Jean's Weblog

“Boys are such boring creatures.” Once one of my friends told me, “you know one, you know them all — they are all the same!” I didn’t quite agree with her since I happened to know two very diferent boys, Lee and Lin, who were my high school classmates.

In our high school, we wrote journals for literature class every week. Most journals were open to the whole class since reading these journals helped us to understand each other better. Lee and Lin’s journals aroused my curiosity immediately.

Lee’s first journal was about a picnic he had had with his old friends during middle school years — a very common narrative topic in high school. But I was surprised that he used a very slow and sorrowful tone to describe it: “… the wind was gray, the sun was sinking down little by little…we made a fire, started to cook…smoke risen from black earth, twisted itself, then mixed with the air, disappeared…an old man rode an old bicycle across the field along the macadam road in the distance…” I read it over and over again till I could recite it.

Besides his peculiar desriptions of ordinary events, he held a strange opinion of life. In his another journal he discussed responsibility and society, he said: “I only do what I’m able to do, not what I am supposed to do…living in my inner shrine is enough.” The instructor wrote down something like “It’s impossible to live in one’s inner world forever, one’s inner stream will dry out very soon, by then one will possibly lose his meaning of existence.” Lee’s response was right after teacher’s words “…dry out, I’ll find another fountainhead, being alive, as long as I’m alive, is meaningful.”

Such a strange and rebelling soul! He was able to point out every tragedy in life, convince everyone that life was painful and dull, but in the end he would always put a little “spark” there, a little bit of hope, which was dim and unpredictable, but it was there, and it was all we had; then we had the strength to live on, for the “spark.” I loved the way he looked at things. It seemed so unique and mature to me. Actually he was merely sixteen, no older than anyone else in our class.

Lin’s journal, on the other hand, was warm and romantic. He wrote lots of poems for his ex-girlfriend.

If I’ve ever loved you
I won’t forget
while I have no choice but to continue
and say, ‘The weather is nice;
wind is gentle.”
and be able to smile, tiredly, when the sun rises
and say, “Life is simple
no twists or sorrow.”
But if I’ve ever loved you
I won’t forget

Lin preferred to forgive every tragedy that ever happened. In his eyes life was simple but precious, since we could only live once. While Lee was thinking we could only die once. When Lee’s real feeling was hiding behind one “wall” after another, Lin put his heart right in front of you, and smiled, “Love me, If love hurts, I will cry but I will forgive.” Pure like an angel.

After reading these journals, I started to pay attention to the two authors. Coincidentally, their appearances were very similar. Both were tall and slim; each looked poetic and shy. But later when I got to know them better, they both appeared to be active and always joking around. Most of all, both boys exhibited excellent gentlemanly manners, such as opening doors for girls, and always waiting for us girls to arrive at the lunch table. Some of the rougher mannered guys teased them about this once in a while, but they don’t care a bit. Girls just loved them.

Despite the pessimistic viewpoint on life that showed in his journal, Lee was a very sociable boy. He always hung around with a bunch of boys and girls. he seemed desperate to keep somebody around him. Once we went roller skating; there were about fifteen people all together. We had a very good time, but when my friend Cat said she wanted to go home, Lee was almost mad at her. I realized then how he hated to be alone.

Lin, on the other hand, was often alone and seemed to enjoy his solitude. One summer afternoon, Cat and I saw him sitting in a small wooden boat on the lake near our school. This kind of boat was usually rented by couples. We asked him whether he was waiting for his friend; he told us that he liked to pass time on the lake by himself; sometimes he would take a nap in the boat under the stone bridge. All the words he said, the way he looked with flecks of sunshine that were sneaking from dense poplar leaves above us, jumping about his shoulders, and his peaceful smiling eyes in the languid summer wind, reminded me of a paragraph in his journal:

“…A traveller went into a small station, where a old Indian man read his palm besides the dim lamp, and told him, ‘You are a man, who is fated to wander alone.’”

before our last high school New year’s Eve, Cat and I designed a postcard for Lin. We cut out Lin’s figure from all the pictures we had taken of him in that summer afternoon, and stuck them on a card with two sentences printed on the top, ‘DO YOU REMEMBER?” and “HAPPY NEW YEAR!” Then we mailed it without signing our names. Every day we checked the communal student mail box in eager anticipation. When it finally came, we delivered it to Lin’s desk while he was out of the classroom. Sitting at the other end of the room, we waited excitedly to watch his first reaction. He came in, looked at the postcard, threw it in his bag, and left. No reaction! he didn’t even look at us. We were very disappointed.

A couple of days later, when we were all rushing out of classroom and racing for lunch, Lin walked toward us, and put a Christmas card in my hand in front of Cat! ‘happy new Year!” he smiled, moved on quickly, and left the two of us standing in the middle of hallway, staring at my name on the top of the card. We never expected things would go this way!

Later when we played almost the same trick on Lee, he figured it out immediately. Then, unlike Lin, he came directly to us, said ‘Thank you,” asked us where we had bought the card, and teased us about our spelling mistake –a very normal and pleasant response.

I decided I would straighten things out with Lin if he asked me to dance at the school New Year’s Eve party. But he didn’t. So i asked him. he said “Sure!” well, he was the worst dancer I’ve ever met. We just moved back and forth in the same place, like marching soldiers. Anyway I asked him why he thought it was ME who sent the card. “I just knew it!” He said confidently, smiling like a proud kid who’d just figured out a puzzle. So i told him that it was from Cat and I. he blushed and said nothing. We marched on till the end of the music without any more words. Maybe I shouldn’t have told him the truth, I thought to myself.

Lee, meanwhile, being regarded as the best dancer in the school, was the most popular gentleman — he wore a dark blue suit to the party, looked more like an adult than a teen. I was blissful when he asked me for the last dance. We were turning around and around, while he kept joking about everything. I was laughing all the time, thinking how lucky I was to have such a great friend. But at the end when I looked into his eyes, I couldn’t see any joy. The pupils were cold and calm. No. he was nobody’s friend. Even when his hands were holding me he was still so far away. I had a feeling of being cheated.

As I write it has been two years since I have seen them. Although they are so different from each other, I always had a feeling that, Lee was once as simple and honest as Lin, but somebody or something had broken his trust, which caused him to change. I only wonder what it was.

I miss them both.

JQZ
April 1992
college of Alameda, English 1A, Essay #3