I've come to believe that part of lovesickness comes from this conflict between control and desire. In love we have no control. Our hearts and minds are tormented, teased, enticed and delighted by the overwhelming strength of emotions that make us try to forget the real world.

And often it would be a woman who was in her 70s or 80s who would win the beauty contest, because bound feet never age.

i would rather be married to broken jade than flawless clay

Maybe we're all like that with our mothers. They seem ordinary until one day they're extraordinary.

I’ve never thought much about whether I was happy or if I had fun as a child. I was a so-so girl who lived with a so-so family in a so-so village. I didn’t know that there might be another way to live, and I didn’t worry about it either.

I am still learning about love. I thought I understood it--not just mother love, but the love for one's parents, for one's husband, and for one's laotong. I've experienced the other types of love--pity love, respectful love and gratitude love. But looking at our secret fan with its messages written between Snow Flower and me over many years, I see that I didn't value the most important love--deep-heart love.

People come in and out of our lives, and the true test of friendship is whether you can pick back up right where you left off the last time you saw each other.