Wangwang | Bed Sheets, Quilts, and Books

He Chen and Li Zhenhao, next to the Nature Studio at the foot of the mountain, have opened a new space selling bed sheets, quilts, and books. When I first heard this idea, I was taken aback. Bed sheets, quilts, books—seemingly unrelated things, but on reflection, they are connected.

In my past memories, most of my reading scenes were indeed on my bed. When I read, I would constantly adjust my body's posture, restless. I would keep some crackers and puffed rice nearby, crumbs falling all over the sheets. After a few hours, my bed would look quite messy.

For many years in the 1990s, my room had only a warm yellow tungsten lamp. At its other end was a "switch" made of nylon rope. I still remember the feel of pulling it. There was no washing machine at home, not even a proper drainage system. My mother would go to the riverbank to wash clothes, sheets, and quilt covers. It was hard work, but my clothes and sheets always carried a faint scent of soap. That scent, along with that tattered "Italian Literature," remained in that space and in my memory. In that dim little room in a boring town, I heard of Calvino and Boccaccio, and began to imitate them in my composition homework, proudly thinking that my Chinese teacher must not have read their works—and indeed, that was true.

In the City of Sunlight, I lived by the Lhasa River. On idle rest days, I would dry quilts and sheets on the rooftop and read. That was an age when I could enjoy being exposed to the plateau's harsh sunlight for hours.

My landlord was an auntie from Dalian. She often made delicious chive boxes, as delicious as the Lhasa sunshine—almost the same flavor.

Perhaps you don't know, but autumn by the Lhasa River is beautiful. You can ride a bicycle over fallen leaves on the ground, and the wind will turn the pages and stir the sheets above your head. These scenes, like millennium-era TV commercials, did appear in those past times.