Although Dec through Feb typically sees 90% of the rainfall in the SF Bay Area,
I didn't remember a wet Christmas. Outdoors felt miserable in the biting gusts
under an ominous sky. The foliage, once promising abundance and joy in Oct, had
turned rusty and bleak toward the last week of the year. Among the deciduous,
the ginkgo trees had held out the best, graceful even as their bright golden
Chinese-fan leaves were shedding and piling up. This was the way, they were
telling the world, an end portending a beginning. Not all plants agreed,
however. The silver-topped olive trees had turned into a vivid dark emerald
after a few washes. The east hills had donned a new coat of lush verdant blades.
And the vermillion firethorns seemed freshly waxed for the special day.
What had made this Christmas great for me, along with solitude, the dictionary,
weight-lifting, rope-jumping, running in the rain, coffee, and fasting, was a
book titled "Best Chinese Stories 1949-1989."
Last summer, on a habitual impulse, I bought the 500-page volume and a copy of
beautifully illustrated Greek Mythology for five bucks (Today, the first fetches
$35.99 on Amazon used.), at Los Altos library's forsale section, flipped through
the mythology, and forgot about the other book until a week ago. Despite of the
title, between the hardcovers, only the last page was in Chinese that said
中国优秀短篇小说选(1949-1989)，熊猫丛书. So far, I have savored the first 13 of the
40 short stories translated to English by a handful of people. The purchase felt
more than a coincidence, after all.
The tales brought me to the 50s and 60s, where much suffering had happened. I
was lucky to be born in the 70s but awed by the absurdities and tragedies molded
by the events, the Great Leap Forward, the Anti-Rightist Movement, the famine,
etc. My parents lived through them but left little for me to remember. Frankly,
I didn't care either until growing older. It amazed me that in 1989, things had
loosened up enough that these could be published. "The Story of Old Xing and His
Dog" by Zhang Xianliang and translated by Alice Childs had been my favorite.
Old Xing, a widower and hard-working peasant, took in a woman running from the
famine in northern Shaanxi and later married her. He treated her well and she
brought him life. It turned out, however, that she came from a rich peasant
class and couldn't get her residence transferred. Ineed, even disclosing this
fact was risky for her. In a year she stole away, they believed, back to her
parents in law and two kids. The poor illiterate Old Xing understood no class
struggle and waited and waited for her return and his loyal dog became his
only family. Soon after the dog was put down, to save grains as ordered from
above, Old Xing breathed his last. Three years later, a letter came from the
north for Old Xing and was sent back with the stamp "deceased."
