I've been wanting to write about this topic for quite a while now. You could say it was premeditated. After all, I've been contemplating these questions since high school, yet even now I can't see the end of this journey of self-discovery. I anticipate this questioning will continue for a long time, and I've always felt that perhaps my life will truly begin only when I finally find clarity.
This is a lengthy article, perhaps with too many digressions and such a long preamble that the main content might seem thin in comparison. It's memoir-style, attempting to reconstruct my memories as faithfully as possible. I can't guarantee complete objectivity; it's simply an attempt to recount, from my perspective, a period of memories that have been sealed away for many years, untold to most people.
Elementary School
I was born in a small county town, and in my memories, I once had a joyful childhood.
As a child, I studied in many different places - from the bustling city of Xi'an to impoverished townships, spending time in each.
Eventually, I settled down in the county town where I was born and began my formal education.
When I first arrived at the school, being a transfer student, I was reluctant to speak with strangers. For some reason, my homeroom teacher didn't seem to like me. She was strict with me and seemed to think little of me. While she didn't deliberately target me, she never showed me any warmth either. At that time, I thought I must have done something wrong, so I became even more cautious, afraid to make mistakes, fearful of angering the teacher. As a result, I grew increasingly quiet, no longer seeking attention, preferring to hide in corners, not wanting to be noticed by others.
I remember there was a popular publication called "Youth Monthly" at the time. Since I had bought it before at my previous school, I had the complete set, but at this school, each class only bought a few copies that were passed around during reading class and collected afterward. I didn't like this arrangement, so I brought my own copy from home.
Coincidentally, the copy I brought was identical to the ones the teacher distributed, and when the teacher found one copy missing during collection, she questioned the class multiple times with no one confessing. My desk mate then told the teacher I had a copy. I insisted that this book was brought from home and wasn't stolen, but she didn't believe me. She even called in a teacher from the neighboring class, and they took me to the hallway where both of them kicked me, accusing me of stealing and refusing to admit it, saying I would only ever amount to being a thief. Finally, when they saw I still wouldn't confess, they asked me to bring my mother in. The next day, my mother brought all our copies of Youth Monthly from home. I don't know what happened after that, but I never received an apology.
At that time, I was just relieved that my mother could help prove I hadn't stolen anything. From that moment on, I no longer wanted to be noticed, no longer wanted to interact with others. But being unnoticed was impossible. I was usually among the top three in class examinations, and because of my timid personality, I was often bullied. People would throw things into my clothes, carve vulgar words on my desk, publicly read my private diary to the class, make obscene jokes using my parents' names, force me to do their homework, and even beat me if I didn't do it well... And all of this was dismissed by teachers as normal children's roughhousing.
Later, I could only try to please certain people to reduce the chances of being bullied by others. Although these people would still bully me, at least the number of times I got beaten would decrease. Even at the elementary school graduation party, the apples and drinks I was given and wanted to take home for my little sister were taken away by others, leaving me to return home empty-handed.
Middle School
Academics had never been my weakness. In middle school, I was placed in the best class of the best school in the county.
You can't imagine how delighted I was to discover there were no elementary school classmates in my middle school class. Finally escaping that place filled me with both joy and anxiety - happy to leave, yet worried that the place I was heading to might be even more frightening.
Fortunately, most of my middle school classmates were nice. At first, some people did try to take advantage of my quiet nature, asking me to do this and that, but when several more righteous classmates noticed this, they immediately confronted the bullies. I'll never forget their words: "If you dare bully He Yi, you'll have to answer to me." Honestly, those tasks weren't really a big deal to me - just helping them fetch water, buy food, or lend them my meal card. I said it was fine, no need to make a fuss.
But they insisted that if I ever got bullied again, I should find them, and they would stand up for me. Looking back now, it's truly touching that there was such a group of people willing to pull me out of the abyss. Unfortunately, I wasn't truly saved. While I may have physically escaped school bullying, I remained the same as before - inconspicuous, accustomed to hiding myself, seeking shelter through avoidance: as long as no one noticed me, I wouldn't be bullied.
In second year of middle school, I was horrified to discover that my home, which had held all my warmth, was about to disappear. My parents' increasingly frequent arguments left me helpless countless times. I tried to pretend I knew nothing, tried to convince myself it was fine, that things would be better after the arguments, just like when I argued with them - there would still be breakfast the next day, and they would still coax me to get up. At that time, I didn't understand that a family ultimately cannot be held together by lies. Two people with different values should not be bound together by so-called responsibility. Of course, this is all hindsight now. But overall, middle school life was a relatively good period. I had teachers' favor, good friends by my side, people willing to protect me without asking for anything in return... It's just that the knot in my heart was never untied.
High School
My performance in the high school entrance exam was neither particularly good nor bad. Ranking 99th in the county, while not entirely satisfactory, was enough to get me into my backup class choice. During registration, I found myself placed with several middle school classmates I had gotten along with well, and one even became my desk mate. She told me she had always known the name He Yi but could never remember who I was until we formally met in high school.
I smiled, partly from embarrassment, but also partly from relief.
High school was good, except for encountering someone... someone who once occupied my entire heart but chose to leave me because they felt I was affecting their studies. They gave me hope of walking towards the light, only to personally cut it off.
I once contemplated suicide because of this incident. I borrowed a small knife and carved bloody marks on my arm, one cut after another, but ultimately couldn't find the courage to sever an artery. I just numbly watched the blood flow from my broken skin, numbly watched as the knife was taken away and thrown out, numbly watched as several people carried me to the teacher's office. The teacher asked if I had thought about suicide, and I said yes. She told me this wouldn't solve anything, and that even if I didn't consider myself, doing this would deprive my parents, who had raised me for many years, of their only hope for a happy life. I promised not to do such things again, not for myself, but because I couldn't and wouldn't dare to imagine how my mother would cope if I died.
Later, watching them laughing and chatting casually with others, I became angrier: Didn't you say I was affecting your studies? Well, let me show you just how well you can study. I quickly adjusted my state and started pushing forward with determination. The result was still good - my college entrance exam score ended up being quite a bit higher than theirs, according to what I heard, there was at least a 40-point difference.
I was fortunate in high school to meet some of the most important friends in my life. Even now, I still actively maintain contact with them, unwilling to drift apart after separation like before. I'm grateful to my homeroom teacher and biology teacher in high school for helping me rediscover my interest in learning, preventing me from continuing to sink and muddle through those three years.
I was the math class representative for a year in tenth grade, which seems absurd thinking back now. Math homework was everyone's pain in our class, it was literally impossible to complete. But I was too stubborn back then. Because in middle school, neither the math teacher nor the class representative cared at all, my math skills deteriorated quickly without anyone supervising. This was of course my own fault, but perhaps if someone had been stricter back then, would I have regressed so much? I didn't want someone to look back on high school one day and think their poor math performance was because I didn't do anything as class representative. So I felt it was okay even if people didn't understand or criticized me, as long as I did what I thought was right. But... I overlooked one thing: no one has the right to make decisions for others. What I should have done was just fulfill my duties as a class representative, not cause trouble for others in the class because of my own reasons. Unfortunately, I realized this too late, and couldn't even say sorry to them.
After the college entrance exam, the family relationship also completely broke down. Actually, everyone understood that this relationship should have ended long ago, with only a thin layer of paper left unpierced - that was the last face-saving measure they gave each other.
University
In university, I encountered many new things, met many people, and experienced many events. While not perfect, it wasn't particularly unsuccessful either. I was gradually emerging from the shadows.
I became less timid around strangers, could handle things on my own, could try to take care of others, could make more friends, could allow myself to be happy.
Perhaps that's true. But undeniably, periods of depression became more frequent, I became more prone to melancholy, more easily hurt.
But fortunately, someone was willing to accompany me through these ups and downs. Although sometimes a bit slow to catch on, sometimes not fully attuned to my emotions, they were willing to stay with me, willing to listen to my troubles, willing to move forward together. That time I asked them: "We'll have a future together, right?" They said we would.
I cannot predict if this is true or false, but I'm willing to believe once again. I deeply look forward to that day in the future.
I once said that going abroad for me might not necessarily be about pursuing a better life, but rather escaping from my current life. But since meeting them, perhaps my biggest motivation for going abroad is no longer about leaving this place, but rather hoping that one day, we can be together properly, even have a wedding ceremony that belongs to just the two of us.
I am someone who fears marriage, with an instinctive aversion and disgust towards it. I always thought I would never want to bind myself to someone else. But it turns out that when you truly fall in love with someone completely, you don't resist marriage - you even want to enter into it. I look forward to the day when, in a church, under the watch of divinity, I walk towards a future with them.
Thoughts
The story pauses here for now. Organizing my thoughts like unraveling silk threads hasn't been easy for me. Those things I had hidden away, deliberately concealed or even distorted in key parts, have now been fully revealed. At least from my perspective, this is the truth as I remember it. But as I mentioned at the beginning, I can't guarantee objectivity. People tend to delete unfavorable memories, and perhaps in others' perspectives, I'm just someone who brought everything upon myself. After all, one shouldn't believe or listen to only one side of the story.
Reflections
Thinking carefully, what have I been pursuing these twenty years? At first, it was happiness and joy - when 2 yuan of weekly allowance could make me happy for days, when I could play with friends on weekends and buy treats.
Later, I sought freedom, wanting to escape from that oppressive place, hoping to break free from the life of being bullied.
Then, I hoped for family harmony, wishing my parents would stop fighting, hoping our life could return to how it used to be. Though we weren't wealthy, couldn't afford many treats or toys, couldn't live in a place with heating, couldn't buy a proper cup of milk tea, at least back then, our family was happy, and everyone's faces still wore smiles.
After that, I wanted to pursue a relationship, like someone who had been walking in darkness suddenly seeing light, but when I reached out, I discovered I had already been burned, and thus fell into an even deeper abyss.
Later, I studied frantically, almost out of spite, perhaps just to prove a point, to avoid being looked down upon.
In university, I took many detours, tried many things, learned quite a few skills that now seem useless. I might have gained more than others, but it couldn't be reflected in grades or competitions. I learned enough to look for a decent job, only to find that my skills were common to everyone, even falling short of vocational school graduates.
When I was almost becoming numb, I met a few younger students. Although it might not be appropriate to call them "kids" given their age, I've gotten used to calling new students "kids," haha. I saw a bit of my former self in them and didn't want to watch them walk the same winding paths I had taken. I wanted to find my past self through them.
Things are perhaps better now, or maybe not. Who am I? What kind of person am I? Where am I heading? All these questions trouble me.
Whether to work, pursue a master's degree, or even a Ph.D. - what would I choose without external influences? What should I choose when considering objective facts? I don't know. I doubt everything I do and feel anxious about my uncertain future. What should I pursue in the future? Money or ideals? Reputation or status? Or perhaps none of these are attainable?