Old Trades · Old Rules (Nostalgia Series)

Author: Xia Hong
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2001-09-01
Features: Most of the people and events in this book have not yet been completely abandoned by life, but the baton has been passed on to today's affairs; beauty salons have taken over the barber chairs, large factories have taken over the work done by scattered artisans, and the night watchmen have been replaced by alarm clocks. In the folk, one can still see people selling flowers and doing laundry, while beggars and prostitutes continue to write the story of the old lower-class life. But I ask: how much of their old worldly wisdom can they still retain in the fast-paced progress of society? With the changes in the appearance of life, the inner essence of life has also changed. Behind the changes in characters and stories, the former ways of survival and life attitudes have turned into history. In the slow or fast evolution, one by one ways of life have gradually been abandoned, and the echoes of joy and sorrow have become faint and turned into a subtle sigh in our hearts. Only the past and lost things enter the realm of aesthetics when the reality evolves into memories. I originally thought that I could truly treat my own existence with an aesthetic attitude, but after reading these texts, I realized that when reality gathers around me, I can only appreciate the beauty of the things that have been abandoned. Or perhaps, because it is unattainable in reality, I include those that have gone far away in my vision. Looking from afar, without pain or joy, without desire or struggle, the restless heart even finds a sense of peaceful solace. I know that this solace will also leave, and what they give me will eventually be taken back by them. What remains unchanged under the sun? Their fate foreshadows our future.