What if you were to retire permanently in Taiwan? What would you like to leave behind? Anything material? Familial? Personal/professional legacy? Would you have passed the torch… served as fuel in transmitting the flame, be it time served in some institution that rolls on, a love of x, knowledge of or proficiency in x? Or simply fade to black?
I’m back south in the mountain boonies, attending another funeral. In the past, I’ve seen the scant physical legacy of lives disappear to the merry sound of tinned Mozart, and headstones buried under mounds of trash discarded from institutes those very people founded.
This time around, I’m less bound to this rock, and I’m now a father, so ideas of endowment and legacy are particularly potent. But Taiwan’s environment and culture often strike me as particularly hostile (or at best, unfriendly) to material legacies.
That’s all I’ve got: questions, a vague itch, a desire to do well and leave things and specific people a little bit off for my being here.
Since you used the expression would you like, and not do you expect, do you plan, or do you intend: something true of at least middling value, or something encouraging.
This [quote]simply fade to black[/quote] or this [quote]buried under mounds of trash[/quote] or something along those lines.
I wasn’t criticizing the expression you used. I didn’t mean to sound finicky. I was just qualifying what I said so as to make sure I communicated that I wasn’t bragging about some big things I planned on doing.
And I would actually like to leave behind something true or something encouraging.
antarcticbeech’s idea sounds great, but I don’t know how to make beautiful stuff.
[quote=“Jaboney”]What if you were to retire permanently in Taiwan? What would you like to leave behind? Anything material? Familial? Personal/professional legacy? Would you have passed the torch… served as fuel in transmitting the flame, be it time served in some institution that rolls on, a love of x, knowledge of or proficiency in x? Or simply fade to black?
I’m back south in the mountain boonies, attending another funeral. In the past, I’ve seen the scant physical legacy of lives disappear to the merry sound of tinned Mozart, and headstones buried under mounds of trash discarded from institutes those very people founded.
This time around, I’m less bound to this rock, and I’m now a father, so ideas of endowment and legacy are particularly potent. But Taiwan’s environment and culture often strike me as particularly hostile (or at best, unfriendly) to material legacies.
That’s all I’ve got: questions, a vague itch, a desire to do well and leave things and specific people a little bit off for my being here.[/quote]
Ideally, I’d like to write a book that will have a lasting place in Taiwan lore like those written by Campbell and Mackay (and more recently Almas John…I really think that one is going to stand the test of time on some level).
Other than that, I just hope I’ve touched the lives of my students and will be remembered fondly, do more good than harm, be a good father and have someone who cares enough to come clean my grave on Tomb Sweep Day.
Never mind the world - I’ll focus on shaping my family’s values as much as I can, and to try and live up to my own ideals so that I can be an example to them and the people in my life.
What makes you think you haven’t already? [/quote]
I suspect most people never recognize what remains in the wake, what has the greatest or longest lasting effect, for good or ill.
