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Begin again in the library


     

    I just made a decision that I would not work on the new market research project and now I am back in the library again, Just like in 2021 when I quit my job and stayed in the library trying to prepare for the English level test and learn Dutch by myself. Now I am really learning Dutch because French broke my heart :) Sometimes when you look back at the past, you just keep wondering which mysterious force pushes you to become who you are now. Me again, being proudly unemployed. That's a joke since I just cried this morning feeling all the anxieties about the uncertainty of life. 

    One of my dreams is to become a writer. I actually thought about the idea of applying for the creative writing program after completing a course at Berkeley called people of mixed racial descent. I loved the course so much that I had a strong desire to make my voice (and the people that can relate to my experience) heard through writing. Then I came to doubt whether I write in English or Chinese. Because English is not my native language, I feel at ease talking about sociological terms in English but I sometimes struggle a bit talking about daily life when wanting certain things on the shelf but don't know the English word. I think I would be able to write sociological articles in English but I would not be able to write novels. After thinking for a while, I just put away the dream and started to apply for sociology Ph.D. and master programs, hoping in one day I would go back to Berkeley, where I have so many new experiences and life-changing moments. 

    Now, I am trying to apply for a Ph.D. program in Belgium that wants to make migrant voices heard through creative-writing workshops. Life is a circle, somehow I am back to where I was before. I think everyone has moments when they wipe off the boundary between familiarity and distance. The library in Belgium is new to me but the feeling of staying in a library and thinking about the future is familiar. Sometimes when I wake up or wander on the streets, I feel at home because I know the place by heart but at the same time being a bit unfamiliar thinking how English becomes the private language in my life. 

    These days I started to read a collection of essays talking about solitude and loneliness. In the book, there is one Chinese author who talks about her experience of writing purely in English. English is a second language for us that we learn in school and will use in public situations for example seminars, airports, and cafes. However, English can also become a private language when English is all over your life, you think in English and dream in English and when you talk to yourself, it is also in English. Writing, as a way of expressing myself, is a very private behavior, which can also be in English. When I think about my experience, I feel mind-blowing that I build my friendship and relationship in English, even though when I make love, I speak English. I created all the private conversations of initiating sex, during and after sex in English. While saying I love you in Chinese 我爱你 is awkward and weird, I feel I love you can flow out of my heart easily. Sometimes, a word from another language feels closer to you, which wipes off the boundary between familiarity and distantness. Like the author I mentioned before, she was deeply impressed when she learns the term "kill the time" and that time can only be killed by pointless things. I feel the same when I am not happy doing meaningless work. I think she partly solves the continuing puzzle of my validity of writing in English. 

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Location: 比利时鲁汶

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