The preface of a Chinese comic book I bought awhile back, translated by me…
Back when I was growing up, it’s as if, was lived simultaneously in two separate worlds: one, a world that’s made me upset, the adults, and, a world I was really happy, living in, a world, of my own imaginations.
In the adult word, I’d observed, that look of upset, that look of ambiguousness toward how life is going, and all the seemingly reasonable adult ways, and even sometimes, I’d felt, that these adults were, left behind completely, by this world, that they were only, chasing it for their own false pretenses. It was a feeling that, scared me so: with the coming of age, will I too, turn into, one of them, entered into the adult world that belonged to them, and lived every single day repeatedly the same way?
So, unlike the kids in my generation, I didn’t, want to grow up fast.
In my own world, I have my art and my imaginations. I’d grown up, in a Japanese style one-story house with shingles, with my drawing pens and my small desk, this was also a place, that I’d used, to rebel against, the adult world. The army of ants, were my company, the spider musketeer too, the fairies in the bushes that lived inside the flowers, the dream gnomes that hid under my bed, along with that little monster that danced all day long, inside the bathrooms too. That, was my whole world, I can spend the entire two months’ summer vacation indoors. As a young child, I’d, cherished my summers especially, because the summer seemed to be the only time I got, to stay in my childhood years.
here’s an intro of the comic found on Youtube…
Naturally, those summers that’s, come and gone, never actually, halted at all, they’d only became, these, deep memories as I’d, become, an adult.
With a childhood like mine, I grew up, married, moved away from home, and I was, put through the trials of the adulthood years. In the busyness of day to day, I’d worked hard, to keep my childhood innocence intact, from how I lived, to how I worked, I’d kept, naively, simply, gone back, to that childhood that’s, already, lost. And yet, with my old home getting torn down and the changes that happened in life, for a very long time, I’d, lost track and sight of my own childhood, lost that world of imaginations, along with all those fairies who’d, accompanied me growing up, said goodbye, to all those, monsters too. Until back in 2000 with the coming of age of my own young, I’d, reexperienced my own childhood all over again. I’d found, that those creatures of childhood, they’d not, forgotten me, nor had I, them.
My child attended a public school, with only a handful of students, with the loosened grading systems, and my wife and I would often take him to skip school, to catch the insects, to hike, to go see the trees, to play in the creeks, and for a while, he’d not shown up at school, for half the school days, he’d just, gone trekking down those streets we’d never ventured down, or those streets, we’d, walked from before. As he’d walked in front, where the ray of the sun shone down, he’d talked of the scenes in the tales he’d, made up himself, and thinking back, that’s, become a shared memory of our collective childhood years. I’d enjoyed sitting at the supper table, hearing him talk of the monsters he’d dreamed up of on the previous nights. Until now, at the age of twenty something, he’d still discussed with me excitedly, on how to draw out those monsters, at this time, it’s, as if, I could see that I and him, were meeting up with the exact same monsters in childhood, alongside that mildly confused, fearful kid, with endless, limitless world of, imagination.
I truly believe, that every child’s childhood, filled with magic, is enough, to influence her/him for the rest of her/his life, and it’s that memory that’s, telling us, “What sort of a person you want to grow up to be?” “What makes you happy?” It’s just, most people slowly drifted away from their selves as they aged, and, from “me”, became, a “we”, it’s just, that we are not happy.
Perhaps, in our generation, a lot of people believed, that this world of ours is, slowly, getting taken apart, actually, what we’re experiencing, is the “loss” step-by-step, brought on by this, overly industrialized world, we’d lost the way of life we had before. The world of a child has NO “loss”, because a child has nothing, so, a child’s world is, purer, and more enriched. Every child lives with nothing to own, just that imagination, and a way to approach life—using the most linear way of thought to figure the problems out, using the most imaginative way, to see the world. But, strangely, because of this quality of theirs, they’re, able to, get in touch with the most realistic aspect of the details of life, then, imagine, and play and enjoy this world as it is.
For the children of this generation, I hope to give the right to dream, and an environment that encourages them to dream back to them, in that place, the adults should, step aside, to allow every single child, to exercise her/his ability to “dream”, because, money doesn’t make people progress, dreams do.
And, for the adults of this generation, I think, the most important thing is, find that child that’s, hiding in all of us, with the children’s dreams, hugging your younger selves, then, face this world with them. The child will tell you, how NOT to lose your nature to choose the direction, at the turn of your lives. Actually, that imaginative self that you once were, didn’t really leave yet, s/he is, waiting for you, at the turn of every single dream.
And, this, is from the comic artist’s own life experiences, he’d gotten lost in the tramples of day to day, as an adult, and, it took him long enough, to finally find that innocence that he’d lost back again, and, this is especially important, because children have a special way, of seeing this world, and yet, all of you adults (I’m NOT one of you!!!), just kept pushing us children, forcing us, to fit into that small box you try hard, to put us in, so we can become whatever it is YOU expect or think we should all become, and you’d, stolen OUR innocence, and, MURDERED us all!!!
Life, the Obstacle Course 