Text | Ma Suping
(Daqin Island)
Yan Jie, a classmate on the island, came to Yantai, stayed at his son's house, and was reunited with his wife, who has been living here for many years to see his grandson.
Old Gu, I call him Lao Gu behind my back, we are the same age, this year is sixty years old, the old use of the word "old Gu" is appropriate, but in person or call him Yanjie. His wife Hongyan was also my island classmate, and we studied at a school when we were young. Although I and Hongyan's sister Hongxia and Lao Gu are in the second class, Hongyan is in the first class, but because when I was a child, I often ran to her house with Hongxia to drink water during recess, and often went to her house to play on holidays, and Hongyan was also familiar with her. They are not sisters but sisters, they are members of the reunited family of Hongyan's father and Hongxia's mother. When I was a child, I was stupid and stupid to distinguish these relationships, and when I grew up, I straightened it out.
The last time Lao Gu came to Yantai was three months ago, when he caught up with my old father and was hospitalized, and then drove the crane west. At his father's memorial service, Lao Gu and Yantai classmates Bingshan, Lina and Jianjun attended the farewell ceremony. I cried so darkly that day that I was so sad that I didn't say a word to my classmates. Half a month later, Lao Gu sent a WeChat message, saying that he wanted to come to my house with Hongyan to see me, and let me refuse. At that time, I was in a terrible mood, lying at home all day, no one wanted to see me, and when anyone mentioned my father, I burst into tears and even cried. Lao Gu and Hongyan had to persuade me on the phone to take more care, and then when Lao Gu returned to the island, I didn't know, and I didn't have the heart to ask.
Lao Gu used to come to Yantai often, and every time he came, our classmates had to get together. Either he called me when he was at a party of relatives and friends, or I organized a liquor bureau and invited him and Hongyan to come over, and we talked about the past. But Hongyan participated in a small number of times, she could not rest assured that her little grandson, she let Lao Gu come by herself.
(More than ten years ago, the photos of our classmates traveling, counting the authors, Hongyan, Yanjie, and Li Gang from right to left)
When he came to Yantai this time, I originally wanted to continue to perform the duties of the host, but my little grandson just stayed at home for a while, and I also experienced the mood that Hongyan always couldn't come out to dinner before, or take care of the next generation as my responsibility. Last weekend, my grandson went back to my grandparents' house, and I thought that I would be fine and ask the old man to take care of it, but I was uncomfortable and lay at home for two days.
Yesterday morning Yan Jie sent a WeChat message, asking me if I had time to come to his house for a light meal at noon. The old man was afraid that I would resign, and then told me that they would return to the island after the 20th.
Now who in the city still calls in the house to eat? Unless it is a relative who is close to each other who often moves around. From childhood to adulthood, my contact with Lao Gu and Hong Yan has not been broken, and the nostalgia and classmate affection are closer than family affection. Although I have a bad appetite, I really want to meet my old classmates, I haven't seen them for a long time, and I seem to miss them a lot. I promised Lao Gu, said that noon passed, and asked him to send the address of his son's home to WeChat again, I have been to the name of the community that I can't remember a few times, I am really old, I don't remember anything.
Lao Gu told me that the weather outside was not good, there was light snow on the road, pay attention to safety.
I got up from the bed, briefly combed the mirror and made up a few times, and it was almost eleven o'clock when I sat on the Didi Express. When I arrived at the door of the community, Lao Gu was waiting there.
The weather was really cold, and there was a thin layer of snow frost on the ground. Entering the Moon Gate, the weather is not normal if it is not cold.
Entering the house, Hongyan and his little grandson Cheng Cheng greeted me in the living room, Hongyan had just wrapped the dumplings, and there were still dandruffs on his hands that had not been cleaned. Seeing my arrival, I didn't have to say a few words, so I rushed into the kitchen and said that it was fried fish for me to eat.
He was already four and a half years old, and I remember that when he was born that year, I and my two sisters and brothers-in-law went into Daqin Island to reminisce, living in the home of jin hong, a classmate in the south village, and the old Gu family in the north village, so they came to accompany us every day. Daqin Island is my birthplace, and June 8th also coincides with the anniversary of my mother's return to the army, after leading my brothers and sisters and father to reunite, the new member of the family, I, to register. On that day, the big cake ordered by Yan Jie and his classmates and the hotel arranged for me to celebrate my 54th birthday, a day that I will never forget, is very commemorative. When we left the island the next day, Yan Jie told me that he was going to take a boat with us out of the island, and his eldest grandson, Cheng Cheng, was born in Yantai on June 6. If it weren't for our living on the island, he would have come out to greet the arrival of the eldest grandson for the first time, and I was particularly embarrassed at the time, delaying the old Gu family's important affairs, but he said it didn't matter.
In a flash of time, four or five years passed, and his little grandchildren grew so big.
Cheng Cheng came back from the kindergarten early holiday, the grandparents were in a hurry to return to the island, his parents were still at work, so Lao Gu wanted to leave on the 20th, and the son did not let it, saying that he would wait a few days. I said Lao Gu then in Yantai New Year, what does it mean to go back to the island for the New Year? Lao Gu said, how can we not go home for the New Year, although the parents are gone, but that is the place where our ancestors have lived for generations, we must go back to the New Year, and we must ask the ancestors to go home for the New Year.
When I was a child, I knew that the people on the island were particularly concerned about the New Year's Festival, and they were also particular about it. Although there are large garrison troops on the island, and it is also the era of "breaking the four olds and establishing the four new", when they often go to the homes of their classmates and landlords in fishing villages to play, they will also see them sneaking and quietly engaging in some family tree extensions, offerings, and inviting the gods to do some memorial activities. At that time, the families and children of our troops were strictly disciplined by our fathers, who called this superstition, which was the kind of cattle, ghosts, and snake gods, and we must resolutely resist. Nowadays, it seems that these are also part of the traditional culture of the Chinese nation, and it is understandable that the fishermen on the island mourn their ancestors and express their way of commemorating their ancestors.
Old Gu went into the kitchen to help Hongyan with the meal, and The beggar did not recognize the life at all, and played with me. Before playing, he innocently asked me: "Are you a guest of our house?" As soon as I saw that the child had gone through a big scene, and the little wisdom was still quite large, I told him: "Your grandparents and I are classmates on the island, and I grew up playing together." Have you ever been to Daqin Island? That's where I was born. He looked at me twice, as if he had let down his guard, and dragged me to his toy area. Because I had just seen my little grandson, I learned a little bit of toddler songs and stories, and I was basically familiar with how to communicate and interact with children, and then the two of us had a lot of fun in the toy area. The toy gun I brought to Beggar, Beggar is self-taught, three times five divided by two is installed, we play the game of the police catching bad guys, I was impressed by the cleverness of the little Beggar. During the period, Lao Gu came out twice to watch us play, and said with a sigh: "When we were young, we could fish for so many toys, and we never even saw the rudder of a toy car." Crazy, fighting, and making trouble outside all day, compared with the children now, what kind of childhood is that called? I said, "Yeah, childhood and adolescence have come this way, and I'm still full of memories." We have our play, we have our fun, that's made by the times, we have no choice. ”
Video loading...
Lao Gu and Hongyan began to put meals on the table, I was still videotaping Cheng Cheng, Cheng Cheng read the kindergarten literacy textbook aloud, the little child was almost backwards like a stream, the thin little mouth deftly spat out sentences, such as gold beads falling into the basin, crisp and powerful, I couldn't help but want to kiss this little cute. Lao Gu came over to let us go to dinner, and said: "This child is the same as you, the language is good, what poetry or story, tell him twice, the mouth is still clever, you say what to let him do when he grows up?" lawyer? Or what? "Oh, they all say that three years old looks big, seven years old looks old." Such a smart child, what he will do in the future is good. If you can't do it, become a writer. Haha..." I replied to Lao Gu half-jokingly. I know that Lao Gu loves to read the reminiscences I wrote the most, he is a particularly emotional fisherman, he cherishes the friendship with our "children of the army's families" who were born and raised on the island, he often said: "I can't forget the era when your parents built the island and defended the island, you can't go back to your parents' hometown, take the island as your home, and share weal and woe with our people. ”
He almost read the nursery rhymes in the whole book to me and let me record them, and then he was reluctant to lead me to wash my hands and eat at the table.
In advance, I instructed Lao Gu and Hongyan, saying that I had a bad appetite, I couldn't eat much, and I didn't get so many meals, but the table was still full of plates and plates. "Seaweed dumplings, smoked knife fish, fried fish cubes, steamed small red shrimp, jellyfish skin mixed with cabbage cores" are all things I like to eat. Eating line, the wine is not drinkable at all, Lao Gu persuaded me several times, I still resisted the temptation of "wine aroma", he had to drink himself.
Lao Gu's alcohol intake is particularly good, and the wine style is also very positive, and his friends who have drunk wine have said so. Realism, no hypocrisy, no rhetoric, no aggressiveness, this is the disposition of the island people at the banquet table, this is the noble quality of the island fishermen who have gone through the wind and waves, and the character characteristics that cannot be changed even when they go to the edge of the sky.
After the meal, I said that my stomach was uncomfortable, and Lao Gu took the "morphine" pill and asked me to take a tablet, saying that this medicine works best to relieve stomach discomfort. Maybe the medication really worked, but after a while, I didn't have any uncomfortable feelings. In fact, this is also the main factor that met with the students on the island, talked about the people and things in the hometown, the spirit is better, and the body is back to normal.
Hongyan said that there is another important reason for the rush to return to the island years ago, is that the 89-year-old mother needs to be taken care of, she went back to replace Hongxia, want to take the old mother to her home for the New Year, the family's hygiene, the New Year goods also have to be packed up and prepared.
The old mother is Hongyan's stepmother, for decades, Hongyan and several sisters of Hongxia took turns to take care of the old mother after the old father left, and the virtue of filial piety and filial piety in the family style has been passed down from beginning to end.
As we talked, Hongxia's second brother's daughter knocked on the door and came in, she took a step back to the island ahead of time, came over and asked her aunt what she wanted to carry home, and she drove in. Only to see Hongyan from the living room floor repeatedly several times to help his niece to move things to the elevator, saying that this is for the mother, that is the son Zhaokun to the uncle and aunt ... Island traffic is still not as convenient as land, they enter the island once, hate can not move back all the items they can buy, not to mention the Spring Festival is coming, there are many things that need to be purchased.
See, such a harmonious big family, its affection is sung with the sound of the waves of the sea, and witnessed by the majesty of the mountains: wordless but deep as the sea; silent but heavy as a mountain.
Originally wanted to sit in their house for a while, the mobile phone came to a call, an old colleague of the unit heard that I was uncomfortable these days, wanted to come to see me, said that it was almost to my home.
(Seaweed dumplings, Daqin Island seaweed)
Hongyan hurriedly filled me with fried fish cubes and seaweed dumplings that I didn't eat much at noon, and filled them all in a packing box for me to eat more when I went home at night. I am not polite, I did not dare to eat more at noon, I want to eat more at night, the food made by this islander is delicious, I am not tired of eating. Eating and taking from the upper family is also the custom of interacting with the classmates on the island for so many years, and they will not let you go empty-handed.
I seem to go back to my childhood when I lived with my parents on the island, and the interaction with the old fisherman's family of the landlord is also like this: "You come and I have a deep love like the sea, and I can't finish the situation of the military and the people!" ”
When he sent me to the elevator, Lao Gu said: "It is still the same as before, after the New Year, when my son Zhaokun comes back to work, he will give you some big food and fish on the island." "I know that it is useless to be polite and prevaricating, and the more you don't let them carry it, the more they think about it, and they even say: Good, good, good!" I also instructed Lao Gu and others to send me a few more small videos and photos of Hongyan steaming and frying fish, and my "Island Dream Hunting" column should show the Spring Festival cuisine in my hometown this year, publicize and publicize Daqin Island, let the fishermen on Daqin Island this year be on fire, and let the people on our island drum up a little more!
One Point Island Dream Hunt