Colombian writer García Márquez once said, "Loneliness is an eternal theme. ”
We are inevitably lonely, no matter where we are, how old we are, or what our mood is, loneliness will always come unexpectedly.
When you are aging, you are plagued by loneliness, and you feel helpless and powerless, how do you resolve this hopeless state of mind?
Japanese writer Shion Miura is in"If the Years Were Long Enough".In this book, we are told how to do it.
The book tells the story of two elderly people who seem to have different personalities, but in fact they care about each other, warm and care for each other in the long river of time, and become the most trusted friends in each other's lives.
They work hand in hand, with a detached attitude, calmly face aging and loneliness, and calmly deal with the difficulties and impermanence of life.
Mr. Yang Jiang wrote in "Walking to the Edge of Life": The future of the elderly is illness and death.
Indeed, the end of life is death.
So, between life and death, how can we be at peace with time and make the journey of life more meaningful?
Let's find the answer in "If the Years Are Long Enough".
73-year-old Kunimasa Arita went to attend a friend's funeral, and at the funeral, he met his own hair Kokobori Genjiro.
To his disbelief, Genjiro Hori had dyed the only remaining hair above his ears bright red and appeared in this serious occasion without any scruples.
Guozheng rubbed his temples with his hand and asked, "How old do you think you are?" ”
Genjiro disagreed: "I can't re-dye it, the red that was dyed last week is always bad for the hair roots." ”
Guozheng was a little annoyed: "Then shave me." ”
Genjiro replied in seconds: "Even if your hair is all white, you don't need to care about it so wide." ”
The two old men, who are 146 years old together, often ridicule and damage each other like this, and never feel that there is anything wrong.
Guozheng also knows his old friend Genjiro deeply, he is such an optimistic and cheerful person who is a bit of a hanger, compared to his own old age, it seems that Genjiro lives a faster life.
Therefore, Genjiro has become his medicine for loneliness.
Since his wife separated from him, Kokumasa has found that his life has become more and more boring.
Whenever he feels surrounded by loneliness, he goes to Genjiro's house, who also lives alone, to find some vitality in life from there.
Genjiro would take him to eat ice cream with him like a child, pull him to fry the gangsters with rocket fireworks, and use his unfriendly cooking skills to make him a cup of sour umeboshi tea.
From time to time, the two quarrel, chat, make fun of each other and take pictures of each other, and the days slowly slipped away in their fights.
After getting along, the somewhat restrained national politics are also much more cheerful. He found that he liked to stay with Genjiro more and more, so that it seemed that the days passed faster.
Wang Xiaobo once said: "A life is very long, and you have to be with interesting people." ”
The good-looking skins are the same, and the interesting souls are one in a thousand.
Life is long, and being with interesting people can resolve the many troubles of the day, share songs and laughter, and life becomes interesting.
Genjiro originally had a family, and his wife was a kind and beautiful elementary school teacher, Hanae.
The husband and wife are an enviable couple.
It's a pity that Hanae fell ill and died in her 40s, and Genjiro, who lost his beloved, never tried to find his other half.
When he is alone, he has a weapon to pass the time, which is a hobby.
Speaking of which, his hobby was just a "tool" for making a living at first.
Genjiro's parents died when he was a child, and in order to have something to eat, he apprenticed to learn how to make hairpins before graduating from elementary school, and has been working hard in this area since then, and then sincerely fell in love with this craft.
Don't look at him always looking like a hanger, idle, and treating the hairpins can be described as excellence.
He can forget to sleep and eat, and continue to sleep for more than ten hours, just to make the fine hairpin in his hand more delicate and beautiful.
Genjiro is a true craftsman, he said:
"If you want to be a first-class craftsman, you have to think about hairpins when you sleep. ”
He has no pursuit of life, but he uses all his passion for his hobbies.
Even if it takes a lot of energy, it's still enjoyable.
His apprentice praised his master's craftsmanship as the best in Japan, and Kunimasa believed that Genjiro was working with his soul.
Genjiro is not afraid of the years, in addition to his open-minded optimism, more is that he has his own love.
Love can last a long time. ”
Love is like a beacon on our way forward.
When you're lost, or tired, as long as the lighthouse is there, there's hope.
Life is short, we can't compete for years, and we can't run out of time, but we can use love to survive those difficult days.
The state government often gets into the bed as soon as it gets dark.
But on this day of the New Year, it would be too boring to go to bed early. He simply brought some char siu to Genjiro's house and had a Chinese New Year's Eve dinner with him.
Coincidentally, Genjiro's apprentice was also there with his girlfriend.
They took the opportunity to invite Kunimasa Arita to bring his wife to their wedding and act as a matchmaker to officiate the wedding.
Guozheng guessed that his wife would definitely not agree, but he couldn't bear to refuse this happy couple, and gave his wife ** with apprehension.
As expected, his wife rejected his request on the grounds that "the two had been separated for too long, and it was unlucky to be a matchmaker to officiate at the wedding".
Guozheng understood his wife's determination, and for many years, he put his mind on his work, and cared very little about his wife, until his wife decided to separate in despair.
In order to persuade his wife to be a matchmaker, and in order to alleviate the conflict between husband and wife, Guozheng decided to exchange his wife's forgiveness in his own way.
He wrote a postcard to his wife one day, and in addition to greetings, he didn't forget to add "Please think about being a matchmaker." ”
Later, I really felt that there was nothing to write about, so I wrote the guilt of my wife into the postcard one by one.
Three months later, the wife was impressed and agreed to reconcile with Kokumasa and also agreed to officiate the wedding with him.
However, after the wedding, the wife still stayed at her daughter's house.
In this regard, the state politics is not entangled, and he respects his wife's choice.
The stalk in his heart has long been released in the words in the daily postcard and in his wife's attendance at the wedding.
Some people say that the saddest thing in life is loss, and once some people leave, it is forever.
But when you still have the ability to catch it, do your best to make the other party stop complaining about you, and there will be a lot less regrets.
When the wife returned, they were all overjoyed; When his wife left, the state government also gave his blessing.
In the face of the restlessness of life, having a good attitude is more important than everything.
Gains and losses are all part of life, treat them normally, and be at peace with what happens.
We have been sharpened off by tedious daily life, and we have also been tossed by setbacks and lost our fighting spirit, and we can only comfort ourselves for contentment.
The years are like a stream, in fact, we often ask ourselves.
What kind of life do you have to live, so that you don't feel that you haven't come to the world in vain.
When I think about it, I still don't really understand the meaning of life.
It doesn't have any color, it's just our mood and mentality that give it a variety of colors.
It's brilliant, it's gloomy, it's all in the heart.
Be quiet and find your own happiness in your normal day.
You'll find out that, actually, it's pretty good.
May we, in the passage of time, be able to "pamper and not be surprised, watch the flowers bloom and fall in front of the court, go and stay unintentionally, and look at the blue sky." ”