2 . When summer night falls and the streetlights go on, a dozen cars arrive at an open outdoor space. Drivers open their car trunks and set up stalls (摊位) outside their vehicles. They are selling handmade cakes, coffee and iced drinks, as well as other inexpensive goods out of trunk, while customers relax nearby in camping chairs, listening to live bands and enjoying the soft summer evening.

Car stall fairs emerged as trendy play last summer in cities across China. For the past six months, selling hand-brewed coffee at car stall fairs on the outskirts of Xi’an, Shaanxi province, has been Zhuang Shenyang’s main way of supporting his family, with a daily income ranging from 50 ($6.98) to 2,000 yuan.

The 40-year-old — who learned oil painting in college — had to find ways to support his family last year after he closed down his training school. “After staying at home for several months without income, I made up my mind to go out to earn money, even if it was running a stall on the streets,” he said. He was inspired by a conversation with a roadside food vendor (小贩) earlier this year and found that the business with little investment can make a living.

He sets up his mobile stall almost every day and has attracted many regular customers. “People don’t just come for coffee, they like to sit and talk, often staying into the night,” Zhuang said. “It’s a way young people like to socialize outdoors.”

He named his coffee stall “A Coffee Bar in Debt” with self-deprecating (自嘲的) humor. “I want to convey an attitude that even though I am in debt, I will never ‘let it rot’,” Zhuang said. “The popularity of the fairs shows that many people’s incomes have been affected by the epidemic, but they don’t want to ‘lie flat’ at home; instead, they work hard,” he said.

3 . Fashion always influences people, Isabella Springmuhl Tejada from Guatemala, one of the first professional fashion designer with Down syndrome, is proving that fashion goes beyond normal limits.

Tejada who discovered her hobby in childhood said, “I think that fashion design is in my blood.” After all, her grandmother had a studio where she produced Guatemalan-style clothing. And, when she was young, Tejada’s mother gave her fashion magazines to read. Tejada spent hours of her childhood reading the magazines and designing paper dresses for her dolls. By the time she reached high school, Tejada had decided to enter the world.

After being refused by several fashion schools because of her Down syndrome, Tejada found her own path. She signed up for a clothing-making course, where she began to make clothing for “worry dolls”, finger-sized traditional Guatemalan dolls. And she created life-sized dolls and dressed them in the colorful clothes that she’s now famous for. This-design experience greatly helped Tejada. She fell in love with traditional Guatemalan patterns and colors. She explained, “I’m lucky to work with traditional cloth, inspired by our culture and representing our country.”

Tejada also pioneered fashion design for people with Down syndrome. She said, “It is difficult for people like me to find suitable clothes. We can be shorter or weaker. That’s why I decided to design clothes that would be perfect for people with Down syndrome.”

Tejada has created her brand, Down to Xjabelle. The new brand took off right away. It made it all the way to London Fashion Week. And the great designer has plans for the future as well. Tejada said, “I want people all over the world to know my designs and to know that people with Down syndrome can do what they set out to do. I want to be able to live on my own.”

5 . The Sydney to Melbourne Ultramarathon, an endurance race of 875km, was considered the toughest in the world. It used to be a five-day race, with only the world-class athletes daring to attempt it. Most athletes who took part in this ultramarathon were under 30 years of age.

Cliff was a farmer from Australia with a dream of running a race. When he attended the race, he was 61 years old. He had no specialized sportswear. Instead, he wore galoshes overalls. When he appeared at the venue, the onlookers thought he was probably a spectator. To their surprise, Cliff picked up a race number.

Having grown up on a farm, Cliff had to go out to round up the sheep every time there was a storm, because his family could not afford horses or tractors. Two thousand sheep scattered across two thousand acres of land—it took him as long as three days of chasing the animals, but he always succeeded.

The race began, and the strong and young racers started leaving Cliff behind. The racers had a strategy. They would be running hours each for the five days of the race, and sleep for the remaining 6 hours. Nonetheless, Cliff had no such strategy! Being an amateur athlete, he was not familiar with any such game plan. So, he just ran on and on, and the next morning, when the other athletes woke up, they found that the old man had caught up with the others by jogging all night. By the final night of the race, he had surpassed the other competitors and became the champion.

The next time Cliff caught attention again when he was 76. He took up the challenge of running along Australia’s border, across a distance of 16,000 km with the aim of raising money for homeless children. Unfortunately, his crew member fell ill, and Cliff had to withdraw from the race, after running for 6520 km.

Cliff, a simple farmer, created a one-of-a-kind history. Instead of withering away, he started his new life, and showed the world that it’s never too late to start following the heart and pursuing dreams.

6 . Derek Veal found an old suitcase filled with photos, some more than 100 years old, when he explored his grandfather’s old house in Georgia. It belonged to his great-grandmother, who had Alzheimer’s(老年痴呆症)and lived in a nursing home. Veal and his grandfather went to visit her with the photos, hoping she could tell them more about the photos. What happened next changed Veal’s life.

“Everything came back to her when she saw these pictures,” Veal said. “She recognized her sisters, her aunts, her grandparents…It was the first time I had ever seen someone’s excitement from an old photo returning to them.”

The experience made Veal realize the power of old photos to hold precious and long-forgotten memories and restore a sense of identity. It never left him. Two years ago, when he came across old family photos for sale at a thrift store(旧货店), he decided to pick one picture and try to track down the family. Soon, he was inspired to buy more photos and started a Facebook group called Old Photo Project to aid in finding their families.

Veal is not alone in this hobby. David Gutenmacher, 26, lives in Queens, New York, and started his project, Museum of Lost Memories, in late 2020. He has already had over 300,000 followers on Instagram and over 750,000 on TikTok. “Some of my posts have gone viral and twice a person or family was tracked down in a matter of minutes!” Gutenmacher said. These lost pictures can bring the memories back to the families they belong to.

What makes this hobby so unique is not only how it gives people the chance to help others, but it also brings these enthusiasts a sense of purpose. “I feel like this is my calling,” said Gutenmacher. “The more I return memories, the more it feels like I’m supposed to be doing this.”

7 . Ida Keeling had grown up poor in Harlem and done hard, grinding work in factories during the Great Depression. She had lost her husband early to a heart attack, and two of her four children—both of her sons—died in accidents. Keeling had sunk into a deep depression. Her health had begun to slide and her daughter, Cheryl, began to worry that she soon might be losing her mother as well.

Keeling’s daughter is a lifelong athlete. That may be what would pull her mother out from under her dark cloud. She suggested a run. Not just a jog around the block, but an official run. At the time, Ida Keeling was 67.

It had been decades since Keeling had done any running, and she would later recall that the first “mini-run” was wonderful. “I just threw off all my bad memories,” Keeling says. She hasn’t stopped running since, and it’s no longer the difficulty it was during that first meet. Since then, Keeling has set records for 60 meters in the 95-99 age group, and in 100 meters for the over 100 group. “I was just exercising,” she says, “and now I’m all over the world.”

When she’s not running, she’s working out. She’s in the gym three to four days a week, running, working out with weights and pedaling on the exercise bike—and even exercising while she’s cooking. Part of her healthy diet is an occasional dose of red wine mixed with her coffee or water to aid blood circulation. She’s written a book about her experiences, titled Can’t Nothing Bring Me Down: Chasing Myself in the Race Against Time. Her philosophy is also fit for a runner: “Every day is another day forward.”

8 . The unique pink box in the front yard was originally created to serve those in the community. “Ever since my teaching partner told me about Little Free Libraries, I have known I wanted to make one,” says Carrie, a teacher in Illinois. Little Free Libraries, first created in 2009 are a way for people to take a book to read, or leave one for someone else to find.

Carrie’s husband, Matt, promised to make her one for her birthday in May 2020. In June, she was found to have breast cancer. Designing and planning the Little Free Library became a helpful distraction(分散注意力的事).

The book exchanges are often made on different, creative themes. Carrie always posts her adventures with greyhounds Rose and Flattery, German Shepherd Dog Kuster, and Belgian Shepherd Dog Kiva on the Internet, which make a difference to her life. She decided to create a dog-themed library featuring dog related artwork, a metal dog on top and a jar of dog treats. The library took her husband almost a month to build and another few weeks to paint.

The project has given Carrie something positive to focus on as she goes through her treatments. In addition, it has shown her how many people care about her -from her husband and another relative who helped construct it, to a nephew who painted the artwork, to friends who donated books. She also has a better understanding of them. The Little Free Library holds about 25 books. As people stop by, she discovers another benefit. “After many years of living here, we’re finally getting to know some of our neighbors.”

10 . Betty Sandison was having lunch with some friends when the subject of wish lists came up. Although she had spent more than 30 years working as a registered nurse, Betty told her friends that she regretted never finishing the bachelor’s degree she’d started more than 67 years earlier.

Betty was the first person in her family to pursue higher education. With a dream of becoming a nurse, Betty enrolled at the University of Minnesota. But when she was just 25 credits short of getting her degree, for some reason, Betty dropped out of school and soon got married. Her career was put on hold as the couple moved around for her husband’s job, spending time living in different places.

Many years later, Betty returned to community college to become a registered nurse. She worked as a nurse for more than 30 years before retiring in 2013.

But in 2018, she still felt regretful over her unfinished degree. Encouraged by her friends, Betty decided to return to university to complete her bachelor’s degree. She chose to live in the dormitory and got on well with her roommates. She enrolled in classes and started working on those last 25 credits. However, she was discouraged by the new technology used when taking online courses during the coronavirus pandemic. Even so, Betty persevered.

At age 84, Betty got her bachelor’s degree in Multidisciplinary Studies from the College of Continuing and Professional Studies. She described the accomplishment as “pure joy, pure satisfaction”. Betty may even audit (旁听) college classes now that her degree is complete. She is not sure what’s next, but there’s one thing she does know: Life’s too short to live with regrets!