In that remote town surrounded by mountains, time seems to be slower than everything in the world. People’s lives are slow and rhythmic, and it seems that every day repeats yesterday’s story. On the small roads in the town, you can see people carrying loads or little women with children walking leisurely on the road from time to time, with unhurried steps, as if they have nothing to do with anything in the world.
I was born on this land. My father is an honest farmer and my mother is one of the most gentle women in the town. Our family lives in a small house at the head of the town. There is a stream in front of the house, and the stream water is clear. Every summer, the stream will ripple lightly, and sometimes a few dead leaves will float on the water. The small field next to our house was reclaimed by my father with his life’s hard work. He never said much, but I know that his love for this land exceeds everything.
And I seem to be born to be with this land and this countryside. When I was young, I ran in the fields all day, played hide-and-seek with the children in the village, or picked up stones by the stream, as if there were only mountains and blue sky in the world. At that time, I didn’t understand what the future was, but I felt that time seemed to have no end, and everything in life was so simple and beautiful.
But people will grow up eventually. The carefreeness of youth is gradually replaced by the responsibilities and pressures of life. That year, I met her, the girl who brought me warmth and pain. I have long forgotten her name, but I still remember her clear eyes, like a stream, quiet and deep. We met at the market in the town. She stood in front of the stall, lowered her head and looked at a bouquet of flowers in her hand, with an unspeakable sadness in her eyes. I walked over and stood beside her without speaking. We just stood there silently, and neither of us broke the tranquility.
She had no family, like a wanderer, who came to the town just to find a place to live. She said she used to be a painter, living in a distant city, but because of an accident, she lost all her relatives and all her support, and finally chose to escape from that strange world and come to this quiet place. She lived in a shabby hut on the edge of the town, painting every day, painting the city in her memory and those disappeared days.
At that time, every time I was with her, I always had an indescribable throbbing in my heart. There was an incomprehensible depth in her eyes, and that depth was accompanied by a little helplessness and sadness. She was like a person abandoned by fate, but she still tried to find the peace that belonged to her. We were speechless, but whenever we looked at each other, we could always read a lot from each other’s eyes. That kind of silent tacit understanding seemed to be the arrangement of fate, destined us to be together.
However, love stories are often not as beautiful as we expect. Our getting along is like an inevitable tragedy. She always smiled and said that she was just a passer-by and would leave one day. She said that her heart no longer belonged to this world or anyone else. Her love had long disappeared in the passage of time. She said she never believed in love, because love can only bring hurt, and she has long been unwilling to touch those wounds.
I don’t understand why she treats her emotions so coldly. Every time I try to get close to her and try to understand her heart, she always gently pushes me away, and tells me in a gentle and distant manner: “Some things are destined not to be owned.”
Her departure is the kind of silent disappearance. The last time we met, she said nothing, but gave me a smile. There was no joy or sadness in that smile, as if her life had come to an end. She quietly left the town, as if she had never existed. I never mentioned her name again, but occasionally in my dreams, I recalled her clear eyes and the sentence “Some things are destined not to be owned.”
The passage of time has made me gradually understand some truths. That girl gave me a lot and took away a lot from me. She taught me how to understand love and loss, and taught me how to find my own peace in the helplessness of life. Perhaps, life is like this stream, under the tranquil surface, there is always an undercurrent. Everyone may have a pain that is hard to touch in their heart, which turns into a calm ripple as time goes by and quietly dissipates.
The wind in the small town still blows over the familiar fields, the stream still flows slowly, and I still continue my own life among the mountains and rivers. Perhaps, as she said: “Some things are destined not to be owned.” What we can do is to learn to accept, learn to live quietly in the face of an unchangeable fate, until the years bring us new tenderness and cruelty.