一封有趣的email

今天收到一个以前认识的朋友寄来的email。问了个非常好的问题，我希望把我的答案跟大家分享，尤其是那些对我有不少疑问的同学。也希望陈同学不要介意我擅自刊登他的电邮。
hey ellen,

前言问候省略……
ok, i just ask a brief question

From your essays on XXXX, i think engineering is one of your favorite.
isn't it?
But if i ask, what is your passion? how will you answer that?

我的答案是：
That's a really good question. I never really try to be a role model, coz i'm not from fresh start. Engineering is indeed my favorite. At this stage, it's my career, my hobby and my best friend. So it's basically, my life. I'm not saying like I'm a total geek, but it takes 90% of my attentions and time besides my family and my close relationships with others. Well for my passion, it's the ability to solve problems that we face day to day.Or to be more realistic, I'm lazy, i want to know the best, easiest and least time consuming way to do something. It's just a very general concept. To be more specific, it's an area called "architectural acoustics". And this general concept and the specific field that I am awfully passionate in are both based on the engineering background.

Well, then you may wonder why "architectural acoustics". I'll try not to get down to it too technically. I have this in my family background. My father has been doing this his whole life and 20 years, he never doubted himself or ever gave up on it. So I saw it a lot since I was a kid. I did something about it when I was in high shcool for the shows. I was fascinated by the science behind it. It's very amazing for me to know how to manipulate such complex science with things we can do as engineers. And another personal reason for me is that I have no interest in any kind of competition. So this path happened to be the kind of career. I have some peace of mind.

After studying engineering for two years and did my intern for six months. It's very upsetting, at first, to realize the fact that I only know how to refer to my books for answers if I encounter an engineering problem. It might be a little bit exaggerrated, but you get the idea. It's a career that values accumulation of knowledge. You go out to the industry, you see many cases, and you keep learning. Engineers help make a better world from our old lessons. The problems you encounter as an engineer will never be easy. They all come in practical and live, but if you can solve it, you see the amazing result of the effort. We preserved a historic building(the city hall of philadelphia, important icon rite?), we learn the nature of materials then we can manufactured a heart to help those trying to survive on the waiting list of heart transplants. There were tons of examples out there. We face one problem after another, we have to be creative in order to solve them, we can make our lives easier. We are very similar with doctors, like we both strive for the good quality of life.

I am very encouraged by the big dream of engineering. And as for my personal career path under this discipline, I picked "architectural acoustics". I'm very lucky to have a passion in what I do and what I like.

我看看有没时间翻译成中文吧，太懒了。

很多不太认识我的人会觉得我很冷，冷得很可怕。稍微认识我的人会对我形象来个180度大转弯：死婆妈之余还有一种罕见的热诚和专注。我并不是想要向各位说明这位小彭同学性格多么好或者多么的奇怪。大家想想，我一直的主张是什么？凡事要过得了自己那关。没错，我这种生活方式和状态过得了我自己心里那关，身边的爸妈和元释同学也觉得OK没问题。但是我真的并没有意思要让全世界人向我靠拢。据说是双鱼座特质，我是觉得这个世界上没有两个背景完全相同的人。那就决定没有完全两个人性格一样际遇一样同样情况下做出的决定一样。那也最后导致你是你，我是我。

肯定有人要反驳我：对，你很厉害。可是我不能像你这样（此句抄袭我表姐跟我妈对话）！我没有你这样坚持不懈的爸爸，没有这样善解人意的妈妈，没有这样和你一样臭味相投的元释同学，没有这样的懂事成熟，没有你这样出国留学的机会，没有你这样的成绩，没有你这样的性别，没有你这样语文不及格英文拿满分，没有你这样讨厌历史政治所有文科一切记不住只记得住物理公式，没有你这样那样这里那里……

我通通接受，你说得太对了。那是真的不需要羡慕我的了吧？你要翻版我前20年的人生，哪怕是老天爷在你前十辈子欠你一亿吨黄金几百年来加上累计利息觉得这辈子不让你重头来过是要被他弟弟雷公劈，你也不一定乐意让他来操劳。我并不想让大家自己跟自己过不去。所以不要对我说“你吃饱了撑着还要拿出来现眼”或者是“啊，你是我偶像啊”。实在是没必要。

也肯定有人要问我：你到底是如何成长为一名如此有主见的女性（注1）。这个问题你问我爸妈好过问我。我要是知道怎样把我自己培养起来的话，我首先要把自己塑造成36/24/36，敢穿粉红色hello kitty，会穿高跟鞋会化妆会拍照摆最佳角度会撒娇会挑香水会……

我只是在茶余饭后稍稍感叹我是何等的幸运，老早老早就把前途担忧解决掉了。那一段心理卑微的、惆怅不以的、快要发疯的、不堪回首的高一岁月，我survive了、熬过了，你现在只看得到我寥寥数字。那可是人生一大关口啊。那一天谁都要经历的，只是我经历得早，解决得早，最最最最狗屎运的是还算解决得挺完满。所以我此生后不需要再仰天长啸“神啊，我何去何从！”我就把那些功力留到我的实际操作中了。

最后来句广告词：你要是想和小彭同学一样精神生活美滋滋，是不是也去考虑一下把这个大问题尽快解决掉，不再留待明日？


注1：我以前一直以为大家会误会我为男生全是怪阿妈懒得给我起个女仔名。其实原来我女人得不能再女人的英文名字写在纸上，大家都可以理所当然把我当男的办。我承认，这个是我人品问题。