I have had a dream this morning. Some friends and I were floating through space and drifting in time aboard a spaceship. Then we came across Earth. It wasn’t easy — we have been drifting for so long. I was eager to return home, so I asked my best friend to land with me, while the others still wanted to explore the unknown. We parted aways. We might not see each other for years, and I didn’t know if we ever would again. Then the scene shifted to Dream of the Red Chamber, where Lin Daiyu was playing the Chinese zither. She was practicing the final bar of a melody she had once played with Xue Baochai. Her lover, Jia Baoyu, was watching her. Hearing the last bar, he, too, thought of Xue Baochai — her smile, and the time they had spent together. Then I woke up and saw my cat playing with one of the sheet fastener buttons. Maybe the sound in the dream had come from the button. I went back to sleep, and the dream continued. This time, it shifted to my family. My cousin had just returned home after years of space exploration. She had been to the solar system and had now come back to Earth — returning from a foreign country and traveling all the way home.

I had a dream this morning. Some friends and I were floating through space and drifting in time aboard a spaceship. Then we came across Earth. It wasn’t easy — we had been drifting for so long. I was eager to return home, so I asked my best friend to land with me, while the others still wanted to explore the unknown. We parted ways. We might not see each other for years, and I didn’t know if we ever would again. Then the scene shifted to Dream of the Red Chamber, where Lin Daiyu was playing the Chinese zither. She was practicing the final bar of a melody she had once played with Xue Baochai. Her lover, Jia Baoyu, was watching her. Hearing the last bar, he, too, thought of Xue Baochai — her smile, and the time they had spent together. Then I woke up and saw my cat playing with one of the sheet fastener buttons. Maybe the sound in the dream had come from the button. I went back to sleep, and the dream continued. This time, it shifted to my family. My cousin had just returned home after years of space exploration. She had been to the solar system and had now come back to Earth — returning from a foreign country and traveling all the way home.