Crazy/Beautiful
Su Shi (苏轼), not the Japanese food variety that my baby loves, otherwise also known as Su Dongpo (蘇東坡) was a great poet of 11th century China. Su Shi who was from Hangzhou once compared Hangzhou's West Lake to Xi Shi, one of the four great beauties of China (learnt that from you bie in the car after dinner at your place :)) who could supposedly stop a fish with her beauty. Su Shi was responsible for constructing a pedestrian causeway across the West Lake utilising 200,000 men that still bears his name; sudi (蘇堤) as governor of Hangzhou during the reign of the Song dynasty. Now, thats familiar info that anyone can easily look up on wikipedia or google, so what has a a dead poet whose name people might not know have to do with my post today?
What really made me quote Su Shi was that there is a saying. A saying that says that if a pair of lovers were to cross the six bridges across the Su causeway, they will cross into forever and ever. Do not actually know the basis of that saying but Su Shi was a loving husband who wrote a poem for his dying wife entitled Jiang zhenzi (江城子);
Ten years living and dead have drawn apart
I do nothing to remember
But I can not forget
Your lonely grave a thousand miles away ...
Nowhere can I talk of my sorrow --
Even if we met, how would you know me
My face full of dust
My hair like snow?
In the dark of night, a dream: suddenly, I am home
You by the window
Doing your hair
I look at you and can not speak
Your face is streaked by endless tears
Year after year must they break my heart
These moonlit nights?
That low pine grave?
Jiang zhenzi is a poem full of emotion. Not sure its well written because hes a poet but I choose to believe that the poet must have been really in love for him to write such a poem that others will think of his wife for a thousand years later after her passing. I write this post for her and also for myself. Similar to Su Shi of a thousand years ago, I hope that the world remembers her as the most perfect, adoring, beautiful person a man can ask for to spend a lifetime with. I would love to walk the six bridges with her this moment but I understand that to walk a lifetime with her means more than that. Even any kid knows that but the meaning of walking the bridges means so much to us.
We made a list, a list of things that we would like to do before we wave goodbye to the world. I would like to hold her hand and cross the six bridges more so for the symbol of how much it would mean to us. I believe in a lifetime of love and I am trying with all that I have been given to make it all a reality. Shes standing there by the lake wishing I was with her. Baby, did you know that we are looking at our West Lake right now?
Our West Lake is right now. Baby, I am holding your hand walking past these bridges of life day by day. Some planks are loose and we might fall on our way, some planks are tricky parts and most of it is perfect, and at times when it is not perfect, I just want you to know I'm holding your hand and you will never fall. We make our forever. Luck and fate play a huge part but most of the time, we are on our own. During times when you feel weak or scared, just look around and see our West Lake. When we get ditracted, we forget to see the beauty of our West Lake. It is beautiful and unlike Su Shi, I have no 200,000 men but I what I have is what it takes to build you a bridge worth walking with me to last a lifetime.
Its a Wednesday, stuck in between of a week, a day neither here nor there and theres a lot to be sad and upset about. But we have a choice on how we want to walk the bridges every second. Today, I'm deciding that both of us are going to walk this forward bravely with a smile. There are many bridges that brought us to this exact path on our bridge right now. And the truth is that there are a million bridges from this moment, but it all comes down to one. It doesn't matter which bridge brought us here or which bridge will exist. What matters is that we are holding hands smiling as we walk our one bridge at this moment. I have a name for this bridge we're walking on. Its called a lifetime. And at the end, I would like to hold your hand just like this picture above, old and having seen the world, sitting right there by our West Lake overlooking Su Causeway. Can you see how beautiful it is?
PS. Bie, you are the reason why our West Lake is so beautiful. West Lake exists for you. Will you walk the six bridges with me?
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