One of These Days...

If I have any literary talent, one of these days, I really should write about a few friends of mine from my college days, with whom I am still in constant contact. Over 20 years ago, we were all so young and so curious about what the future would bring to us. Today, one might say that life has turned out to be totally unexpected for us. Strangely, though, one could also say that in some ways life has turned out utterly as predicted.

My best friend back then was kind of a tom boy. I was very annoyed with her when I first met her back at the military academy where all freshman of Peking University had to go through a whole year of military training. I hated the environment and I did not want to be there. I was in a bad mood. She was transferred into our room together with two other girls just a month after we started at the military academy, presumably because these three girls were "better" behaved so that they could teach the rest of us rebellious girls. She and I shared a bunk bed, with her taking the upper bed. I saw her hang up her cap on the nook that I used, and I told her without smiling that it was mine. Without a second of hesitation and without any flash of displeasure, she immediately put her cap on the other nook, and was like, "oh sorry". - I felt a little better. Then she and I got the worst shift of guard duty one night (2 am to 4 am), and there was really nothing to do except for chatting to stay awake. She started talking. I don't quite remember what she said, except that she suddenly realized that she had written letters to everyone else except for her brother. Two hours passed quickly. The next morning when I woke up, without realizing it, I decided to talk to her more than anyone else. And I just talked and talked, to the point of others suspecting lesbianism. We would chat about going abroad to study, and she said that we would go to San Francisco together. Fast forward 20 years - she and I are both living in San Francisco Bay Area, her daughter 7 months older than my son. She and I are both in the biotech industry, with her in research at a big and stable company, and me in business doing dangerous startups. We still talk a lot, and can't imagine living a life without friends to talk to all the time.

Another friend, whom I have mentioned before, now lives in the UK. In every movie about girls, there is always one girl that's a bit chubby and loved by everyone else. She's like that. She was funny, kind and considerate. We became friends because we both loved George Michael! As I mentioned in a previous blog, she would invite another friend and myself to her home which is just a few blocks away from campus to watch MTV videos of American pop music. After college, she went to Rhode Island to study, while I was attending MIT. We had so much fun seeing each other on some weekends. We went to buy crabs directly from the boats at Galilee. We went shopping in Downtown Crossing on a work day, because she came to visit me while my boss was out of town. We went to the same Chinese restaurant Sichuan Garden over and over again that the owners remembered us. Michael and I once knocked at her door (uninvited) on the way back from a trip to New York and I so enjoyed seeing the surprised look on her face. She and her husband drifted apart over the years. She joined a big multi-national company and moved from Austin to Beijing and now to England. A tough professional woman on the facade, she is actually quite a romantic.

The other friend on those MTV video watching afternoons lives very far in New York, but feels very close because we talk all the time still, chatting about movies and books, and complaining about everything including work, kids and husbands (especially husbands). She is so sweet and dear to me. She and I helped to organize a 10-year reunion of our class including an electronic year book. Even today, some friends commented that it's really a joy to read that book, although at the time we had to use all kinds of tactics to make people write something, which pissed off some people who pissed us off as well! I am utterly convinced that without her involvement, it would be hard to organize anything again for our class, for she alone possesses the discipline and organizational abilities. She was also the most popular girl in our class. A professional woman married with three kids working for a major media company in New York, I am sure that when she was in college she never would have anticipated that. One thing did turn out as anticipated though - she married her highschool sweetheart. I still remember that once I saw her coming out of our dormitory building, dressed in a flowery skirt, ready to meet up with her boyfriend. She was as pretty and fresh as the flowers on her skirt.

Every girls' group would have someone really cool, artistic or poetic, and our group was no exception. This girl was not a classic beauty, but she has something resembling an "it" girl. She was into rock-n-roll music. She knew artistic people. She could write poetry. She could recite lines from the movie "Dead Poets Society". She had tempestuous love affairs. She would smoke. She dressed in fashionable clothes. In summary, she was utterly cool. True to her spirit, she got married almost immediately right after college, and got divorced almost as fast. Fast forward 20 years - she's been working for the same company after graduate school in the same city (Houston). She's married with two kids. Her older son Aidan was about Winston's age when I went to visit her in Houston, and I completely fell in love with him. I think Aidan was the reason why I decided to have a kid, and for that reason I think Winston even looks like Aidan a little bit! Compared to her past, I have to say that one cannot find a more model wife/mother than she is - stable career, nice husband, two adorable kids, and a beautifully kept house in suburban Houston. In this case, life has turned out completely differently for her from what I anticipated.

Back in our college years, "love" was the most discussed topic, and understandably so at our age back then. As we are entering middle age, most of us are exhausted by the demands of work and family. In addition, yes, familiarity breeds contempt to some extent, as we cannot possibly remain fascinated by the same person whom we know better than anyone else. But one friend has remained "hopelessly romantic". She was beautiful, sweet, considerate and incredibly romantic. She was always into "passionate" and "true" love. She would fall madly in love with one guy, and then a few months later fell out of love. It does not mean that she was cavalier about it. She really can only be with someone whom she absolutely loves. By the time I transferred to Harvard, she was dating someone two years older from our college very seriously. They remained together for many years and went to Hong Kong together. It was there that she met her current husband. Always honest about love, she has been with her husband since, and mentioned many times that she could not imagine she could have met anyone better. She has moved to her husband's native Netherlands, and they have an adorable half Dutch half Chinese son. When her husband's kidney disease required a kidney transplant, she gave him one of her kidneys. If anyone fits the description "love conquers all", she does. In a way, she has remained the same as 20 years ago - romantic to the core. I love her for that - it is incredible and inspiring.

Indeed my friends deserve a book, but I don't have the talent to write about them, except for in this lame blog. How I wish that I could capture their essence, their spirit and their lives with my pen!