The brain is a wonderful organ. I can easily remember things that happened 30, 40, 50, even 60 years ago, with vividness that sometimes astonishes me. Events that had a great impact on my life especially come into focus, often in great detail. And as I am recounting a story over coffee with someone, further details amazingly and unexpectedly emerge, which is one reason why I like having coffee with people. After an amiable coffee, I have an urge to write down the story while it is still fresh in my mind, giving you the story straight from that coffee talk! Maybe the coffee ingredients even help!

大脑是个神奇的器官。我能轻易的回忆起那些发生在30年、40年、50年、甚至60年以前的事，鲜活得让人惊异。对我的生活产生过重大影响的事情更是历历在目，栩栩如生。我和别人边品咖啡边聊故事的时候，很多的细节在不经意间、让人惊讶地浮现，这也是我喜欢和人喝咖啡的原因之一。一杯香浓咖啡后，品咖漫谈让人突然间回想起那个故事，我赶紧把那个故事写下来，趁它还萦绕脑际。这也许是咖啡因的作用吧！

After all, as a neonatologist (doctor that takes care of sick infants), my colleagues and I actually use caffeine to help premature babies who may have a breathing problem: the “coffee” prods their brain to wake up and start breathing. Definitely a great use of caffeine/ coffee. Hence the name of my first creative non-fiction book, Coffee with Uncle Reggie!

实际上，作为新生儿专家（照顾生病婴儿的医师），我和我的同事用咖啡因治疗有呼吸障碍的早产儿，用“咖啡”去激发大脑苏醒启动呼吸。咖啡因/咖啡大有妙用。因此我的第一本原创纪实散文书的名字是《和Reggie叔叔喝咖啡》

I had a cousin who had a brain aneurysm rupture when he was aged 44. I did not even know that he was in the USA until I received a worried call, “your cousin is very sick in Columbus; you should try to visit him.” While Columbus was indeed only two hours away from Cincinnati where I was living, when I received the call we were actually in Canada on a family trip. We therefore rushed down to Columbus to find this cousin.

我有个表兄在他44岁时脑血管瘤破裂。我接到个心急火燎的电话才知道他在美国。电话告诉我：“你的表兄病重在俄亥俄州的哥伦布市，你该去看看。”尽管哥伦布距我所住的辛辛那提仅仅2个小时车程，但是我接到电话那一刻我们正举家在加拿大旅行。我们赶紧前往哥伦布去会这位表兄。

My cousin was in a perilous state. He was drifting in and out of coma. His wife of less than 10 years was distressed because often he could not remember her, nor even the children. It was the first time I had met his family, and probably 36 years since I had seen my cousin. So I was shocked when I walked into his hospital bedroom, that he opened his eyes and recognized me, after all these years.

我的表兄脑血管瘤破裂，病情危重，时而清醒时而昏迷。他太太和他结婚快10年，非常痛苦，他记不起她，甚至他们的孩子。小时候和表兄在一起，一晃36年过去了，我才第一次和他的家人见面。我走进病房，这么多年过去了，他居然睁眼就认出了我，让我非常震惊。

We were children when we last saw each other, but when he saw me it seemed like we had been apart only very briefly, and were continuing a conversation just recently broken off. He called me first, affectionately, by my childhood nickname “Miao” (the word for “cat” which sounds like my original native name). Then he proceeded to talk in his native childhood Chaozhou (Swatow or Shantou) language, which I knew. It was just like we were children again.

我们上次见面的时候还是小孩子，但他看到我的时候仿佛我们才分开片刻，要接着聊刚刚才中断的话题。他先叫我，亲切地唤我的小名“Miao”（“猫”的意思，听起来象我原来的在家乡的名字“锚”）。他接着用他幼年时候的潮州（汕头）话和我聊，这种方言我懂。我们仿佛又回到了孩提。

On reflection, this childhood language he spoke, had long preceded his later English acquisition, which was the language of his American born wife and daughters. And then he lapsed back into a coma, and I never had a real chance to talk with him again. Somehow he had reached back into the deep recesses of his brain and found all those deep childhood Chaozhou connections to bring them to the surface, to communicate clearly to me, before he went to meet his Maker. In brain injury, often older memories which remain in the deepest parts of the brain may be spared, but more recent memories which are in the more superficial parts of the brain are often wiped out.

细细想来，他早年在孩提时学习的方言远远超过了他后来学的英文。他的美国出生的太太和女儿们都说英文。他又陷入昏迷，我没有机会再和他聊聊。不知怎的他探寻到他大脑深处的记忆，找到所有记忆深处关于孩提时潮州的记忆关联并把它们浮现在记忆表面，在他去见他的创造者之前和我聊起那时的情景。大脑受伤的时候，存储在大脑深处的远期记忆常常能幸免，但存储在大脑表面部分的近期记忆往往被抹去。

We are told that we actually all have a photographic memory, meaning that images that we have seen are fully stored in our brain “cloud”, practically without limit, and with no billing charge for storage! The biggest problem is not that our memories are not stored, it is usually that we may not find the code, or the keyword to enter into what could be a file within a file within a file, to find them. So conversations over coffee, and casual times when we are reminiscing, by a process of free associating, suddenly prompt the keyword, and the key to the original photograph and even a fully running video. It is an astonishingly designed system.

我们据说都有图像记忆，我们所看到的图像全都存储在大脑“云”里，真正无限的，存储免费！最大的问题不是我们没有存储，而是我们找不到编码，或者找不到关键词好在文件夹里逐个去找到它们。因此边品咖啡边聊天，我们追忆往昔时候，偶然间随意的交谈，突然触及到关键词和打开原来的图像甚至鲜活的视频的“开关”。令人惊异的设计精巧的系统。

There is no question that events that are more dramatic and vivid will be etched more sharply in the brain, in even the greatest detail. I think this is how the early apostles wrote down the gospel stories and the specific teachings of Christ, since many events were particularly vivid and dramatic, such as His telling of parable stories based on everyday lives, His dramatic miracles, His terribly cruel crucifixion, and His shocking resurrection. All these were historical events sharply imprinted in their minds so that they could write them up 30, 40, or 50 years later. Since they were often first hand observers of what happened, the stories are often captured in startling detail. Even great lawyers and Supreme Court justices, who are superbly trained to criticize historical evidences, attest to the authority and integrity of accounts of key dramatic events such as the resurrection of Christ, including the great Simon Greenleaf, a founder of the Harvard Law School.

毫无疑问，越是激动人心的、越是生动的事件在大脑中留下的印象越是深刻、越是翔实。我认为这就是为什么早年的使徒写下的许多福音故事和基督教义如此生动和扣人心弦，比如日常生活中基督所讲的比喻，他施的神迹，他受到的惨烈折磨和他震惊世人的复活。这些基于史实的事件深深的印在使徒们的脑海，尽管30年，40年，50年过去了，他们仍能毫厘不差的记下来。他们往往亲历了那些事件，所以故事才眉目清晰、细节毕据。甚至包括伟大的哈佛法学院的缔造者Simon Greenleaf  在内的许多大律师、大法官，尽管他们经过专门培训去批判历史史实，但是他们还是证实了诸如基督复活在内的诸多重大事件的权威性和完整性。

It’s only recently that I discovered that this category of writing that I’m engaged in is called “creative nonfiction,” which means that I will write real stories from memories of real experiences (hence, “non-fiction”), and where creativity comes in putting the story together in as interesting a light as possible, but never tampering with the facts. Interpretations, explanations and context provide some of the creative component to make the writing especially interesting, and add a personal touch to the story. The interpretations of course might vary; for example if two people were in the same event, their perspective is often different. My wife Esther says that often my interpretation of an event that involves her, is not the same as her interpretation! (See my Uncle Reggie Stories: Making an Impression). Which sounds quite reasonable, and maybe I should write stories from her perspective also. That would give a complementary view of events, just like there are four Gospels looking at events from somewhat different perspectives, but sticking with the facts.

直到最近我才知道我我正在进行的系列写作的风格被专业写手称为“creative non-fiction，原创纪实散文”，我从我亲身经历来写真实的故事, 我的创造只是把这些故事用尽可能引人入胜的方法串联起来，从不改变事实。描述、解释和语境提供了创造性的元素让写作更加有趣，也在故事中添加了一些个人的感触。当然表达会有变化，例如两个人在同一件事上都会有不同的看法。我的太太Esther说她有时候也参与其中的事情我的描述就和她的不同！（参阅Reggie叔叔的故事：reggietales.org留下印象）。这是理所当然的，也许我也应该从她的角度写文章。这就给事件以补充的观点，正如圣经有四篇福音故事从不同的角度来观察事件，但都紧贴事实。

If it were not for this funny brain, none of this writing would be possible, so I’m immensely thankful for this brain, that is continually buzzing and sending off fantastic infinite electrical signals, and that has deep storage of gaza-zillion wonderful memory files, waiting to be discovered and dug up and sent to my desktop for editing. You can add to, or help prompt this frenzy of signals by reminding me of great stories the next time we have coffee.

如果没有这样有趣的大脑，这些写作就不可能，我很庆幸上帝创造了这样的大脑，它仍在不断的运转并发出神奇的无限的电讯号，它深处存储有大量的精彩记忆，等待我去发现、发掘，把他们发送到我的电脑去编辑。下次我们喝咖啡的时候，你可以增添、或者提醒我在这个巨大的讯号里去发现很多的故事。