The Edge of Dream and Reality

Introduction to "The Edge of Dreams and Reality" Seventeen years, eight people, a youth elegy that dances with the times In the autumn of 2001, the sycamore leaves at Jiangcheng No. 1 Middle School had not yet turned yellow. In front of the list of Class Seven, liberal arts class, eight seventeen-year-old boys and girls were pushed into each other's lives by the hand of fate. At that time, they thought that separation was just a matter of changing classrooms, that liking meant borrowing a CD, and that dreams could be held in the palm of their hands as long as they exerted enough force. Lin Xiaoyue was sitting by the window, with an earphone handed over by Chen Qiming plugged into her ears, while Jay Chou sang "Love in B. C." Vaguely. Her heart beat faster and she pretended to read a book. She didn't know that this secret love would last for seventeen years, and she didn't know that the end would not be him. Chen Qiming was wearing a white shirt with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He was as confident as if the whole world was his chessboard. He said he wanted to conquer Wall Street, said he wanted to go to the United States, and said he wanted to be with Lin Xiaoyue for four years in college. He didn't know that some roads would diverge as he walked, and once they diverge, they could never be closed again. Li Mo smoked a cigarette and squinted at the list. His grades were last, but when others dropped out of school, he gave his class teacher a wad of crumpled change. He said, "Just live." He didn't know that he would say this to himself for seventeen years. Su Xiaoman dragged her suitcase through the crowd like a star, and paused at Chen Qiming's name. She thought that as long as it was dazzling enough, she could be seen, but she didn't know that some people's eyes were looking elsewhere from the beginning. Zhao Shanhe stood in the back row, holding half a piece of cake in his hand. The words "Class Seven of Liberal Arts" made his eyes sore. He was the hope of the whole village, and he didn't know that this hope would weigh him down throughout his youth. Wang Xue took Lin Xiaoyue's hand and said that we were in the same class and she only wanted a stable job and a warm home. She didn't know that the simplest wishes often take the longest way. Zhang Chi and Liu Yang crowded together to read "Computer News", high-fived and said they wanted to start a business together. One of them is adventurous and the other is calm, thinking that complementing each other will lead to success. They don't know that on the road to entrepreneurship, what is more terrible than failure is being separated after success. Seventeen years. They walked from Jiangcheng to Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Hong Kong. They have experienced SARS, Super Girl, the financial crisis, skyrocketing housing prices, and the mobile Internet wave. Some people struggled to become writers amidst the decline of the publishing industry, some suffered gastric bleeding and went to the hospital amidst the hustle and bustle of Wall Street, some lost their money and grew old overnight in the collapse of the construction site, and some hid in the bank and became an ordinary account manager after being unspoken on the stage of the talent show. They have loved, quarreled, separated, and reunited. Some people cried and said "You are not in love with me" after being drunk, some people stood all night under the dormitory of Beijing Normal University, some people bought a hundred books that they did not read just to see her one more time, and some people sold all their belongings after the scaffolding collapsed just because "I am dead and I am responsible." Dreams were shattered to pieces, the fist of reality hit me, love slowly became silent on long-distance calls, and friendship turned into likes in the circle of friends during their busy lives. But they didn't disperse. In the summer of 2018, they reunited at Li Mo's farm. The boy who said "just stay alive" now has white hair, but there is light in his eyes. The boy who said he wanted to conquer Wall Street is now doing educational charity in the mountains. The girl who said she wanted to be a star is now married to an honest man, wearing an apron and cooking sweet and sour pork ribs in the kitchen. They danced in the yard, cried into their arms after drinking too much, and sang "Courage" and "Meteor Shower" from seventeen years ago. The moonlight shone down, illuminating their wrinkles and white hair, as well as the unquenched fire in their eyes. Lin Xiaoyue typed the next line on her mobile phone: "We were swept up by the torrent of the times, tossed and collided between the cliffs of dreams and reality, and suffered bloody injuries. In the end, we did not conquer anything, nor were we completely smoothed. We just found a small land in this edge area that is enough to rest each other's souls." This is not a story about success, no one ever truly achieves their seventeen year old dream. This is a story about living - about how you can still stand up and laugh after a bloody head, and how you can still hold up a glass of wine and say "for the next seventeen years" at the class reunion. Dedicated to all those who have struggled on the edge between dreams and reality. You will find that you are not alone. Intent: one sentence summary: For seventeen years, eight young people who started from the same classroom shattered their dreams, separated their love, and picked up reality in the torrent of the times, and finally found a small piece of land on the edge of each other that could rest their souls.