Lucky Enough

In the subway, on streets or in restaurants, one can quite often witness people hurting their loved ones in a stupid way without knowing it: mother gave a cold shoulder to her children after spitting out unneccesary dirty words; adolescent kid putting an impatient face in front of the elderly; wife could’t stop grumbling in a voice loud enough to reach everyone around, only because her husband got her bubbled fanta instead of the orange juice that she asked for.

It could be just out of the uncontrollable impulses at those particular moments (I’m sure it was), but the instant disgust flashed upon people’s face, together with their ill-mannered words, made me feel ashamed and unbearable even just as an irrelevant passer-by.

I couldn’t help wondering how badly people would wish they had never done what they did, how they gonna be eaten up by their own regrets when they lose their loved ones at the end of the day. They would wish they’d behaved nicer when they had the chance to, other than aggressively venting their temper, getting unreasonably tetchy to test how generous love could be.

We frequently observe others blundered where we used to blunder. I doubt there’re anyone born with the gift of knowing how to treasure something good as it was happening. And for those who do cherish things, you never know how much she’s lost.

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经常可以在地铁，大街，餐厅里，旁观到陌生的人们以最愚蠢的姿态伤害身边亲近的人——母亲冷漠地辱骂自己的小孩；青春期的孩子对长辈充满了不耐烦和不屑；妻子当着众人对丈夫喋喋不休地抱怨，只因为套餐中的橙汁买成了芬达而大发雷霆⋯⋯可能只是言语上脱口而出，但那些一瞬间厌恶的神情，和其态度之恶劣，让我都感到不堪。这样的时刻，我总会难以自禁地想，倘若有天他们失去这些人，失去这些爱的时候，该是如何地悔恨自责。他们会希望自己从来没有那样做过，从来没有那样肆无忌惮地伤害对自己真正重要的人。

我们总是可以从别人身上看到很多自己犯过的错。大概没有人生来就懂得珍惜。而那些已经学会珍惜的人，你不知道她经历过多少次失去。