One afternoon, I was strolling on the beach and met a man around thirty years old, who was sitting and painting under a pine tree whose branches danced along with the waves and their sound. In his painting there were multicolored clouds and the sea at the sunset. He painted like a real skilled, professional painter, but his painting was not beautiful. It was similar to a child’s painting in the purest and honest sense. He asked me, “ Do you think it is beautiful?” I answered smiling, “It looks like a kid’s painting.”
The man continued to dip his brush into some red color to paint a big sun among the clouds. Then he continued to ask me, “ Do you think the sun is too big or too small?” I answered, “Too big. It is really big.” Each time he spoke, he never turned to look at me. He continued to say, “I like the sunset. That is why I paint it big.”
“ It doesn’t look natural,” I answered.
“ It doesn’t look natural, but it is natural.”
After this answer, he turned to look at me. His eyes looked soft with thick eyebrows. He smiled and with a tender sigh said, “Do you have a happy life?”
I looked at the painting while ignoring his question. He continued. “ Do you know? I think, this world is a laughing stock…… Hard workers get tired; lazy people have easy lives; smart people end up with misfortune; ignorant people turn out to be fortunate… Good people are violated by bad people; doing a good deed receives a bad result. Serious people are controlled by sloppy ones… good savers have to turn money over to loose spenders. Persistent people continue to persist…” I think that if I didn’t have cancer, I would have to work hard until the day I die.”
I asked him, “Do you have cancer?”
“ Right,” he smiled, “ but you don’t need to be sympathetic because I am the most happy, sick person.”
“ Why?”
“ Cancer destroys my future. It gives me the full meaning of the present. You can see that right now I have full freedom. I sit and paint anything I want without having to worry about whether it’s good or if I have to please somebody?
“ Why is this? Because you are sick?”
“ Because this sickness is allowing me during the last part of my life to do what I like, to be whomever I want to be. When I didn’t know that my life was coming to an end, I had to work hard. I tortured myself from childhood. I studied hard. It almost caused a nervous breakdown. I misled myself. I’ve never done anything for me. I like to read novels for my own entertainment, but I thought it was not as useful as reading textbooks. I like to listen to music, but I pushed myself to listen to the news.”
When he said this, I laughed. He patted my shoulders, asked me to sit, and continued to question me, “Do you think this life is only about persistence?”
“ Not true. I think life is about hope.”
He was quiet for a moment and said, “Actually my life is good. I sleep as much as I want. I can take a stroll. I do what I want to do. No pressure on my life. Must I have to have hope? Must I?”
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