三是轉身橫劈，四才是仆步正樁，單押腳側身下探，五是出掌。我爸演示過一回，要我依樣畫葫蘆照著練，我做了幾回，他極不滿意，說：「身子 骨這麼輕浮！」然後叫我跟著他一起走入還沒插秧的水稻田裡，把腳踩進爛泥巴裡頭，然後他在泥巴裡又演示一回仆步樁給我看，我一看當真傻眼，我爸在水稻田裡 吊腳、轉身、下探，動作之乾淨俐落如履平地，一點都不為泥巴所黏滯，膝蓋以下雖沾泥帶水，動作卻行雲流水，讓人簡直不敢置信。輪到我了，才剛要起腳，哪知 右腳陷得太深，拔不起來，拔了幾下才勉強拔起，推掌單吊腳，順勢正要轉身橫劈時，卻因動作太猛，下腳太遠，兩腳間距過大，一不小心，重心不穩，兩腳如繫桎 梏，動彈不得，撲通一聲，一頭栽進泥水裡，好巧不巧，這時候我外婆正好出現在庄口叫喚著：「阿榮仔，轉來食飯喔！啊我耶金龜孫子呢？」

只傳心法不講架子

算一算，我斷斷續續練仆步樁、蹲馬步的時間已經過了六年，但當真開始練太極拳還是等我爸從台南回來，用賺來的錢買了一間二樓透天樓房，從此父子倆有空閒聚 在一塊兒，這才又重新入門。新買的二樓透天樓房，位於蔥仔寮三公里外的褒忠街的街尾。搬進新家後，父親不再往台南工作，而是留在家裡讓人當師父僱請。這下 子，我爸又要我練拳了。

練拳的地點是在頂樓平台，時間和往常一樣是在黃昏時刻。這一天，做完暖身操、蹲完馬步後，父親說：「趕今兒個起，來練太極拳。」他叫我在一旁候著，自顧自 地演練起來，每演一式即口呼一令，只聽見金剛搗碓、白鶴亮翅、青龍出水、懶紮衣、單鞭、玉女穿梭、白猿獻果、當頭炮等名號絡繹從耳畔掠過，演了約莫八十餘 式，方才深呼吸雙手合圍順胸而下，對我說：「這是陳式太極拳，屬陽剛一路。」又站回原地，說：「再看仔細了！」然後又陸續演了楊式、吳式、武式、孫式四家 太極拳 ，有偏柔的、有偏剛的、有柔中帶剛、也有剛中含柔，風格不一而足。可我就不明白，既然我老祖宗傳下來給我爺爺，我爺爺再又傳給我爸，沒道理不用張家做名號 創一個張式太極拳 啊？我爸聽了我的問題，緩緩說道：「咱們張式太極拳，只傳心法，不講架子，所以不以拳式聞名，不過，咱們張家拳法遠在各家之上，日後你自然明白這個道 理。」

自此之後，我即由陳式太極拳入手，日日演練，約莫半年，熟習一家，熟習後便換習一家，四年之後，五家七種（陳式分老架、新架，楊式分一路、二路）太極拳皆 嫻熟精擅，演練無礙。四年期間，父親經常在一旁指點要領，說：「練架子要注意內外上下，屬於內者，即所謂用意不用力，下則氣沉丹田，上則虛靈頂勁；屬於外 者，用身輕靈、節節貫串、由腳而腿而腰、含胸拔背、沉肩墜肘。」其他道理我都懂，單單對節節貫串不明白，父親再又解釋說：「節節者，指身體之九關節，頸、 脊、腰、胯、膝、踝、肩、肘、腕，一動俱動，節節貫串，動在手，腳亦著動，動在腳，手亦著動，全身合而為一。」

變化多端來去自如

這一天，天氣酷熱，父親在一旁覷著我練拳，忽然發出嘆息聲，搖著頭伸手阻止我，說：「停停停，練來練去，一身空架子，半點神氣也沒。」叫我下樓，隨他出 門，朝家門前左邊一條農業小徑走去，最後停在一棟豬寮後面，這是一方池塘，池水碧綠。我爸衣服也沒脫，隨即縱身入池，要我也下去，我慢慢探腳下去，走到父 親身旁，池水深及頸部，我爸比我還矮一點，池水在他的嘴唇邊流蕩著，父親開口說話：「看仔細了！」忽然霍地一聲，父親從水裡高舉雙手，開始演起太極拳，只 見舉手投足之間，忽而水花四濺、忽然柔波輕漾、忽而拔跳出浪、忽而屈身破水，身形極其輕盈、神氣鼓蕩不已。收勢演完之後對我說：「這太極拳的精義，就在於 要如水之流，趁虛而入，盈科後進，柔而化剛。又可多姿多態，硬可為冰、柔可似水、虛可成雲成霧，變化多端，來去自如。」然後他又舞動右手，漣漪從手臂旁一 圈一圈漾出，說：「全身發勁，也要像水，手腳纏絲而動，剛開始是大動轉圈，大圈之中有小圈，圈圈相連，化小圈於無，也就是說要由大動化為小動，小動而不 動，雖不動卻全身皆動，這樣才算真正入了太極拳的門了。」然後只見父親把手靜止在水中，卻不斷有漣漪產生，向外推送。

後來我讀高中，有一天通車回家，遠遠望見賣房子給我們的房東兒子，正和父親大聲吵嚷著，房東兒子說：「這空地是我們家的，現在要闢作停車場，你種的這棵番 石榴要砍掉！」父親火冒三丈說：「房契上明明註明這塊地是我的，怎麼？現在仗著你們人多，地又變成你們的了，啊？」一旁的房東和親戚們七嘴八舌叫嚷著： 「這阿山仔，真正番袂直！」房東兒子那時剛從海軍陸戰隊退伍，全身黝黑精壯，肌肉結實，這時候又把脊骨挺直，看上去暴躁得不得了，瞪大著眼，厲聲道：「你 是欠打乎？」我爸當時已經六十好幾，略顯老態，個頭又差人一大截，我一看情形不對，趕緊上前要拉父親一把，預防衝突擴大。誰料房東兒子右手已電閃揚起，直 撲父親臉頰，眼看就要正中眉心，剎那間，父親側身微退半步，右手包住來拳，順勢後拖，房東兒子頓時前傾，手臂打直，父親左肩略一肘靠，劈叭一聲，房東兒子 手臂應聲而斷，大哇一聲，倒在地上，趕忙用左手扶住右手臂，狀似十分痛苦，圍觀者見狀，趕緊把人扶了起來送走，回途中沿路還不斷漫天叫罵詛咒著。

太極拳不就是動靜、虛實、剛柔、開合、方圓、卷放、輕沉、快慢、裡外、大小、進退、上下、左右，等等看似二元對立實又相互統一的狀態嗎？那麼生死呢？生死難道不也是太極嗎？

我上了高三，臨七月聯考之前的春假，意外以資優生保送台灣師大國文系，我爸可樂了，一來我們臨張家第一位博士的路又近了一步，二來讀師大全部公費，每個月 還有三千餘元生活補貼，能替家裡節省不少開銷，三來距大學開學還有半年時光，省去準備聯考的讀書壓力，反倒可以專心練拳。半年間，除了練拳之外，父親也搜 出一些太極拳書要我讀，第一本讀的是陳鑫《陳氏太極拳圖說》，這本書極厚，約二、三十萬餘言，善本書款，裡頭全是文言文，所幸我當時已熟讀四書，能用文言 下筆成章，閱讀上甚少阻礙。書裡頭談的是陳氏歷代積累的練拳經驗，詳解架子、身形、步法、運動和周身規矩，最特別的是以易理詮解拳理，貫串纏絲勁的核心作 用，而以內勁作為統馭。當中有段話，到現在我都還能背上：「用力日久，豁然貫通，日新不已，自臻神聖，渾然無跡，妙手空空，若有鬼神，助我虛靈，知豈我 心，只守一敬。」似乎是太極拳之最高境界，當時雖不能至，卻一心嚮往。後來又讀楊澄甫所寫的《太極拳體用全書》，身形手法與陳鑫所記略有不同，理論卻大抵 相近。

暑假結束，動身往台北讀大學的前一晚，父親在客廳對我說：「大凡諸家講太極拳的，沒有不以意為主，以固定架子為準，咱們張家太極拳恰巧在這裡與諸家不同，同樣以意為主，卻不執著於架子，所謂身隨意轉，意動架成，是咱們張家太極拳的主要心法，你要好好記住才是。」

「身隨意轉，意動架成，這樣說來，既然不注重架子，那我起先練那麼多家架子做什麼？」

「諸家太極拳所訂的架子，各得一偏，正所謂道術為天下裂，想要還原太極拳原貌，唯有熟習各家，再隨意而動，截補短長，出入各式架子，最後能隨意拼湊，變換萬端，這道理哪是諸家膠柱鼓瑟的固定拳式所能比擬。不過，話說回來，不由諸家拳式入手，也通透不到這等境界。」

推手不是在沙發上練的

就在我差不多認定這輩子功夫再怎麼努力也不可能超越父親的時候，父親卻被突如其來的幾個敵手攻擊得毫無招架之力，潰不成軍。這回遭遇的對手，個個來頭不 小，招招凌厲凶狠，盡取要害而攻之。譬如說，心搏速亂了他調息吐納之功，白內障蒙了他眼觀四面的清明目光，珍珠瘤掩了他耳聽八方的靈敏動靜，帕金森症廢了 他打樁使拳的身形，更糟的是，腎衰竭直搗五臟六腑，摧而毀之，就這樣內外夾攻之下，彷彿只是一夕之間，我爸，他老了，那速度之快，變化之巨，簡直讓我無法 相信。好似昨兒個才厲聲教訓我「身子骨輕浮」、「沒半點神氣」，一邊神氣鼓蕩演練著拳式的那個父親，今天猛可成了舉步維艱、佝僂喪氣、神情蕭索、垂垂老矣 的老人了。

那時我剛從金門退伍，進研究所念書，把父親接到台北同住，白天母親照料父親一切瑣事，晚上則由我負責替父親洗澡、餵食、分藥，攙扶著在客廳走東走西，或用 輪椅到樓下公園閒逛。大部分時間，我就坐在沙發上陪他玩推手，父親手顫得凶，其實已經不太能正確感受我的發勁，推著推著，雙掌就自己解開了，露出一大片致 命的破綻，這時候他會焦急地說：「啊，糟糕。」我便趁虛單掌長驅直入，笑道：「達陣得分！」然後他就搖搖頭：「老了，老了，手都不聽使喚。」說這話的當 頭，其實只有我知道箇中酸楚 －熟習太極拳的人都知道，這推手不是定在沙發上頭練的，而是必須配合身形步法，利用全身皮膚觸覺和內體感受探知對方來勁大小、剛柔、虛實、長短、遲速和動 向，施以四正手和四隅手的適當反應，手動身轉，進退周旋，達到引勁落空、乘勢借力、以輕制重的目的 －父親這哪是在跟我在練推手，不過玩玩而已，往昔練推手時，哪一回不是被父親約束纏繞、迴旋扭轉得東倒西歪，前仆後躓，狼狽不堪得很，此時推玩之間，可沒 想到竟推出一片感傷。

有時候，父親會自己從沙發上登起，想靠自個兒力量走進廁所方便，一不小心，就踉踉蹌蹌倒栽地板，通常額頭、後腦勺或膝蓋會撞出大小不一的傷口，鮮血直流， 我一聞撞擊聲便心知不妙，連忙倉皇奔出，趕緊扶好父親，熟練地包紮傷口。父親也不喊疼，只衝著我笑：「剛才那一招白蛇吐芯擺得還不錯吧！」又有時，我半夜 尿急起來上廁所，發現他倒在走道上動彈不得已經好一段時間了，我拍醒他，凶他：「有包尿布，尿出來就好了啊！」他就會傻笑說：「這怎麼好意思！」「不然就 叫我啊？」「那怎麼行，擾了你清夢，明兒個還要上課，沒精神。」接著又一派天真地說：「上得成廁所就上廁所，上不成我就躺在這兒，練練樁啊！」

父親定時去萬芳醫院洗腎已經兩年餘，每周三次，每次四至五個小時不等。後來不知怎麼了？原先左上臂的人工血管突然堵塞，洗腎的針頭插進去不見血出，只得趕 緊送進手術房開刀疏通，醫生說血管的使用年限到了，怎麼疏通也疏不成，只好又在左上臂靠胳肢窩的地方又重新埋了一條人工血管。這一折騰，就開了兩次刀，原 本以為就此打住，豈料新埋的血管要一個月後才能使用，但洗腎間斷不可超過四天，遠水救不了近火，於是直接將洗腎針頭插入右大腿的股動脈，當作臨時血液透析 之用，好端端洗到一半，沒想到又阻塞住了，只好又往左腿股動脈插上一針，重新再洗，好不容易終於洗完全程，總算可以好好休息三天。驚濤駭浪過後，我爸這 時，看上去虛弱得不得了，一個人躺在病床上沉沉睡著。

再來打一回拳吧

隔天，他幾乎都在睡覺，醒的時間很少。又過一天，我一早醒來，他也醒了，招呼著我說他要下床走走，我說不行，手上腿上各有傷口，醫生千萬囑咐不可輕舉妄 動。他不聽我勸，右腳攀著扶欄，做勢就要翻身下床，我奈何不了他，只好扶他下床坐著，要他乖乖坐好一起看晨間新聞，他看了一會兒，忽然轉頭對我說：「走， 咱們父子倆再來打一回拳。」我說好啊，來練練推手吧。「不是，咱們到走道上演演太極拳！」我說不可以，你身子這麼虛弱，萬萬不行！我爸牛脾氣又上來了，挺 直身子就要站起來，我又只好扶著他到走廊走走。他一到走廊，便伸直搖顫的雙手，開步紮樁，我一看這怎麼了得，趕緊在後頭抱住他，防著他又摔了下去，然後他 便緩慢又辛苦地演了三式我從未見過的架子，我在背後抱著他，只覺這三式意境蕭索卻又生機蓬勃，彷彿山窮水盡又似柳暗花明，看似淡默渾沌卻又從容飽滿，就在 我參悟不解的當下，右腿上一股熱流忽然漫上身來，我低頭一看，褲子竟染滿鮮血，再仔細一看，父親右股動脈正大量汩出鮮血，我揚聲大叫護士，連忙把父親扶上 病床，趕來的護士急忙壓住傷口止血，重新上藥包紮，再放上沙包壓住傷口，妥當處理後，護士回過頭來不斷指責我說：「不是說過不可讓病人下床嗎？你不知道這 樣很危險嗎？」我連聲道歉，護士才憤憤地離開，我回頭看父親，他又沉沉睡著了。

父親這一睡，就再也沒能醒過來了

入葬當天，大夥都散了，我一個人獨自留在五指山上，陪著父親，陽光清明，從墳地上望去，可以看見整個台北盆地，左邊遠處海上的基隆嶼歷歷可見，四周青山， 微風輕拂，我望著父親的墓碑，眼淚又不爭氣地掉下來，就在這個當頭，我不自覺地揮動起雙手，隨意周轉，任情擺架，不由自主地演起太極拳，這一刻我才恍然， 父親曾說過的張式太極拳心法「身隨意轉，意動架成」，原是這般道理，而我流著淚有意而出的拳式，竟是招招不捨，式式想念。

又過了一年，我爸周年祭，我上五指山祭拜燒紙錢，紙錢燒完後，又不由自主地演起拳來，不同的是，這回拳路極為心平氣和、哀傷無動，就在我收勢作結的同時， 忽然胸前湧起柔和似風、靜止如山的舒坦，這一刻我才猛然領悟出父親在醫院走廊上演示的那三式究竟是何用意，也許他老人家是想藉著太極拳告訴我一些人生況味 －太極拳不就是動靜、虛實、剛柔、開合、方圓、卷放、輕沉、快慢、裡外、大小、進退、上下、左右，等等看似二元對立實又相互統一的狀態嗎？那麼生死呢？生 死難道不也是太極嗎？父親在臨終前奮力一搏，他預知了自己即將不久人世，可是他知道死亡不只是生的終結，同時也是生的開始，生和死一樣看似對立，實則也是 統一圓融無礙的 －等我悟到這一層的時候，我才坦然喜悅起來，因為往後無論哪一回我開步紮樁、揮手運拳的同時，父親正也在另一個世界和我陰陽無缺地配合著，一回、二回、三 回，回回相扣，生死相關，一直要等到我把拳又傳給了我的小孩，他才會真正休息，而那時我早晚也是要和他再重新相聚的。

Graham Greene

No, I did not finish the reading about Ayn Rand after all. The first sentense of the article drove me away -- "The relationship is sexual or nothing".

Instead, I found another article about Graham Greeene, the author of the Quiet American. The author described that Graham Greene produced his writings in a very special way -- he wrote exact 500 words each day -- not more; not less. Graham would even leave an unfinished sentense as long as the word count reaches his quota.
It is quite impressive. I hope that I can write programs this way one day.

During the weekend, we took Anbo to the nearby indoor swimming pool. Details can be found in my lovely wife's blog.

Fountainhead

An article in NewYorker brought my attention to Ayn Rand. The article describes an architect, Stephen Valentine, who designs a special building named 'Timeship' as an ultimate site for cryonics. In the article, Stephe Valentine is described as a perfectionist who is largely influenced by a novel called 'Fountainhead.'

Ayn Rand wrote 'Foundtainhead' in 1943. Now, the novel becomes a classic. It is so popular that I can't even borrow one out from the local library even though the library holds 53 copies. This fact only triggers my curiosity about the author. After all, who on the earth is Ayn Rand, the author of such an influential novel?

I have New Yorker DVDs by hand and I did a search on them. Before long, I found an article about Ayn Rand. ( I start to appreciate the fact that I borrowed such a good collection from the library. Unfortunately, I have to return it back to the library. Somehow, I start to worry about my lives without these DVDs. After all, they did enrich my English and nourish my knowledge. A smart girl would understand what I mean. )

The article is quite long and enough to entertain me tonight. Tell you more when I am done with it.

The Economist and New Yorker

I now fall in love with two magazines: The Economist and New Yorker.

These two magazines are on two extreme sides of one spectrum:

Articles in The Economist are written by anonymous authors. The style of each article is uniform: short, concise, to-the-point and easy to read. In each issue, there are many short articles covering things happened internationally in the past week. I particularly like the title of each article -- one word captures the spirit of the article. The topics covered by the magazine are broad, including politics, economics, science, technologies and books.

On the other hand, articles in New York go for different direction. The magazine emphasize the authors, therefore, articles in one magazine normally show you the different styles of the authors. In each issue, there are not many articles, but each article are normally lengthy since a great details are shown in the article. Comparing to The Economist, New York covers topics more towards to arts and literature. I particularly like the fiction in each issue of New Yorker.

Although, the two magazines go for different directions; however, articles in both magazines are all enjoyable. I have great time with these two magazines.