The End of Summer

I remember the summer of 2003, right after I graduated middle school. Around August 15th, the rain started in Zhengzhou and just wouldn’t let up.

After that, summer left and never came back. My closest friends from middle school scattered too, and we lost touch. The next time we met was Chinese New Year.

That was the first time I felt like I was “abandoning the past and opening up a new world,” but I wasn’t all that keen on opening that new world. I still liked my old friends better.

August is over again this year, which means summer’s over. Maybe there’ll be a late-summer heat wave, but every autumn rain brings a chill with it.

I didn’t do much in August either — just worked. Hard to believe my job actually has busy periods. Probably the whole country’s been fucking around lately.

I originally wanted to stir things up and then keep pushing, but in the end I chose to give up on fixing things. My health isn’t great, so I figured I might as well rest.

My birthday’s probably next month. This one’s significant — it proves I’m actually getting old. I always feel like I’m not old yet. At least judging by my checkup results, I’m way healthier than people my age, and healthier than a lot of young people too. Maybe I’ll live a long life, who knows.

I did a lot of thinking about feelings in August. Sometimes I feel like I let down that art teacher from before. I reread what I wrote back then and feel like I did wrong. She just lacked a sense of security, and I never expressed anything to give her that security — I just stayed cold. That naturally bred more suspicion and distrust. She really did put a lot into me; I just wasn’t interested and didn’t see it. That’s on me. Sometimes I wonder if I should apologize to her, and I’ve even thought about sending a text on Teachers’ Day to test the waters and see if I could salvage things. Whether I actually do it depends on my mood.

I read some posts on Quora saying there’s a type of person who feels indifferent to everything, but even when they have opinions they don’t want to communicate them to others. Sometimes they’re defiant, sometimes totally detached. Most of the time it comes down to one thing: low desire.

Maybe I’m just a low-desire guy.

Hoping I can be a bit happier in the second half of the year. I won’t submit to this Boss called life, and I won’t submit to the people trying to fast-track me into the “old folks” line.

“Natsu no Owari” is the OP song from the game Owari no Sekai to Birthday. In the game’s initial setup, the world is supposed to end at the end of summer.

I get the feeling Japanese people really love summer — it’s always owaranai natsu this, owaranai natsu that. I say I hate summer, but my memories of it are still the most numerous.

Maybe summer really is a good season, and this year that good season has just ended.