Chapter 16 Gullangwa: The heart is on the road - a small note of Ding Lin

1 Both Ding Lin and Lin Da love to read the articles. The former's articles are widely circulated on the Internet, while the latter's books are quite famous among readers.But recently, I suddenly read a cloud of fog.This fog is not because of the articles of the two, but the relationship between the two.At first I thought that Ding Lin and Lin Da had nothing to do with each other, but later I found out that it was not. It seemed that Ding Lin was Lin Da. Later, a friend told me that Ding Lin was not one person, but two people. It was the pseudonym of Lin Da and his wife.It's a strange reading experience.

I have seen three of Linda's published books: "I Have a Dream Too".The first three books are called the "A Closer Look at the United States" trilogy, which has a huge influence on the readership. Its descriptions and explanations of American society, democracy, and institutions are simple and thought-provoking.Later, it is said that there was also a collection of essays called "Take a Book to Paris". This book was published later and had much less influence than the previous three books. The author is very low-key. The book has no preface, preface, or postscript. It starts suddenly and then ends suddenly.This method of publishing books can only be selected and liked by readers, and it can only rely entirely on the skill of words.But it was the author's overly low-key attitude that aroused my curiosity, so after eating eggs and wanting to see chickens, I searched for the author's introduction everywhere.As a result, I searched and searched, but found nothing.Later, I found clues in Mr. Zhu Xueqin's article.In "From "Mayflower" to "Harvard", Mr. Zhu has this passage:

Christmas came, and my southern friend drove 3,000 miles from Georgia, the hometown of novels familiar to the Chinese, and drove for two days to see me.And the two books written by the couple introducing American society, politics, and culture were also on the list of popular books in China that year, "Sorrows in the Deep History-A Closer Look at America" ​​and "America from a Closer Look" have become popular among Chinese reading circles. familiar.Those two books are well written, and they are related to their living conditions. After many years in the United States, they made a living as peddlers, struggling at the grassroots level, without any of the bad habits of the class of overseas students in the United States.The couple had heard of Harvard's name from afar, but they always thought they were country bumpkins from the south, so they didn't dare to come here easily. This time, they took advantage of me to come to Harvard to explore their brains.Therefore, I joked that this year's Christmas was "two peddlers went to Harvard", and their revenge for me was to bring me a copy, and the title page gave me such a reply: "Christmas 1997: Harvard does not read books!" They drove me here and there, and walked to many places that I could not normally go because I didn't have a car.That week, I really couldn't read a book, and the hawker couple laughed happily.

This couple is the Linda couple.However, judging from the situation disclosed in Mr. Zhu's article, Linda and his wife turned out to be a pair of hawkers, which was quite different from my original imagination.In my opinion, these two are at least scholars, working as professors or visiting scholars in a famous university.But the result was beyond my expectation.This more or less formed a gap in my psychology.But I also have doubts about the "hawker" couple.If they are really peddlers, how do they have so much time and leisure to write things?Maybe it's because Mr. Zhu is too familiar with Linda and his wife, that's why he got this nickname? !

Later, I continued to search, and in an article called "Small Probability Events" in Mr. Zhu Xueqin's book "Revolution in the Study", I saw his description of Linda and his wife again, and this time the writing was a little clearer: I went to the United States, went to the south, and talked with Linda and his wife who wrote "I Have a Dream" for three days in a remote farmhouse in Georgia. It seems that this time is right, but they actually saw Linda and his wife in the "remote farmhouse".It seems that he is not a hawker, but also a farmer. Look again.I finally read a relatively complete account of Linda in Mr. Zhu's "Bringing a Book—From America to Paris", which clearly stated that Linda and his wife were indeed a pair of peddlers. Living in a relatively remote place in the countryside of the United States, struggling at the bottom of American life, their lifestyle is "half a year of work, half a year of writing".Among them, Mr. Zhu has a more detailed description of Linda and his wife's trafficking life:

When the car stops, many wooden boards are moved out to build simple shelves, and the artworks for sale are placed one by one; when it gets dark, these shelves are restored to wooden boards of different lengths and taken back into the car.At the end of the day, my back hurts, and they laughed at me as "Chinese cadres participating in American labor."The days to go to the market are from May to November, and when the weather is cold and the leaves fall, the hard-earned money earned in half a year is enough for a year's food, so they quit work with peace of mind.From autumn to winter, they return to the old house, chop some firewood in their own woods, light the stove, read and draw by the fire, and write "I have a dream" or "Take a book to Paris".

After confirming that Ding Lin and his wife were indeed a pair of hawkers, on the contrary, I was not disappointed, but envious and relieved. "Working for half a year, writing for half a year", what a good mentality this is, and it also makes me feel ashamed of having such an idea at the beginning.This simple way of life of "breathing freely, working freely, and writing freely" is actually more admirable than the life style of those scholars who chase after fame and fortune. "Write what you see, write what you hear, start as you like, and stop as you like." This low-key, civilian writing method may be more worthy of our respect.Their personality strength and pursuit, their "poor but rich" life are actually more attractive.

2 I think my quest has come to an end here.Unexpectedly, I am not the only one who is interested in laying chickens after eating eggs, other readers also have similar hobbies. At the beginning of this year, in Guantian, a netizen wrote a post to explore the secrets of Linda.This netizen said hello, and suddenly ignited the passion hidden in everyone's hearts. Hulala, a large group came up, each expressing his views and providing materials.But it is a pity that readers' understanding of Linda and his wife is only limited to my level of understanding, no matter how much, it seems that there is nothing.

Unexpectedly, when the mountains and rivers were in doubt and there was no way out, suddenly the willows were dark and the flowers were bright.The so-called "beautiful willows and bright flowers" is: because of this post, Linda and his wife who were diving in Guantian were attracted.What surprised people even more was that they made a "self-confession" here, which was very rare, briefly recounted their past, and talked about their current situation.After I read it, I was very happy.Unexpectedly, the joy was too early, and Linda and his wife asked the moderator to delete their "self-confession".After all kinds of hard work, I finally obtained the text they posted at the beginning, and recorded it below for the eyes of netizens who couldn’t see it at the beginning:

Don't guess, everyone, let me confess. We, my husband and I, whether we are called Ding Lin or Lin Da, we just chose a name when we had to have a name for something to say.The man's original surname is Ding, and the woman's name has Lin in it.Usually it is a woman who writes the first draft, so careful people can see traces of women.The reason why it is not very "show" is that there is really nothing to "show".Readers, after reading it, think it makes sense, and we will be satisfied if we leave an impression of those stories; if it doesn't make sense, there is nothing wrong with cursing.

The two of us are middle school classmates, and the teacher Liu Haisheng mentioned in Mr. Zhu Xueqin's article is our teacher at Shanghai Fuxing Middle School. The two of us joined the team in Xiaoxing'an Mountains, Heilongjiang, did farm work, and let the horses go.Later, when I returned to Shanghai, the man was a street worker, and the woman worked as a carpenter for the construction team for several years.When the Cultural Revolution ended, I went to university and studied "engineering".After graduation, the woman took the postgraduate entrance examination and studied under Mr. Chen Congzhou.We both later worked at the university, but both quit shortly thereafter.That was around 1987 or 1988.Since then, they have all worked on construction sites. Of course, with some books and technical background, the work is much lighter than ordinary small workers, but it is natural to live in a work shed with the workers.In this way, until 1991 when I had the chance to go abroad, the chance was still to work. After going abroad, the work you do is on the edge of agriculture, warehouse, construction, transportation, etc. That is to say, you have to do what you should do under the boss.I also took a little class, which was very complicated.Reading is also very complicated. The word "hawker" is really accurate.At local festivals in small towns around the world, set up a "stand" to sell small things, such as small things made by yourself, handicrafts and the like.It's like going to a temple fair.It is not easy to make a living, so one of us has to maintain a regular job and go to work every day.The advantage of making a living in this way is that I have traveled all over the small towns in the south and got used to the country people in black, white, red and yellow. The most frightening thing is that the editor puts a note next to our "name": Scholar.Do I have to be a scholar to get credit?Can a non-scholar have common sense?We are no longer scholars.We both have calluses on our hands. Recently, the two of us are busy building a house by ourselves and improving our living conditions. DIY is very common here.President Jamie Carter is from our state, and his old man likes to spend time doing carpentry.We think it's great, what do you think? I remember reading an article by He Qinglian, saying that life is like walking on the road, but each person's realm on the road is different.Most people are "on the road", they are burdened by the material goals they set, and in the end they cannot escape Caesar's sorrow; a small number of people are "on the road", they live for the freedom of the soul, In the process of pursuing spiritual freedom, human civilization has been endowed with dignity and nobility, leaving many precious spiritual wealth for people. Ding Lin is the kind of person who leaves spiritual wealth for people. Bless Ding Lin, hope they live a prosperous and happy life in DIY!Maybe hope they can leave us more "spiritual" wealth. 2003-12-15