Davidzhu

I recently met a girl whose story has left me unsettled. At 35, she has been through so much. Having lost her parents and with her only brother already married and settled, she has become a true loner. She has been in a few relationships, but none have worked out. Every time she returns home from afar, seeing her brother and his family happy together, she feels like a guest, as if the home that truly belonged to her was lost from the start. She used to run her own business, but it failed miserably, leaving her with nothing. Now, she works alone in a distant city, and her company is struggling, with her salary dwindling. She asked me if she should go to a big city and start anew. I asked her what she wanted to do, and she said she wanted to sell boxed meals and beef noodles. At that moment, I felt a pang of sadness, not because selling boxed meals and beef noodles is a bad thing, but because a 35-year-old woman, after experiencing the loss of loved ones, failed relationships, and business bankruptcy, can only pack her bags, alone, and start over in an unfamiliar city. At that moment, I began to understand the harsh reality many women face. Some men, no matter how poor, still have a home to return to, with parents who care and family who worry. But for some women, after their parents are gone, and their relationships haven't worked out, when they turn back, they find no one is left. The collapse of an adult is often silent; she smiled and said she wanted to give it a try, but all I heard was the difficulty of life. I thought of many similar stories, all about women's loneliness and struggles. A 35-year-old woman, carrying her dreams and despair, walking alone in an unfamiliar city, searching for her own way to survive. Her story made me deeply feel the harshness of life and the strength of women.