Dream 0531
It seemed to be early morning when I had a strange dream.
A young female professor from college had suddenly died. We needed to put her body in a coffin, and I was there.
“Come give us a hand,” said my little uncle, calling me over to help. The room had coffins of different shapes—rectangular, square, long cylinder—but all pitch black. They chose a long cylindrical one for her.
I was scared to approach, as I’ve always been afraid of things related to death since childhood. But I went over anyway.
They held her, positioning her in a leaning, seated pose inside the cylindrical coffin. As I used my arms to support the teacher’s waist, the fear vanished completely at the moment of contact. She was just a person. Why be afraid of a human being? But then came a wave of sadness and longing.
I didn’t have much interaction with her, really. I just had her on QQ, where she was almost always online. Whenever she had a new post, I’d check it out. Never exchanged a word, and she probably had no idea who I was. But that didn’t matter; I just wanted to follow.
They hung the coffin up and burnt some spices underneath to slow down the body’s decay.
I thought, tomorrow there will be no more glimpse of her online status on QQ. One day, I’ll be like this too—leaving everything, fading away in the wind. Truly taking nothing with me, and unable to take anything even if I wanted to.
Her son returned (though in reality, the son belongs to another teacher from Nanjing), deeply grieved. I offered some perfunctory condolences, but I don’t remember what exactly. Just that they were half-hearted, full of sorrow.
Suddenly, I found myself far away from them and realized that grief was not theirs alone. It came in waves, affecting many families.
The world was flat, entirely black. Nothing else was there—no sky, no sunshine, clouds, houses, streets—just sorrow. They lay on their deceased, crying, sobbing in silence because this world had no sound, or perhaps I couldn’t hear any.
On that black backdrop, the tears sparkled like crystals.
At this moment, I was quiet.
Woke up in the morning clearly remembering the dream. Of course, I knew the teacher should still be alive, but I couldn’t wait to turn on the computer. Sure enough, she was fine. Her latest post was: Silent. Mourning. About the 5.12 earthquake.
The morning news once again highlighting our soldiers’ heroic rescue efforts—a group of people tearing apart huge blocks of concrete by hand. Some might find these images inspiring; I used to as well. But now, I only see human insignificance. “Man will conquer nature,” how ignorant and foolish. In the face of nature, humans are forever tiny.
What’s tragic is, after experiencing such disasters, we seem to reflect not at all. After grief passes, we continue living unchanged. Numbness.
Why “rescue” against nature? Why destroy ecosystems?
I think it’s because we live solely in a human world, unaware of what nature is, what plants and animals are.
Year in, year out, we rarely touch the earth with intimacy, rarely run our hands over a green leaf, rarely listen quietly to birdsong.
We might keep pets, but we seem to treat them merely as lifestyle accessories, like phones, or mp3 players. We treat the world the same; in our eyes, humans are always the main characters—I am always the main character—everything around me is supporting cast, disposable.
Ironically, the most fragile life is human life. Thank the Creator. No matter how arrogantly or cautiously you live, life lasts only decades (this is the reason everyone is equal). A tree, unintentionally, might live hundreds of years, watching generations pass.
There’s nothing more to say. I am truly a rebel. Yet no matter my obstinance, my heart still yearns for faith. Without it, where can the soul find rest?