“No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow.”
I wanted to scream out of joy and write about Lin Yutang, but then I realised that words are useless in trying to describe the spirit that could utter the above.
Thus, when I read Lin, I opted for silence. And the silence gave birth to the seasons. Intuitively my heart saw the ageless dance of Maya. As the true heart never rejects, I smiled at her and joined in the dance.
Artist: Joaquín Sorolla
So, in this case, when my words are powerless, it is best to let Lin do the talking. An excerpt from “My Country and My People” (1936):
“I like spring, but it is too young. I like summer, but it is too proud. So I like best of all autumn, because its leaves are a little yellow, its tone mellower, its colours richer, and it is tinged a little with sorrow and a premonition of death. Its golden richness speaks not of the innocence of spring, nor of the power of summer, but of the mellowness and kindly wisdom of approaching age. It knows the limitations of life and is content. From a knowledge of those limitations and its richness of experience emerges a symphony of colours, richer than all, its green speaking of life and strength, its orange speaking of golden content and its purple of resignation and death.”