S.W. had never suggested that possibility, even though doctors proliferated left and right in her family. We never talked, even though we lived under the same roof and ate dinner at the same table. I simply slept in my study night after night, glad to have survived the day’s trials and tribulations, thanks to Jack Daniels.

The doctor’s diagnosis surprised me. So I would spend fourteen days in the hospital with tubes protruding from wrists that were hanging in the air, with time enough to ponder those fateful questions that confront us all.

S.W. would only visit once and then for only five minutes, anxious to return to her latest private placement and leveraged buyout. That was very telling. That so little told so very much.

Come operation day, the anesthesiologist explained how the injection would . . .

And I wouldn’t even remember his sentence, just as the needle penetrated my wrist. The next thing, I woke up and the surgery was over. It was a success.

So that was what death is like?

"Is that all there is?" goes the classic Peggy Lee song.

"Is that all there is?" I asked myself.

One minute you breathe, laugh and cry, but when you’re gone, it’s one big blank. I realized then that life was precious and short. To be lived to its fullest. To be challenged like you’ve never been challenged before. To be appreciated whether momentarily it was good or bad. I’d pondered all that as I lay chained to my bed, with my very existence hovering on the verge of eternity.

I would learn and study everything that I could. Research new ideas like there was no tomorrow. Write books and papers and change the way people think. Travel the world. Meet interesting people. Take risks. I would find the romance that I’d lost long ago and go wherever she might be.

You didn’t really want, on your death bed to say, "I should have done this, should have tried that." You really didn’t want to squander your life.

So the surgery was successful in more ways than one. That day, I’d solved the problem that had defied solution for so long. My mid-life crisis was over.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

S.W. and I would grow farther apart with time, living through three layoffs and their grueling disappointments. All the time her financings bringing her company to greatness. For a while anyway, at least until 2008.

I was not the smart guy destined to be rich that she dreamed of long ago. As I surmised once upon a time, moneyed Mandarin merchants and pigtailed Cantonese peasants, like water and oil, could not mix.

And they wouldn’t. But like dedicated ancient Chinese, brought up in Confucian ways, we were creatures of habit and would raise our brood well. And to the very end.

"Those books you write," S.W. exclaimed many a time, "no one reads them. Why do you bother? Don’t waste your time!"

"You’re better off working at McDonalds," she would say, sarcastically.

And she was right. Hour for hour, I could have made more flipping hamburgers than flipping equations. It was your typical M.B.A.’s business analysis focusing on the critical short term.

But in your heart, you know what will work. I thought differently and out of the box. You know what offers potential. You know what will change the world. You know what is right and what is wrong.

You know that, the day you leave this earth, you should leave behind something to help humanity even if you never profit from it.

"Build it and they will come," the saying goes. And I knew deep down that, if I built it, they really would come. And it was true because I believed it in my heart.

All who have walked this desolate and unusual path know the heart as a lonely hunter. But the heart only hunts well when it struggles to survive.

On the home front, S.W. and I had danced together in lockstep in a tango difficult to defeat. Hand-in-hand, we battled the outside world, broke its defenses, and like miracle workers, brought up two wonderful children.

But like water and oil, that unlikely comparison in Chapter 1, S.W. would go her way and I would go mine. It would be an ending as unpredictable as our first meeting long ago.

Our journey was interrupted by endless demands, challenges that challenged all marriages. The kinds that destroy the fire and passion behind the best of romances.

The divorce was bitter. What was once young love turned to negotiations about money and legal stuff written by lawyers. In the end, I’d lost everything because I wanted to move on with the thrill of living and not the business of dying. And I would lose it again in the market crash of 2008. Yes, life is full of dreams but sometimes the nightmares come first.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Father was an optimist despite his dire circumstances. He always saw hope in the future. And his Number One Son’s future was his future. In his later years, he was willing to take risk. And he was forever encouraging.

"When one door shuts," he explained, "God opens another."

"He is testing you, challenging you," he said, with the conviction of a devout Christian. "You must look for opportunity. Don’t think for the short term."

With the divorce behind me and J.J. and J.W. taken care of, I would do just that. Like a battlefield commander in retreat, I would survey the landscape and redefine my strategy.

I would no longer be hostage to oil prices and layoffs and company politics. I would quit a job that paid in the six figures. I would do what’s right. It was the only solution.

You didn’t really want, on your death bed to say, "I should have done this, should have tried that." You really didn’t want to squander your life. I remembered those thoughts well.

At an age when the lucky few retired, I would start over from Square One in a Monopoly game I didn’t care to play. But it was one I had to play because the world plays by different rules. Illogical and unpleasant ones I had not agreed to and had no part in writing.

So on a whim I would travel to China to start over, just as Father had instructed decades ago. It was a dream. I sought the excitement and the unknown and the adventure and the thrill of the hunt. I wanted success and romance, none of which I had. And which had eluded me for years. But the task was not easy.

I spoke no Chinese. I read no Chinese. I understood no Chinese. It was like the three monkeys squatting on the ground with hands covering their eyes, except that I was all three monkeys all rolled into one. A gorilla of an old fool. And a fool who would gamble it all on the only plane ticket he could afford and the single backpack that held all his published papers.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I was interviewing interpreters who would travel with me throughout China and help me open new petroleum markets. I had fired the first two. They failed to translate the jokes, or "ice breakers," that Americans used at meetings to get their feet through the door. And no ice breakers meant no money.

But my Asia Girl "A.G." was different. At first, she spoke passable but understandable accented English punctuated by broken prepositions. That would quickly change through the years. Interestingly, she thought the way I thought. And almost by design.

We were philosophical equivalents. We finished each other’s sentences. We laughed at the same time and enjoyed the same foods. Our steps would march in unison as we walked the streets of Beijing, during afternoons and evenings which were many.

"Growing up in the States," I explained to A.G., with emotion in my voice, "was not easy. In the 1950s and 60s, China was not China and Chinese were not respected. It’s a little bit better now. Being Chinese now may not be too bad."

"But still, there are problems," I explained. "That’s why I am here. It’s a long story."

"Read my memoir," I asked her. "It’s unfinished. I started it years ago when I was down and out. It will tell you a lot."

A few days later, we met again. A.G. was serious. And very curious. My "novel" was the first thing we talked about. She was anxious. She had thought about America long. It must be better than China, A.G. thought, as all Chinese did, eager to emigrate.

"You define your life by your novel?" A.G. asked, reading my Chapter 1 for the first time.

"Yes," I said. "My novel does and nothing but."

"It’s touching," she said. "It makes tears fall down my cheeks. I cried when I read the first half. The second made me even sadder. I didn’t know America could be so harsh."

"So the streets are not paved with gold? The sidewalk squares are not perfect?"

"I didn’t know," A.G. confessed, like a naïve child. "I thought the Golden Mountain was really that."

"Made of gold, made of dreams," she added.

"And the other chapters?" A.G. asked, wanting to read further, wanting to learn more about America. "May I see them?"

"Don’t know. Haven’t finished them yet because I don’t know the ending. That’s why autobiographies and memoirs are difficult to write," I said, with dejection.

"One waits a lifetime, you know," I continued. "Perspectives only come with age."

"For a long time, I saw only a sad ending," I remarked. "But people don’t buy books for sad endings."

"Good songs are always sad," I said, dreaming of the future. "But good books, they always have happy endings."

"The ending could be a happy one, but I am not sure," I concluded. "Life is one big unknown."

"You’re a scientist," A.G. said as she smiled. "You should know everything."

"Not in life’s matters," I said. "Just ask a lot of questions. Questions without answers."

"You seem so philosophical," A.G. reflected, her eyes, now wet with sadness, gazing at me the way My Girl did decades ago. That first girl I left behind on the road to success.

And that brought back sad memories and poetic moments. Thinking of those take-outs that I’d given up so I can continue with my straight-A’s. Pondering about what might have been.

But I was flattered now. I was a much older man but it was wrong. I should leave young enough alone and alone to explore life’s wonders in her own special way. I thought I should run and run away without looking back but I could not and would not. I would stay and stay forever. After all, I was only human.

And why not? Perhaps it was fate, this time for the final time. God giving me a second chance. A girl I met completely by accident, on a trip I almost did not make. A lover I was not looking for, in a relationship I was not expecting.

God does not play dice with the universe. So who was I to judge my Creator? Perhaps A.G. was part of his plan. A grand plan whose ending I could not yet understand. But a plan that would evolve in a way I would never have imagined.

A.G. was a much younger woman. One whom I thought would never love me. And why should she? A Ph.D. who failed in everything he did. An old dreamer who only dreamed nightmares and only to awaken without solutions.

And dreams like Tony Leung’s desperate one-liners in the screenplay of Marguerite Duras’s autobiographical novel, The Lover.

"And a Chinaman, no less," said that young woman, referring to the older Chinese man who tried too hard.

But A.G. would become my lover. My dream. My window into Father’s past and the crystal ball revealing our future. However, Houston was still home and business was still struggling.

I needed to find work and keep the few clients I had satisfied. I would only occasionally set foot in Father’s homeland. But even so, A.G. was always on my mind during the times I was away.

And when away from China, I would picture A.G. on that very ferry, in the opening scene of The Lover, gently leaning on the rails, wind blowing through her hair, the ripples of her skirt flowing like the waves beneath her. Her face hidden by her fedora, her heels anchored on the floor stop, her eyes staring into the muddy but romantic waters of the Mekong.

But it was very clear, at last. Two people suddenly thrust upon each other, into each person’s warm and receiving arms, as if God had planned it deliberately to its finest detail.

And meet they did, holding hands like first loves, their melody like two song birds living each and every day. The minute he set his eyes on her, he knew she was his. And when she set eyes on him, she felt he was hers.

It was a convergence of the unexpected, of paths that normally diverge. He from his world, a westernized one devoid of all things Asian, marked by superficial towers of concrete and steel and glass prone to crumble.

And she, an exotic eastern one deeply etched in thousands of years of civilization and lasting values, one as different from his as his was from hers.

And how ironic that their paths might even cross. The Father leaves the Old Country to find his New World, and dies suddenly, never really having found it. The son returns to his Father’s homeland, to find himself and to seek his fortune.

But in doing so, he discovers something far more valuable. He learns about himself, he understands his mortality. He uncovers the love and true sensitivity that had been missing for years. He discovers his purpose. And he finds the meaning of life.

And the remaining chapters? The story, alas, is finally emerging. Tied together by a mosaic of interests, like their love of music and appreciation for dining, and their common aspirations, the two would explore the thrill of the hunt together as equal partners.

Yes, they would be drawn together by complex themes: like threads woven within a beautiful fabric, with telling colors subtly darting in and out, amongst elegant patterns that repeated themselves over and over, and strong ideas and thoughts that would define what would be for years to come.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

That was not my first trip to China. A year before, I would suddenly find myself on the plane to Beijing, representing, of all places, the company I had abruptly quit. It would be another of Nature’s grand reversals.

I had worked in "formation testing" because Halliburton cancelled my M.W.D. project. But I would develop the company’s famously successful algorithms for predicting permeability (a.k.a. cash flow and profitability) in real-time for real oil customers.

So it was not illogical that the company would ask me to handle its tool’s roll-out in China. What could be better than a yellow face speaking to a yellow audience? For once, yellow held its advantages.

But it would be the age of "Don’t ask, don’t tell" in an age before "Don’t ask, don’t tell."

I didn’t speak a word of Chinese nor did I read any. Nor did I care. And no one asked. But given this golden opportunity, I couldn’t quite refuse. So I boarded the first flight to Beijing.

Following Father’s plan would not be easy. In China, I was a novelty. A yellow face who was constantly lost. One who could not order from menus. One who could not speak his thoughts. Just like Lo Wong’s grand-daughter. And one frustrated by simple things he could not do.

But despite the frustration, there was optimism in the air. Companies allowed me to tour their facilities. Examine their products. Question their strategies. I would visit colleges and talk shop with researchers. Meet university presidents and top scientists. Travel the country with my hosts. And speak about America.

All were open and honest. I would learn about China’s problems. And there were many. Competition with the West. Limited access to information. The language barrier. A regimented educational system. An agrarian economy. And its need for oil. I gained so much in my interactions. I would understand first hand the challenges my hosts faced. After all, we were family.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

So I was not completely crazy, wanting to return. Sometimes in life, one abandons familiar surroundings for the road less traveled. In uncertainty there is often potential. And when you have little to lose, the risk is not all that high.

"I don’t understand you," A.G. said with a smile. "Crazy American."

"You’re a crazy man," she laughed. "Don’t know Chinese and come here to do business!"

She grasped her books close to her chest, shaking her shoulders and hair just so, completely confounded.

"I would not dare!" A.G. continued. "Give me nightmares."

A.G. looked beautiful when she scolded me like that. It made me less nervous about my hopes. About dreams that might not fulfill themselves. And risks that waited around the corner.

Beijing is one of the world’s largest metropolitan areas, its population today approaching twenty-five million. And within the Chaoyang District, where my Great Wall Sheraton was located, all of its women were beautiful. All tall, fair in complexion, completely elegant, just like A.G. Which is not to say that all in China are created equally.

In the neighboring counties, beauty was a rarer commodity. The reason was simple. In wealthier districts, as in such communities throughout the universe, successful men married attractive wives. Natural selection makes those attractive even more so and beauty would perpetuate itself.

So I was afraid that A.G. was pedigreed and that this poor Cantonese would repeat history. But A.G. was not an attractive woman bred from natural selection. She was just simply beautiful inside and out. She was a worker. She learned English from a dictionary. Struggling with prepositions and poverty just as I had during elementary school.

We would understand each other. Like me, she worked a start-up and needed a breather after a fatal automobile accident. Like myself, one eye-opening incident would force A.G. to question her purpose. She needed change. And continuous challenge. She wanted more in life. She wanted to live.

So she left Guangzhou in South China amidst family and friends and traveled alone to Beijing. And like me, A.G. thought of her mortality. She didn’t want, on her death bed, to say, "I should have done this, should have tried that."

"You want to try new things, really?" I asked, hesitantly. "Maybe you can help me with petroleum. I need to develop customers."

"You can help with cold calling," I suggested, "developing clients, something I am unable to do."

"I need all the help I can get," I pleaded.

"But dreams," I would confess, "dreams are all I can promise."

A.G. looked serious. She knew what lay in store for the future.

"Together, we can make it work," she replied, hesitantly, thankful for the opportunity.

And in time, it would work, I hoped.

We finished our "job interview" and spent more hours telling jokes and laughing like children. There was chemistry in the air and chemistry in the relationship about to form. There was melancholy too as we recounted our dreams and our failures.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"S.W. and I use to be so much in love," I told A.G., revealing my nostalgic self, pouring out my long but sad tale over dinner. Tears overcame me, as we sat at a small table in a darkened corner of a Sanlitun music bar, introducing our lives to each other.

"Don’t know what happened over the years," I said. "We each went our separate ways."

"You use to lie so close to me," I whispered one day to her.

"Give me a reason to stay . . . or go," S.W. replied. Then she turned and pulled the blanket over her. That would be our last time together.

"One day," I recollected poignantly, "she asked me to leave."

But it was not the first time she asked. She had demanded that many times in her temper tantrums. Tired being married to an engineer. Tired being just so ordinary. This time, she said so quietly. And this time, I knew she meant it.

"When J.W. leaves for college," she said, "you can leave too." It was sad that she said that. We were one, I thought, forever.

"So I did," I told A.G. girl. "I left. Never wanted to look back."

"You did what you had to," A.G. reassured, "you followed your heart and you did your best."

"Don’t look to the past," she consoled me, gently placing her hands on top of mine.

"Do that and it will haunt you forever," A.G. continued, "Look towards the future."

"I guess my expectations, my aspirations, led to this," I said. "But maybe it’s for the better."

I was so alone, I needed attention, I needed support. And I am human, after all. And A.G. was there to listen.

"We walked to different drummers in the end," I said, sadly but surely.

But no, I was not crazy. I believed in what I was doing. I wanted to make the world a little better, but on my own terms. I wanted to leave a lasting mark on society the day I would part from this earth.

Mother, the seamstress that she was, understood that. Her lifetime labors had taught her that much.

"The world," she said, drawing from experience, "is built piece by piece. In time, you will see the changes. Things take time, my son."

"Follow your dreams," Mother offered wisely. "Let God take you wherever he may."

"Getting your Ph.D. from M.I.T. not easy either," Mother recollected.

"Be patient. It is a Chinese virtue, but it is universal."

"Father," she insisted, "would have supported you."

"Go ahead, go to China," Mother encouraged. "The China we fled is no longer the China of yesteryear. Your travels will bring you new insights."

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"China needs petroleum," A.G. explained. "It’s been an oil importer for more than a decade."

"It will be profitable for you," A.G. continued. "The price of oil is the same in China as it is in the United States and the rest of the world."

"And her needs are growing by the day," she confidently reminded me.

"It’s like Houston in the 1980s," A.G. noted.

"But hopefully, history won’t repeat itself," she laughed, amusingly, with her fingers crossed.

Our conversations were serious, very often. We talked about the past, but more often than not, we dreamt of the future.

"I am hopeful," I told A.G. "I see the future returning."

"And it is ironic," I explained, philosophically, with a touch of emotion.

"Father leaves China for America, never to return," I said, reflecting on his long days and evenings in the laundry.

"And the son turns to China to find his future," I pondered, with a faint smile that dared to reveal itself.

"It’s a twist of fate," I gathered, "as strange as it is interesting."

"Like a movie plot turned upside-down," A.G. added. "The world works in unusual ways."

For better, China would open its doors to foreign technology, becoming one of the world’s largest manufacturers and exporters. By 2015, it had become the world’s second largest economy.

And A.G. was right. Its energy needs were escalating by the day. In the rest of the world, petroleum was a sunset industry. But in China, it meant optimism, it meant excitement, it meant the future.

"Our country is built on dreams. On vision. And our willingness to work hard," A.G. said.

"In the coming years, you will see bullet trains. Beautiful bridges, rockets that conquer space, and modern cities with tall glass skyscrapers," she continued, dreaming about China and its destiny to come.

"China will lead the world and we’ll be part of it," A.G. concluded.

She choked as she said those words, her watery eyes showing emotion. And she did because she’d meant every word. She thought of her mother and father, her brothers and sisters, who saw her off that day, wishing her the best as she left to seek life’s fortunes.

"You dare to be different and you dare to dream," A.G. said with a sigh. "And I want to dream with you."

"Stay with me," she continued.

"You will be a winner, I know it," A.G. said. "History is told by winners, they say."

She wiped the tears from her eyes. She paused her words as she stumbled on emotion. She touched my cheeks as I tried to say more.

"We’re so different, yet we have so much in common," A.G. philosophized.

Alas, A.G.’s words would be my heart and soul, my eyes and ears to a China this blind man could never see alone.

And alas, A.G., the girl who accidentally wandered across my path would become my walking staff and confidante. Her youth and her eyes saw the future. Her every breath spoke the accent of China. Her touch breathed life into my soul.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"You eat well, my Dung Gwa," A.G. said over the phone. "What did you cook today?"

China’s dung gwa’s are very tasty green melons, and big and round – it was my nickname since I was beginning to look like one.

"I didn’t," I replied, solemnly. "Haven’t eaten yet."

"No? Why not?" she asked.

"Trying to lose a few pounds," I added.

"All that food you feed me every time I visit," I continued, blaming A.G.

"Never cooked since I fell on my rear, on the slippery kitchen floor," I continued.

"What!" she laughed. "How did you do that?"

"The oil kept splattering from the frying pan, couldn’t see it against the white linoleum."

"You dumb guy! You’re always a dumb guy!" A.G. laughed again.

"Hey, you’re not so smart yourself. Your prepositions are wrong half the time," I reminded her of her bad English.

I’d met A.G. on my third trip to Beijing. Not that there’s oil there, but China’s capital was also headquarters to leading exploration companies. Top names like Sinopec, China National Petroleum Corporation and China National Offshore Oil Corporation.

A.G. had advertised for "language exchange" companions and I was looking for an interpreter. At first, we were partners by necessity. But A.G., a fledging English translator, and I, a promising oil man in the land of my ancestors, would become more than co-workers in life’s treasured hunt for fame and fortune.

Her initial response to my ad was touching. Its words reminded me of myself, my days in the hospital reflecting on life, my fateful decision in search of the next step.

"I’m glad to see a Chinese reply," A.G. said.

"It’s not easy for me to write to a stranger. It requires courage. This ad was my friend’s suggestion," she said apologetically.

"She did not think I could learn a foreign language by reading or listening to tapes. Language is live. You must practice with people to make progress. To understand its culture. And so I met you."

"I am a Southerner. My hometown is Zhuhai, a beachside city near Macao. I also ran my own business before coming to Beijing. I enjoyed managing my own work."

"It filled me with energy, passion and creativity. But I worked too hard and forgot to rest. I was hurt in a traffic accident. Fortunately, the shock reminded me to balance life and life’s work."

"My heart had turned cold like a stone," A.G. continued. "Dreams disappearing, my feelings melted away."

"So I quit my job to rediscover myself in Beijing. I would study English. A real challenge. At first, I didn’t think I would be here long. The climate, the pollution and the traffic jams were new to me."

"But I learned to love this city despite its defects. Her culture attracts me. Her vision inspires me. Now I have learned some English and want to try something different."

And so, A.G. would do something different. She would learn about the West from a man she barely knew. She would tackle a profession she didn’t know existed. And she would open new markets and doors that I had not known were there.

A.G. would teach me about China as we traveled extensively, meeting company executives and giving lectures at universities. Taking in sights from Beijing to Shanghai to Shandong to Xi’an. We saw the beauty of China but we took in its desolation too.

And A.G. showed me the China that Father never saw or would return to. But our journeys and times together meant more than work.

We both cried over Paganini and Chopin, we enjoyed the same spicy Szechuan food, we loved Elvis Presley and those Western oldies but goodies.

And in time, we loved each other.

We talked by phone daily, whenever I was away from China. And that was often. But one day, A.G.’s surprising email made me frail with emotion and weak beyond my years.

A.G. was as introverted as I was. I was overwhelmed. And M.I.T. Ph.D.s almost never get overwhelmed.

"What attracted me to you? To be close to you?" she wrote. "Being an out-of-the-ordinary person, perhaps. That is my destiny. I am attracted to the out-of-ordinary. It’s a shaman’s prophecy."

"You must be confused by my reluctance to have your hand touch mine at first. And then surprised by my willingness to spend the night with you."

"Did I really play things on a whim?"

"No, not at all. I refused because I thought I could never find romance in my heart," A.G. said. Which surprised me, the beautiful woman that she was.

"I stayed the night because I didn't want any regrets. Unanswered questions forcing me to think, ‘I wish I had. Maybe I should have. Maybe I shouldn’t.’"

"But who am I to question Fate?"

"Maybe it would be a one night’s stand. Perhaps it would last a long time. Or it might last forever. I really didn’t know. And so, I did."

"Somehow I knew this was no accident, although it was unexpected. But it was blessed and it was what I wanted," A.G. wrote.

"We were destined to find each other," A.G. concluded.

"And someday, we’ll visit Taishan, your Father’s hometown, to see where it all started," she added, surprisingly.

Taishan, interestingly, had seen the greater part of its youth emigrate to America a century ago. It had built America’s railroads, laundries and restaurants. And its Chinatowns. Its residents were China’s forgotten, simple, poor farmers who had little to lose and everything to gain.

"There is an old saying," A.G. continued. "When you find your beginning, the journey will become clear."

"Your life and mine," she said, "will come full circle. We will find our purpose, everything that was and all that will be."

I read those words over and over. How simple and eloquent. We would search. We would discover that other China, its peoples, its strengths, its aspirations. We would understand our place in the universe.

Our emails were rarely this serious. We were not always entrenched in thought. The human soul is not all intellect but deeply passionate. And so, we would dream about ourselves too.

"The next time you come to China, our meeting will be a lovers’ meeting," A.G. offered.

"I will bring you a lover’s kiss, a lover’s embrace, a lover’s touch. And the way you like, with a silly smile and my hair flowing down."

A.G. wrote with strong emotion, the kind you found in romance novels. She wrote with simple words and expressions as I did. With every syllable reflecting life’s tumultuous ways.

"Life is so unpredictable. Who can believe two people from different cultures and times can find each other?" A.G. asked philosophically.

"Thank you for your story and your parents’ wedding photo. I saw in that their tenacious hearts. I will keep it to motivate our work in China," A.G. offered.

"Just as I read your Chapter 1 again, my heart was touched deeply. I could not remain in my lonely silent room."

"So I walked out at 2 a.m. in the morning. It was dark and quiet in my neighborhood. I never thought Beijing nights could be so gentle. The rain ended hours ago."

"The apartment blocks faded behind a weak mist as I strolled about our narrow meandering streets. I tightened my jacket. It was a cold summer night."

"There was no voice in the air except the echo of my steps as I wandered along curved narrow paths," A.G. wrote.

"And do you know what I was thinking?" she asked.

"You, your family, your sister. What hardships you must have endured."

"How lonely America must be," she added. "How lonely you must be, a Chinese in a strange land."

"And the Sounds of Silence you introduced to me played continuously in my mind. I couldn’t sleep, thinking of you. The silence says so much. You must be lonely, my love."

I was, very much. And still am.