I always leave a mark wherever a mark can be left, even though I know that in a thousand years, all will return to the earth.
When did it begin? Perhaps in primary school—but the clearer memories trace back to middle school. Sometimes it was a pencil, sometimes a gel pen. A patch of white wall, no matter how small, was enough. The dates changed, but one thing remained constant: the words “I was here.”
There was never much calculation behind it. In those moments of leaving a trace, I would often imagine the future—when I might stumble upon it again and be struck by how much time had passed, how much I had changed. Sometimes I find old cards tucked into forgotten corners of my room, with sad little messages that now make me laugh. They feel naïve in hindsight, but deeply sincere. The patch of earth outside our old classroom, where I buried a glass bottle three years ago, is now overgrown with greenery. I don’t think I’ll ever dig it up.
Whether those visible traces still exist in the world hardly matters. They became indelible the moment they were written—etched not into surfaces, but into memory. What they contain, or how they appear, is secondary. What matters is that they proved I was here. That I existed, in that moment, in that place.
We may not know who they were, or when they left—but we know this:
someone once stood on this land.
我总会在可以留下痕迹的地方留下一点痕迹，尽管我知道千年后一切都将归于土地。
是从什么时候开始的呢？大约是小学的时候，但倘若追溯更清晰的记忆则是初中的事情了。有时是铅笔，有时是中性笔，一块很小很小的白墙对我来说就已足够。变的是日期，不变的总是那句“到此一游”。
留下痕迹是没有杂念的，我只是常在记录的当下去幻想未来再次看见那痕迹时的场景——然后惊觉时光荏苒，而我也成熟了许多。偶然翻出那些藏在房间犄角旮旯处的卡片，也会好笑当时写下来的悲伤话语，转过头来看好不幼稚，却又饱含真情。三年前在教室外埋下玻璃瓶的那片土地也覆满了绿植，我想我永远不会去挖开它了。
那些可被观看的痕迹，是否还存留于世已然无足轻重。它们早在被记录于实体的那一瞬间就成为了记忆里最坚不可摧的一份子，那一份子无关乎内容和展现形式，只是一种“我”存在的证明。我（这个人）曾来过这里，曾在这个时间记录一些东西。
我们不知道ta是谁，又于何时离开，但ta曾来过这片土地。