Eldest cousin of the wilderness

I have a cousin who is very old. his birthday is at the end of May. If he had lived to this day, he would have been 55 years old. I don't mean he's dead, but I'm not sure. Many things in this world are uncertain, especially the life and death of a person. I'm not saying this from a philosophical point of view, but I mean the existence of a physical concept. After all, I haven't heard from him for months, and he's in the wilderness.

Last year, I was faced with a crisis in my life and my mood fell to a low ebb. One day I received a courier from Memphis, Tennessee, with a letter and a bunch of photos in it.

the letter said: cousin, I knew you were still at the old address. I'm in Memphis now. No, I mean I was in Memphis when I wrote to you, and I don't know where I will be when you read this letter. Memphis is nice. This is the hometown of blues music. You can hear wonderful blues music in every seemingly unremarkable bar. I don't know why I suddenly like this kind of music. I didn't feel it before. But recently I have found that there are more and more things I don't know. I don't know how long I will stay in this city. I don't know the destination of my next trip, let alone the address of your sister-in-law's new home. I just sent you these photos. It records my itinerary during this period. Please show it to your eldest niece and tell her that her father is living well and tell her not to worry about it.

this is not the first time I have worked at a transit station. Since my cousin divorced his (former) sister-in-law and lived in a foreign country, my cousin's sister-in-law unilaterally cut off all contact, not only cutting off her contact but also forbidding her daughter to contact him. For many years, my cousin is like a brave character in a stand-alone game. Under the careful control of his sister-in-law, he constantly escalates to fight monsters, bringing joy and glory to their lives. One day this role is out of control, and it is certainly irreparable. Once the cousin is angry, he completely cuts off the power supply and forbids any direct interaction, and the cousin becomes a person on the screen.

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in this case, I became my cousin's only connection in the real world. Since then, my cousin will send things every six months or eight months, sometimes letters, sometimes photos, sometimes strange souvenirs. These souvenirs include but are not limited to: the ugly mask of a certain African indigenous tribe, the feathers of certain birds, the teeth of four or five beasts of unknown species (if there is only one, I can casually say wolf teeth, if they are several teeth that look different. I can't be sure which one is a wolf tooth, or whether it has a wolf tooth after all). A white T-shirt with a huge handprint, a few jagged leaves, water from a river or lake in a mini glass bottle, two ordinary-looking stones, and a mass of black and red dirt.

these souvenirs are disorganized and difficult to classify. There is no way to figure out the collector's hobbies and tendencies, the only certainty is that if a lightning bolt falls out of luck on a thunderstorm day, it will be put into a collection bag. They appear out of thin air without any explanation or explanation. I think this is my cousin's trick and the capital he shows off in his old age. One day he will come back and sit in the yard and explain their origins to all his friends. Looking at everyone's complacency with their ignorant mouths open like birds to feed, or pure mischief, he has never been anywhere. These are just bargains from some strange mall. Apart from these jealous thoughts, every package from abroad has brought a long-lost freshness to my life, and sometimes even inexplicable ecstasy, so I am willing to be my cousin's underground liaison.

I picked up the photos. They were neatly packed in a white paper bag with the background of the evening prairie on the cover. A middle-aged man in a cap and camouflage crouched next to a bighorn impala with a grin. The sheep's horns hovered high, with the words on the back: Johannesburg, South Africa, July 15, 2014. These photos come in a variety of styles, with few serious tourist photos, such as wrestling with a primitive tribe, holding a big tree, squatting in a stone pit with lettering everywhere, and putting local children on their shoulders. staring at the sky. Some of the photos seem to have been taken inadvertently by people around me, followed by a poem or two, such as:

my desire

shines in the twilight  the boat has passed

has left the anchor of a spiritual desert

No matter whether my cousin has met a foreign partner or not, this state does not seem to last long. There are less than 1/3 shots of cousins in a pile of photos, most of which are strange still-life scenery: lions, rainforest, crucifixion, quaint hotel signs, handlebars displayed in the window, grilled fish on a bonfire, dolphins leaping out of the water, colorful bugs, plants with curled leaves, and a picture full of orange and red, looming black lines that look like roasted sweet potatoes But it reads: Marum Volcano on April 23, 2015

in 2013, the direct point of the sunset on the Tropic of Cancer, and was the height of summer in southern Anhui. The eldest cousin stayed in a big house, restless and restless. five days ago, the house was the warm harbor where he planned to stay for the rest of his life, calmly and safely waiting for the arrival of old age, just like other middle-aged people who were about to enter old age, learning to play grandchildren, playing flowers and plants, teasing cats and dogs, playing chess and cards, swinging his left hand up and hitting the right shoulder back, and the right hand hitting the left shoulder back. One day, when the car was driving on the road after work, it rained, the ground was wet, the air became more transparent, the setting sun burst into the last light, and he was "suddenly struck by lightning." an idea rose from the bottom of my heart: I have been a good son, a good husband, a good father and a good employee in my life, but I have never lived for myself. He thought, tears burst into his eyes, and then his nose became sourer and the nose ran down, so I had to drive into the emergency driveway and cry for a while until the horn that was about to overtake kept sounding.

the next day, he submitted his resignation letter and filed for divorce without any reason or warning. A middle-aged and elderly person with a decent job is about to retire, a partner who has lived in harmony for 30 years, and a generous and selfless father, who is now going to burn down all the good things in life. There is no doubt that this caused an uproar in the family and relatives circle, and a group of relatives came to persuade them, just like the dead men who attacked Shangganling, with lofty aspirations and tragic results. My mother came to me to persuade me, saying that you are a young man and a peer. Maybe he can take your opinions seriously. I know in my heart that you are asking for trouble. From a genetic point of view, the root has already appeared in my grandparents, who died a long time ago. half a century ago, they had rich emotional experiences, and because they were stubborn, they failed again and again until they met each other to form a family. At that time, I was already married late, but I was determined to have a boy, and I didn't give up even after giving birth to six daughters in a row. Finally, when they were nearly 50 years old, they got what they wanted and gave birth to a son, that is, my father and the eldest daughter was the mother of my eldest cousin. A year after my father was born, the eldest cousin also came into the world. Perhaps it was the spirit of his ancestors who did not give up until they reached their goals that helped him achieve success in his career. At the same time, they also decided that whatever he was determined to do, he would go to the dark.

I went there even though I knew it was boring. My cousin was glad to see me. Wave after wave of bombings didn't knock him down. In the course of chatting with me, his mood was always between anxiety and excitement, like two beans swinging around at both ends of a sensitive balance, and his eyes sometimes shone subtly. I knew it was big. Since I was born, all the messages I have heard about him have proved that he is a good man, hard-working, tolerant, selfless, open-minded, and detached. From any point of view, it is enough to serve as a moral model, impeccable to nothing to mention, like a certificate affixed to the wall. At this time, his expression was more vivid than ever before, scratching his ears and scratching his cheek urgently. The desire to return to him makes him more like a spotless person.

"Why am I like this?" Cousin said to me.

"Yes, you have to ask yourself."

"No, I mean, what is life and how can I prove that I am alive?"

"I don't quite understand."

"everyone's life is like a broadcast, talking to themselves all the time. All we do is to make it louder and louder so that no more people can hear and believe it." He said. "but this is not the meaning of life."

"What is that?"

"I don't know, maybe each of us's life is misexpression, coming to an end in the barren torrent of time. Some are committed to the task, so that everyone is satisfied, flinching to suppress themselves, just like me before, while others have become sophisticated patients under the influence of commercial civilization. I don't want to do either. "

"Whatever you want to do, do you have to leave your family to do it?"

"The problem is not leaving the family, but leaving the identity." His eyes pierced me and then said, "cousin, I may never come back." I want to tune my broadcast to another band, maybe it's white noise, maybe there's nothing at all. I decided to go out of the room, take off the moral uniform of my soul one by one, and then expose it to the world and leave everything to the unknown. "

"I don't quite understand."

"A few days ago, I suddenly realized that I could not find myself. The self is a very strange thing. It only exists when you are aware of it. I find that everything seems to be to an end. Learning, reading, unrestrained parties, sometimes relaxing trips, or more abstract qualities, interest, courage, and honesty, all have an end, and I get restless when I think about it. To put it this way, sometimes I wish I was a cow. I slowly ate the grass into my stomach and transferred it from one stomach to another. I smelled the fragrance of the sun, felt the breeze, and spent a few minutes swinging my head 45 degrees laterally. When you are happy, hit a loud noise, time disappears from the scale so that self-slowly clears up. "

I understood what he said, but I didn't agree with him.

Silence.

"Is there anything you've always wanted to do but haven't done?" "it has nothing to do with money." He added.

"me? I have always wanted to follow Su Shi's example of boating with friends in Chibi. It is not necessarily Chibi. As long as you go boating at night and talk with one or two friends, it is very romantic. "

"got it." He took out a pen, pillowed a black-covered notebook on his leg, wrote something, and said, "although I'm going out, I don't know exactly what to do, so I'm going to ask other people's dreams, and then I'm going to realize it."

I think it's kind of funny, "you're not poisoned by some book, are you?"

he looked up at me and said solemnly, "Book?" It's not a book, it's a dream. It's a big dream. I woke up early. I can no longer watch the flames ignited by the trivialities of life and dry the vitality in the hanging furnace. "

A week later, my cousin agreed to the divorce. Just like the Japanese emperor issued the "final War edict", she sent a text message to every relative who had participated in the "battle": he has become different, strangely enough, I can't say there is anything wrong with this difference. I probably never really knew him. However, he is right in saying that he has fulfilled the obligations of all his roles in society. I respect him.

I admire my sister-in-law for her free and easy manner. Even though she has taken away 4/5 of her fortune, she is still a wise woman. An intelligent and cheerful woman.

A few months later, my cousin sent me a picture of a night view, a wooden boat, a lamp, and two people. Four words: not Chibi.

in January, he sent another picture, wearing a riding suit, riding on a bike, followed by the Potala Palace.

later, he never replied to his Wechat, and his cell phone stopped. I received a letter from him more than half a year later. He said he was in Africa.

later, he went to sea in Yemen and was kidnapped by pirates. Instead of being safe, he persuaded the pirates to support him in making films in Yemen, documenting the poor families of the pirates, and then he spent half a year running film classes and film exhibitions in pirate towns.

everything is like a magic story.

"When you devote yourself to being an observer, life is beating and palpable." These are the words behind a photo he sent me, and I regard it as his answer to the original question.

A cousin who has lost all identities has also gotten rid of all inherent definitions. He kept his balance, got rid of his anxiety, and returned to the simplest era of human society. Now that he is in the wilderness, I wish him luck.