Jonathan, Jonathan (-)

Jonathan's heart is broken. His wife left him this morning. He is alone at the home and has nothing to do except to lie on the bed and cry. He realizes he can't cry for the whole day and he can't fall asleep either. He thinks he is depressed. He is a very optimistic person, not like his wife always claims she has chronic depression. He doubts that she really has such problem because he thinks she uses this kind of tricks to draw his attention. The first time he felt depression was the time when he was in college. People remember many first times, the first time to date a girl, the first time to catch a fish, the first time to drive a vehicle on road, the first time ... Jonathan remember the first time he got depression, a severe depression. He asked a girl, who was in the same Physics class with him, to go out for dinner. She refused him directly in front of his classmates. He remembers that was a winter. The weather in Chengdu is always gloomy. So Jonathan's depression in his mind is dark and colorless like the winter. It is not exactly colorless but a little smoky blue. After being refused, he went to the dorm and lay on the bed, tried to go sleep. He felt the pain in his chest. There was nothing he could do to relief the pain and the warmness from his body, reserved by conformer gave him a very special comfort. He thought about his mom and fell asleep fast. It was a long sleep without any dreams. He actually woke up the third day. He felt better but the pain in his chest faded away slowly. Since then, he knows what is called depression. He has gone through this kind of depression couple of times in his life. He gets used to it whenever it comes out however he does not want it anytime.

He doesn't sure who started the argument but he is quite sure he wasn't in good mood this morning. He asks himself, “What is the problem? What are the symptoms? What are the assumptions? What is the evidence? What is the missing information? What are the reasons?” Whenever he has problems, he would like to apply his critical thinking to solve. He wasn't happy this morning when he woke up. He was tired and exhausted. He remembers he had some dreams last night. None of them had happy endings. He understands the bad mood comes from last night’s party. It was his company’s yearend Christmas party. He didn’t go to the party last year and he was very regretful not to go because his officemates told him that was the best holiday party ever. The firm, Patton Boggs, a prestigious law firm in Washing D.C., hosted a splendid Christmas party at a famous hotel near M Street last Christmas. The hotel provided top notch foods for Patton Boggs’ attorneys and staffs. His officemates talked about this party for a whole year and Jonathan really looked forward to having this year’s party. In fact, he arrived at the D.C. office 20 minutes early.

He is new to this company. He is not an attorney. He has never been to a law school or has any formal legal training. He works with computers and maintains firm’s internal content management web sites. That is the reason he and other IT, Human Resources, and Accounting staffs work in the operation center in Tysons Corner, Northern Virginia. Tysons Corner is famous to be the home of two super-regional shopping malls. The area is affluent, surrounded by other affluent areas, Mclean, Vienna, Great Falls, and Falls Church. The newly opened Silver Line metro rail adds new excitement to local residents. He took the metro to commute to the D.C. office near M street.

When he was waiting in the lobby hall, he saw John stepped in the lobby from the outside. The lobby was recently renovated and it looks beautiful inside. But Jonathan thinks it is just ok for a D.C. law firm. He had several interviews with big law firms one year ago before he decided to work for Patton Boggs. His friend Amy helped him to make the decision by telling him the firm is very prestigious. How prestigious? He had no idea before Amy told him so. He thinks the best lobby or building he visited is the one from Covington & Burling. Their building is like a glass castle. Different components in the castle are connected by bridges. These bridges give people a feeling of working in the air or walking into a new century. He had some artistic training in college and he believes he has better taste than others. However, none of them can compare the Rookery Building in the heart of downtown Chicago. The building itself is an icon of American architecture. His brother in law is an attorney in the building and gave him a personal tour.

John also works in the Tysons Corner office as an accounting manager. Jonathan is new to the firm. Jonathan never pays attention to him until one day in the kitchen, John said he is a Chinese. The tea was almost spouted out from Jonathan’s mouth because John is a BLACK. Jonathan thought he might be married to a Chinese woman. Some Americans express their love to their wives and enthusiasm to their wives’ culture in this particular way. “Um, is your wife a Chinese?” “Yes, she is. We have four beautiful daughters. Let me show you their pictures. Here is my wife. We were on a vacation in the Caribbean.” Jonathan looked at the pictures and his tea was almost spouted out again. John’s wife is a BLACK too. Their daughters are very cute and this is a very sweet family. “My grandfather was a Chinese. I heard that my grandmother was very mean to him. Here is the picture. I keep these pictures all the time. My wife is a half Chinese.”

[康斯坦丁Oceans]

Many many thanks. I will continue to write.

[中年呓语]

A very beautiful writing! You must be a soft-hearted person. I'm laughing....LOL...Write more, pls...