A Stranger Not So Close To Me

I made a mistake by reading an article about grandpa this morning. My uncle wrote the article and my mom sent it to me because grandpa's 100th anniversary is coming in April. I read one paragraph and my eyes were filled with tears. I am in the office! Stop it!

The first part is titled "A Stranger Close To Me". That's exactly who grandpa was to me. I knew he was my grandpa; he was always there; he smiled all the time; I knew he was someone great, but I never felt I knew him. Obviously that's not just me, not just because I didn't live close to him. I learnt a lot about grandpa from uncle's writing, his career, his music, his hobbies, his research, and how he survived all the attacks and tortures during the Cultural Revolution. To many, grandpa is considered the third most important Chinese composer in modern Chinese history, next to the two who co-composed the National Anthem of China. To me, for a long time, he was just a name, a face, a biological origin where some of my blood came from. I didn't know how I was supposed to think about him, his fame and all the words and evidence of his greatness until I heard The Nirvana of Pheonix at a concert held by China's Ministry of Culture for his 90th birthday. I was convinced. I started looking up to this small man. I understood why my aunt said there probably would be nobody in the family who will exceed what grandpa had achieved.

The Nirvana of Pheonix is a modern symphony piece. It was later accompanied for chorus with a poem/lyrics written by Guo Moruo (the Chinese writer who was the closest to receiving a Literature Nobel Prize. he committed suicide during the Cultural Revolution before the Nobel Prize was granted, the prize was withdrawn because Nobel Prize only goes to people alive). The Nirvana of Pheonix changed what grandpa meant to me. I could vividly feel my love for him, but he was becoming more of a symbol, a symbol of great talent, and more distant.

When grandpa was sick in hospital, I only visited him once in ICU. I remember I stood in a corner and cried insanely for over half an hour afterwards. Grandpa passed away at the age of 93. It's been 7 years. I have never been back to his apartment since, and I have never visited him at the cemetery after the funeral either, not because I don't miss him but he is the most haunting one among all my passed-away grandparents (all four of them), I am afraid that the physical presence of anything related to him will discharge all of whatever that's been accumulated for 7 years and destroy me. Just like how I have always stayed away from the yard and little street where I spent my childhood. I had a wonderful time there, but memory alone can be too scary.

I published an essay about grandpa on an art magazine when I was in college working for Beijing Concert Hall. I felt proud when I saw people reading my article. My family was proud too, I think. At a family gathering after the essay was published, my aunt read the article to the whole family. Mom told me that everybody cried, then she said she hopes I can write something like that about her someday. I thought to myself, luckily I was not at the family gathering.