Without a name

typewriter      filling cabinet    boxing gloves   janitor       lug nut

I woke up in this morning, dark , it's all dark around. I have to try really hard to forget about this bald thin man asking me to help him find the lamb man who has lived in his boss's head.  I forget everything about how I reach this cabin. I get up and drink a big cup of water. There is a note on the desk telling me that breakfast is outside the door. I opened the door noticing the small box on the ground.
The whole scenery outside is so quiet. It's making me scared. The only thing that is moving is in the mountain about ten miles from my house with about a hundred lambs and a janitor, or more precisely a grazier. The sunshine is hurting me I have to go back.
The only things I found on the desk beside my bed is a typewriter with few ribbons in it. And a small filing cabinet filling with some papers about the stockholm syndrome and the farm history. A couple of books are lying on the bookcase. Works of Shakespeare, and the tale of Genji, nothing that attracted my attention except a record of The Brother Four and a boxing glove. I have to guess that both women and men have been living in this room for a while. Now I am the one.
After about three hours, there is this horse man knocking on my door. I observed him for a long time since his head is so weird. He has two eyes but not one of them has eyelashes. He took out one of his man hand from his pocket giving me a lug nut saying:"Welcome." And he disappeared.
"Welcome." His voice is haunting in my head for the next hour. I never had a car since I was 10 before that I have a room of model cars.
Well, I guess, here comes another cold winter this year.

Living, traveling, running

-book review for Education of a Wandering Man

For my whole life, I always regard myself as a novel reader. Reading prose or traveling notes has been a big problem for me as I would fall asleep all the time. But this time, I gave myself a great challenge for deciding to read "a notes" by Louis L’Amour, a great novel writer.


So as the day-to-day progress of reading Education of a wandering man, I realized that I am not the only one who tried to find challenge him/herself. Louis L'Amour elaborated the details of him wandering the world, working tons of jobs that later provide important facts for his novels. He also detailed his collection of books as related to different ideas gained from different parts of the world. I have to admit that peaks appear in every section of his adventure.



In a section, Louis talked about being an writer. As he was illustrating that how effective the ways a writer write, it reminds me of my favorite writer's first half autobiography talking about running. He is a great Japanese Writer just as Louis L'Amour but just he gained inspirations from his way of running. Sometimes we want to run faster, we just make ourselves do, we want to speed down, we just make ourselves calm down. W. Somerset Maugham once said, every razor has its own philosophy. The author explained it clearly as every single move we do today will become some sort of idea on day. That's what we called philosophy. Louis' philosophy is on his way.


I always wanted to be a writer, since I was a little girl. But sometimes I find my words too obscure that even I don't understand it. I feel like I could start reading and writing again after I read the book of Louis. He gave me the courage to interpret my views out of audacity. Just keeping reading and keep thinking, that's the only way out.

My review in the goodreads.com:  

http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/294988403

The culture of dating

I was trying to learn more about the life of Americans by watching three movies per day these two weeks. But I ended up thinking about the the culture of dating in America.


The American's idea about "dating'" is a completely different principle of what we Chinese think. In China, when we asked about you and him, the answer would either be we are in a relationship or we are not. The three steps of "dating" in China are first, meeting and having feelings;  second, being in a relationship, and finally get married or break up. Most of the time , the line between the first and second step is just a sentence," could you be my girlfriend?" or " Let's be together." And then , that's it.

However,based on my observation these years watching American movies,TV shows , and finally came to America, I noticed that American's view of dating is more complicated as well as simpler than what we think. From the beginning "meeting" to the last step "being together", there are miles of ways to go. Two years ago I watched this movie "He‘s just not that into you". It taught me a lot about the dating culture in America. I heard a lot of sayings like " We are seeing each other, but he is not my boyfriend," or "I don't know if I am ready for it." I feel like from the first step meeting to the second being in a relationship, Americans have to gone through a lot more than just a sentence. They have to go through picking up, having dinner, having a crash on, attracted to and seeing each other regularly and finally get into the relationship. 

Different Americans even have different ideas about "relationships". But commonly, most of them decided not to take it too serious before they are sure they are ready for it. And also most of the "dating timelines" are flexible; having feelings, dating and having sex, those steps can be changeable not like us Chinese. Some people date first while some people have sex first. But sometimes even they have gone through all the steps, they do not treat themselves as "a thing". They don't know where they are.

When you ask an American about your anniversary, instead of saying "I am with him for a month," they would say" we are seeing each other for a month."

It's confusing me a lot. What exactly is "date"?  Does that mean the guy pay the bill? Or if you just pay it on yourself, it's just friends hanging out? I know there's always exception. But " I will pay it" is always a signal of something.

What is exclusive dating? That's a more complicated concept. I wish someone could answer that for me.

Chinese people are always being so serious when they are in a relationship. They always said, you should be responsible or you should take it seriously. Most parents think that "being in a relationship without the purpose of get married is a kind of acting indecently".

Now for me, the complicated way of dating makes me faint. But meanwhile, we always have a choice to go on or quit. We don't need to take it too serious from the right beginning. There is always a way out. And being in the searching for a partner, maybe some day you will realize that this is "the one".






If you are interested, here is the trailer of He is just not that into you,

There is this woman

There is a woman I admire so much that I cannot help sharing her ideas with all of you. 

She told me everything that I need to do in my life.

Here is the Youtube Video to the introduction of 10000h dream idea.

The fly came to this world with one page of things that he needs to do before he dies. He wants to bite a coati, to get drunk, to party, etc. A lot of things to do. Sometimes he has to do with great efforts, sometimes is just a beautiful coincidence. And every time he finished a thing in his list, he would try to make a note. But at the last few seconds, he found out there is no chance for him to achieve the last two goals-- watch the stars and get famous. He died  out of disappointment. But what's fortunate is that God give him a chance to achieve the last two goals.

It's really touching. I smile every time I watch the video.

People said that if you want to get famous and successful in just one area in this world, you should at least put 10000 hours efforts into it. No matter what you are, Albert Einstein, an athlete or any musician. No matter you are gifted or not. Anyone has the chance to become successful. But talking about 10000h, that's not a small number. What that means is two hours per day, you will still need at least 14 years to approach it. Still hard. Now what we need to do is not thinking too much, start working on it.

At first, get your dreams set up.

The woman recommended me a Moleskine notebook, but I thought it does not matter what notebook you are using. So I just took a small notebook and write all my dreams on the first page.

Like :
1) travel through Japan

2) get a psychology certification

3) get tons of old movies and gramophone records

4) write a book
...

you don't need to write exactly what you are gonna do to achieve the goal, just need all the things to be clear on the page.

Anything you want, big and small.

Secondly, classify your dreams

Through all the dreams I have in my books, I will try to make them into three sections( you can do it on your own). 

1) To love, that include traveling and becoming an psychologist, which I can help the people that need help in the world.

2) Writing and reading, which includes the collection of books movies, and to write a book

...

And then in a single area of these dreams, you can help yourself set up the steps with the goals. For instance, as I am a total beginner of the psychology area, I would say, first, you need to reed at least 10 books about the general psychology, 10 about the criminal psychology, 10 about developing psychology in 2012. After that, get a degree on psychology in three years. Things like that, depends on how you would manage your time.

Most importantly, you should write every single efforts you put on this dream.

Allow me to copy what that woman did for her author dream:

Read 《1q84 2，3》                                           09/21/10                                      

Read 《tipping point》                                        10/13/10

      Read《1001 ways to market your books》                      10/15/10

Every small step is a necessary element, a short Youtube video, a short song you played on your guitar or any inspirations you had during the late night chat with your friend. Just write them after the section of the dream.

And the last thing to do is a "stop watch".

Remember you just have 10000h don't wast your time. Put on every thirty minutes you devoted into your work.

For some people, 10000h is too much, you don't want to become another Albert Einstein. You can just choose to do 5000h or 8000h.

Sometimes, dream for me, is not a small thing. It is a thing that you need to give sweat and blood into it. You might do not have time for sleeping. You might lose some of your friends. But always remember, that is the most valuable thing in your whole life. If your forget to do that, don't blame anyone for your own regrets.

Tips:

Keep going on. 

And Watch the video one more time, you will find out that God knows all the things the fly has done to himself, and the small fortunate amber is his reward. A reward, is always there,  for anyone who really appreciate his own life.

An awesome video about life:

Here is my daughter.....

One day, a year ago...

When I was trying to get dressed and get my daughter wake up, I feel headache again. I called her tons of times and she just yelled at me and saying I am doing it,I am doing it. But after all when I have done all my cleanings I walked to her room again and she was still in her bed, with no sign that she's gonna get up today. But anyway I made it, actually she made it.

It was another normal day at the hospital again, I was helping the surgery of changing people's nose or eyes or anything on the face to be prettier. Well, it's common that people want to be pretty to make their husbands or boyfriend happy. 

And now I have to drive for about an hour to get my daughter from her school. She was having some problems these days with her going abroad studying issues. She always asked me my opinions of her going out. I sometimes have no idea what to respond to her. I just say talk to your dad, if he is Ok I would be totally fine. And then she just give me that confusing eyes. She is a thoughtful girl with great grades sometimes before maybe. And now she is just distracted by some kind of escaping thoughts. I used to understand her about her thoughts with those boys in junior school and the dreams she talked about becoming a doctor. I tried to understand her and be supportive. But now I just being more aggressive as she turns to be that way, too. I now have no idea what to do with this girl, its better to just let her go so that she could understand us better.

Whatever, there she is, coming towards me.

Creativity

The talking of Elizabeth Gilbert gives me an impression that she is a little bit proud of what she has done. I am not saying that she is not a good writer or a good person. 

However, she writes one of the best works I have ever seen. I have seen Eat Pray Love for about five times and every time I saw it I would cry out of it. It was a great work. But in general, I don't quite agree with what she said about genius. I believe that any person who has talents on a certain area comes out of huge efforts he or she had put in it. Creativity is not the thing that you try really really hard, and you can come up with the idea after you  strives . Sometimes its just the little inspiration you find from the issues occurred around you. It's not like that someone just give you the words and you write them done, or you dissolve them into your works. It is a reward after your efforts. It's a confirm that you have the ability to do this work. I don't want to make this so serious that I need to argue with the religion. I respect what she said, it's just not that easy for some people.

I have to make a confession that I am facing great challenges in my life right now. It's hard to give them a definition. I would just say that I apply creativity to my life as a tool to make me live more organized as well as enjoyable. I have to make plans for everything I need to do so that I won't forget . I draw pictures on the note book I owned to remind me. Like when I need three movies and two books to be done next week, I make my notebook fancy so that I would feel it was great fun to accomplish the goals. And when I want to do something I am really interested in and I achieve a little goal in my planned time. I would sometimes give myself reward. 

Creativity, is surely not a word just for artist. For any scientists or  businessmen, creativity takes a big part to evaluate ones succeed. A chemists need creativity to design new experiment, businessmen need creativity to think of a way to make their products attractive and also the mathematicians need creativity to give new theories. Anyone who is repeating the things people have done before cannot be treated as  successful. To make this world fabulous, we always need innovations . 

Always remember, creativity is never a gift just comes into your hand, try to respect it and cherish it.