feel so loved

Sunday morning Ricky Martin dropped by with mail. A big box from my mother with chocolate (homemade and otherwise), coffee and craisins (that I'd requested), and a pile of knitted dishcloths for the bakery, among other things. By strange coincidence, there was one from Justin as well. I left both of the packages untouched until I got home from Sam's in the afternoon. Then I tore off the paper and threw it on the floor like Christmas. I do not take days like these for granted.

Justin sent the China Mountain book he promises is good, and a cd - another mix by which I could count the years we've been friends. He says I started it, and I believe him, because I am good at starting things. I am less good at the continuing.  When I visited Nanjing last spring retired kindergarten teacher Chen took me aside to talk about our common personality. She told me the story of her youth - how at 16 or 18, when they were being sent to rural areas for "reeducation", she chose the farthest place she could. She said her husband still doesn't really get it, and we laughed together at how we're drawn to risk. The drawback of our personality, she told me, is that "we've got a tiger's head, and a snake's tail." We're all enthusiastic and gung-ho at the beginning, but later our energy and commitment wanes.

And I think that's why I'm still here, sticking out this language and this place, and this bakery idea. There's the fun of the adventure, but also I'm trying to prove something, mainly to myself, about how I can follow through. Even if it's just in the sheer stubbornness of waiting it out. 

Last week we finally found a shop to rent. Three different friends had told me to go check out this little milk-tea bar for students, and when Charity left Nanchong on the third (and final day of the labor day holiday) I finally did. The current owners have it decorated in low-key browns and black, with an almost-Western feel, and in the back I saw an unused tiled room begging to be a kitchen, so I started scheming. Sam's mom came back with me in the evening and we found out it was up for rent. Three days later we'd agreed on a price, and barring some major glitch, it will officially be ours in less than ten days. And then we start measuring days by money made (or lost).

In a strange coming round full circle kinda way, the bakery-to-be, on "Fish and Rice Alley", is just down the street from the medical college and from my first Nanchong apartment. All those bowls of pulled noodles with seaweed during the first lonely few years in . (The beautiful woman boss still nods at me when I walk by.) And on the corner just fifty feet down is the little bakery where I begged cheap margarine for years. (They used to be the only place open when I would come walking home from ZX's after midnight.) Directly across the street is the new thirty-three story apartment building - the construction of which I had such ambiguous feelings about when all the market vendors got kicked out onto the street and old women held a sit-down on the corner. Funny how easily ambiguity disappears when you start thinking in terms of profit. The development has turned the street into a much more attractive place. Three years ago we would never have considered it as a location for what we hope to do. But now it's there, and here we go.