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Loving What We Do Not Possess: The Chinese Snuff Bottle That Got Away |
| Section: LIFE / HOBBY |
| Author: Gene Sawyer |
| Publication: The world & I online |
| Issue Date: 1/1/1999 |
| Size: 1,383 Words, 8,086 Characters |
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The master said:
What we possess can be lost,
stolen, or destroyed.
What we do not possess we keep.
I can see it now, luminous in the dingy window of an alley shop in Shanghai. It was a stone snuff bottle about three inches high. Of rich amber, it was flecked with bits of gold like myriad golden grains of sand. A treasure! I wanted it for my collection.
But the shopkeeper wouldn't sell it to me. At first I offered Chinese national currency, and when he shook his head I offered dollars. I couldn't argue with him as he didn't know English, but, in war-torn China, American money usually spoke for itself.
Not this time. Frustrated, I asked a Chinese friend to bargain for me, but he wasn't successful either. When I asked him why, he said simply, "The man won't sell." It seeme...
. . .
... the interior of the caves. Made of rough clay, it was completely covered in bas-relief, with small painted faces. I bought it for sentimental reasons.
With time, all this is fading and Chinese snuff bottles have lost their allure. Today I rarely think of them, but if I do, I see the tantalizing beauty of a gold stone bottle in a little shop in Shanghai--never possessed but mine in memory.
(836 of 8,086 characters)
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