​野马尘埃落定 

我和朋友们很快地处理了他的后事，我在太平洋的这边，而他们在太平洋的那边。回想2020年，新冠刚在澳大利亚蔓延时，Scott让非澳洲人活不起就回国。我当时在Facebook上转发了那篇叫做《Coronavirus Australia: ‘Make your way home’, PM tells visa holders》的新闻，留言道“Okey, I will swim back to China. 👏”。提起这件事，倒不是为了特别批判一下Scott以及当时澳洲那种窒息的氛围有多让我不舒服，而是我自己的留言在第二年让怂怂的死显得造化弄人。我没法真的游回中国，就算我游回去了，也需要辗转隔离不知多久才能回到家乡。再者，作为非澳洲公民，一旦离境我也不能再入境澳洲。于是，我在租来的房间里，透着网线，一句接一句地处理了他的后事。​

My friends and I dealt with matters after his death quickly, me on one side of the Pacific and them on the other. Back in 2020, when COVID-19 started spreading in Australia, Scott told non-Australians to return home if they couldn't afford to live here. I retweeted the story on Facebook, 'Coronavirus Australia: 'Make your way home', PM tells visa holders', with the message "Okay, I will swim back to China. I don't bring this up to be particularly critical of Scott and how uncomfortable the stifling atmosphere in Australia was at the time, but it was my own message that made the death of Shy Baby seem like the god of destiny makes fools of me the following year. I couldn't really swim back to China, and even if I did, I'd have to move around in quarantine for who knows how long before I could return home. Furthermore, as a foreign citizen, once I left Australia, I could not re-enter the country. So, I dealt with matters after his death, sentence by sentence, in my rented room, over the Internet.

​

我的眼前没有一只死去的猫，我没有抱着他送给来取他肉体的殡仪馆师傅，他的死亡以真实的不真实感寄居在我的感官里。我一会觉得怂宝死了，一会觉得他还活着。对我而言，这跨海的死亡是那么虚构，而我和他一起度过的时光是那么写实。这两种相反的感觉在我的身体里争夺着这个事件的解释权，我的大脑慌忙应战、不知所措。​

There wasn't a dead cat in my sight, I wasn't holding him to give to the undertaker who came to take his body, his death lodged in my senses with real unreality. One moment I felt that Shy Baby was dead, the next he was alive. To me, this death across the sea was so fictionalized, and the time I spent with him was so realistic. These two opposite senses were fighting for the right to interpret this event in my body, and my brain was panicked and overwhelmed.

​

那天下午殡仪馆的师傅把怂怂的骨灰送回来，我朋友说“怂宝回家的时候还是热的，接到手里简直不能接受。”而后，我的脑子像是终于理解了什么似地对我说“哦，原来死亡是有温度的。”这并不是说我蠢到不知道火化炉的温度有多高，只是直到看到那句话，我才感觉到他确实是活生生地死了。确实是被一把火狠狠地烧过，又带着从别处借来的不属于他的温度回到我朋友手里。他的死亡有了温度，我窘促的大脑得到一分钟的中场休息。​

That afternoon, the undertaker returned Shy Baby's ashes, and my friend said "Shy Baby came home still warm, and it was unbearable to hold it in my hands." And then, as if my brain finally understood something, it said to me "Oh, so death has a temperature." It's not that I'm so stupid that I don't realize how hot the cremator is, it's just that until I read that sentence, I felt that he did die. Indeed, he had been burned hard by fire and returned to my friend with a temperature borrowed from somewhere else that didn't belong to him. His death took on a temperature, and my embarrassed brain got a minute's intermission.

​

2023年中，我总算回家了。6月24日，我去朋友家接怂宝的骨灰。他的骨灰盒被一张寺里的莲花法巾盖住，我想那时候也许师父给他念过经吧。我接过骨灰盒，由于晃动，他的碎骨撞击钵体发出一阵脆响，我才震惊地感到另一个鲜活的事实：死亡是有声音的。​

In the middle of 2023, I finally went home. On June 24th, I went to my friend's house to pick up Shy Baby's ashes. His urn was covered by a temple lotus flower mantle, and I thought that perhaps the master had recited sutras to him at that time. I took the urn, and because of the shaking, there was a clear sound of his broken bones hitting the mantle, and I was shocked to feel another vivid fact: death has a sound.

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死亡有了温度，有了声音，也有了画面。死亡在这一刻褪去了虚构的覆膜而露出了写实的酮体。我这才明白一直以来那种挥之不去的虚幻感是因为感知现实的无能。为了弥补弱势的感官，我只能额外做出很多努力来为已经确认的事实制作可以承载它的实体。让这个实体存在于我生活的空间里，我那羸弱不堪的感官才能从它应付不来的庞大世界里稳定地向我的大脑递送不可被辩驳和糊弄的信号。我的感情，才同意与理智和解，放弃依靠想象和回忆改变感觉和现实的狂妄。散乱的感觉总算成为稳定的情感，使我能一边接受死亡的存在，一边重演真实的过去。​

Death has a temperature, a sound, and a picture. At this moment, death shed its fictional coating and revealed its realistic body. I realized then that the lingering sense of illusion I had been experiencing was due to an inability to perceive reality. In order to compensate for my weak senses, I had to make a lot of extra effort to create an entity that could carry the confirmed facts. By allowing this entity to exist in the space of my life, my weak senses were able to steadily send signals that cannot be refuted and fooled to my brain from a vast world that it could not cope with. It was only then that my feelings agreed to reconcile with my reason and give up the arrogance of relying on imagination and memories to alter emotions and reality. Scattered emotions finally became stable feelings that allowed me to accept the presence of death while reenacting the real past.

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我扮演在那个本应该普通的早上正打算吃煮好的米粉的自己，并拍了一张肖像。我把这张肖像和2020年我最后一次见到怂宝时所拍的照片都打印出来。之后，我用砂纸将两张喷墨照片的图像都刮磨下来，同时把所有磨下来的画面都收集进了一个玻璃罐。我们俩就这样以物理的形式混在一块不分你我。我把我们的灰洒在一张纸上，再固定住。我们的遗体也在这一刻以呈现我们融合后的遗像的方式拥有了另一种形状。为了制作摆放遗体和遗像的棺木，我在家附近收集了一些废弃的木板。当走到那个仓库的时候，我才发现这是一家给小狗做可以铺上草皮的木制便盆的公司。木工大哥在仓库里放着歌，切割着木板，我则在外面拾他的赠礼。我们之间是一张巨大的遮挡仓库门的广告布，画布上印着一只快乐的小狗。最后，我把我们的遗体和遗像钉在了棺木上。​

I played the role of myself who was planning to have a rice noodle soup on that otherwise ordinary morning, and took a portrait. I printed out both that portrait and the photo I took the last time I saw Shy Baby in 2020. Afterward, I scraped and rubbed down the images of both inkjet photos with sandpaper, while collecting all the shattered images into a glass jar. The two of us were thus mixed together in a physical indistinguishable form. I sprinkled our ashes on a piece of paper and fixed it. Our remains took on another shape at this moment in the form of presenting our fused memorial portrait. To make the coffin in which the remains and the memorial portrait would be placed, I collected some discarded timbers near my place. When walking to that warehouse, I realized that it was a company that made wooden potties for puppies that could be covered with turf. The carpenter was playing songs and cutting boards in the warehouse while I was outside picking up his giveaways. Between us was a huge piece of advertising canvas covering the warehouse door, with a happy puppy printed on the canvas. Finally, I nailed our remains and the memorial portrait to the coffin.

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3年了，我们的野马尘埃终于尘埃落定。​

It's been 3 years, and our ashes finally settled.​

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2024年1月21日​

21 Jan, 2024

于维多利亚州，奥克利​

Oakleigh, VIC

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