My Father Doesn't Want to Go Home for the New Year

Since my grandparents passed away, our family hasn't gone back to our hometown for the New Year in four years.

By all rights we should go back this year. My mother said early on that we would.

But as the holiday got closer, I talked with my mother about it again, and she said my father didn't seem to want to go back.

I was taken aback. The village is where my father was born and raised. My grandparents may be gone, but surely that doesn't mean he doesn't want to go back? He doesn't seem like someone with no feeling for his hometown, so I was curious what was really on his mind. Why didn't he want to go?

I didn't ask my father. I asked my mother. After more than twenty years of marriage, she can see right through whatever's on his mind.

My mother said, "Your dad's afraid the neighbors in the village will pester him with questions."

Honestly, I'd thought of all kinds of possibilities, but I never imagined the reason my father didn't want to go home would be so ordinary, so common.

The neighbors' questions touch on a lot of things, but at bottom they're all about a person's and a family's financial situation and material conditions.

For families like ours, rural families who work away from home, every New Year we finish a year of work and come back, and the neighbors ask the same questions. Made a lot of money this year? Why didn't you drive back this year? How's your son's job? Does he have a girlfriend yet? When's the wedding? Have you got a marital home ready for him?

Ha. Just listing these questions, I can picture it. So it's not only me who dreads being asked about my job, my income, and whether I've found a partner. The older generation has the same worry.

My father has an older brother, my eldest uncle. My uncle has a son, my cousin, a year older than me. In the neighbors' comparisons, it's not just my father and my uncle who get compared. Sometimes it's me and my cousin too, since he's only a year older.

My cousin is easygoing and listens to his parents. In the past two years, his family did three things. First, they bought a car, a plug-in hybrid. Second, they renovated the house back home. Third, through an introduction, they found my cousin a prospective partner.

In the traditional story of life, buying a car and renovating the old house are required steps before a matchmaking meeting. In my hometown, if you see a family renovating their house, you don't need to wonder. It's 1000% because they're about to set their kid up on a blind date . The house back home is what gives you the confidence to go on a matchmaking date.

I think the reason my father fears being questioned is probably that our family hasn't renovated the house, and hasn't found me a match either.

Honestly, I really don't understand why the old house has to be renovated before a matchmaking date. In terms of return on investment, after renovating they won't live there much. They go back once every few years, so what's the point of fixing it up so nicely? A house that nobody lives in for years, with no one around, deteriorates even faster. Before you've lived in it much, it may need repairs again.

Another thing: I don't know what my grandfather was thinking back then. Our family house is one building, but it has two electric meters. Yes, really. Where we're from, the older generation, when building a new house, thinks of their children. So my grandfather planned one building as two households, with one wall to connect and separate them.

But when my eldest uncle's family renovated their half, the balcony and door that used to connect the two sides were bricked up. So that wall no longer connects the two households. It only separates them. And from outside, it looks ridiculous, like those short-video streamers who play two people singing a duet, one side in a suit and the other in a dress.

Even if I someday plan to renovate my side, I'd still have to join it to that middle wall. Two houses joined together but in completely different styles. It would look like two people who don't share a language, forcibly tied together.

The second thing is finding a partner. Folks back home love talking about young people's business. They're long sick of their own usual topics. At New Year, the young people come back, and everything that happened to them over the past year is ready to be talked about.

I have to admit that as a student, I may have had the idea of never marrying. But for many years now I haven't thought that way. I feel I'll definitely marry in this life, though I don't know about having children.

Yes, I will definitely marry. But I don't think it'll be in the next few years. From what I know of myself, I'll most likely marry late, and my thirties is quite possible.

Going by the normal script, my cousin will probably marry and have a child in the next year or two. Setting aside all outside factors, if I had to go on matchmaking dates, marry, and have a child in the next year or two, I couldn't do it. It's frightening.

For my cousin's future, my eldest uncle's family has worried themselves sick, and they're all actively pushing this forward.

But I'm different. My family isn't an only-child family. I have a younger brother in middle school, so my parents' responsibility right now is still raising a child. As for me, they haven't had to look after me in many years.

And when it comes to my life and marriage, my parents have never put much pressure on me. I think they've been as accepting as they can be, within their own limits.

When I went to internet cafés to play LOL in middle school, they didn't strongly object. When I said I liked writing novels, they never forbade it. My parents never suppressed my interests or my nature. They only watched me closely on the most basic things, like kindness and morals. So I think I'm kind now, with good character, and I dare to let my nature out and follow what I love.

So I've been exposed to a lot of advanced, trendy culture, and I'm someone who dares to look other people in the eye and say no.

I used to think my parents were like that too. Not like other people's parents, not so traditional, more open to new ideas, better adapted to the new era, more able not to care what others see and think.

But now I find I may have been wrong. They really are less traditional and more accepting. That doesn't mean they can be as carefree as a young person. They'll always care about the responsibility and the burden pressing down on them. It's only a matter of degree.

My father has a natural sense of humor and always makes light, teasing jokes, which makes people think he isn't rigid. That's why I was so surprised to learn he didn't want to go home for the New Year. I used to think my mother was the one who always cared about what other people said. I never expected this. My funny father didn't want to go home for the New Year because of what others might say.

So I really know too little about my father. Deep down, he's still traditional. He believes a happy life means having a house, a car, kids with families of their own, and grandchildren. It's only because of harsh reality that all he can do is face each day with a smile.

I don't think that's unreasonable. Everyone has their own definition of a happy life. It's just that I feel the traditional script of a happy life I described above is more or less something planted in people's heads from outside. For my father's generation, life might be about two things: earning money and supporting the family. Other fun moments are just decoration on those two things. And when the goal of your whole life is the family, how well the family is doing is directly tied to your own happiness.

If a child does well in school, the whole family is happy. If one person marries, the whole clan is happy with them.

Honestly, I can't accept this way of thinking, where the family is all of your happiness in life.

Family is important. For example, I care a lot about my mother's health right now. But for my own future, I don't think starting a new family is something that decides my happiness for life. In fact I think treating it that way is wrong.

Because happiness should run through everything, and starting a family is only part of that process.

Sometimes, if all you think about is building a happy family, you end up stuck in a dead end. You should see marriage within your whole life. Marriage is a part of life. Life is not all marriage.

My parents drove back to the village a few days ago. Whatever happens, we have to go home, and the things we have to face aren't really that frightening.

Sometimes, even if no one asks, you'll still be troubled by certain questions. So the heart of the matter isn't whether others ask you. It's how you see those questions yourself.

Go with what comes and don't force it, and the world naturally widens.

Originally there is not a single thing. Where could dust alight?