Arc of Time

An endlessly circulating neon marble connects twenty completely different lives. The locust flowers in late spring are falling in the old streets, and the dyehouses by the river are filled with the fragrance of indigo all day long. A glass marble rolled from the palm of the old woman kneading dough in the pastry shop, through the washing table with hammers rising and falling by the old well, through the dusty pile of old letters at the postal agency, through the curled shavings on the carpenter's floor, and through the beating fire in the cabin of the awning boat, all the way forward without stopping. It helps those who have been there for half a lifetime see their old friends who have not returned, helps those who have lost their original aspirations to find their young selves, and helps those who are trapped in regrets shake hands with time. From the old street to the riverside village, the marble rolled through twenty hands, witnessing twenty "moments" that spanned the years - those misunderstood persistence, forgotten agreements, and dust-laden longings, all turned into two teardrops separated by a long time at the moment when the marble was raised into the light. They collided gently in the glass core, splashing brilliant iridescence. And that rainbow, going around and around, will eventually return to the hands of the original person. Time goes by and obsession becomes an arc. It is not a boat, but it ferries everyone.