Read aloud: Hou Jian
It's been thirteen years since my mother left, but I haven't written a single word about my mother. I don't think sincere emotions can be expressed in words.
Maybe this is just a reason for herself to excuse herself, thinking that it is really ashamed of her old man. But whenever I think of my mother, I don't know what to write. Write about her industriousness? Write her about being kind to people? Write about her toil? Or write about the tribulations that my mother had suffered? These seem to fit in every mother. People my age, whoever mentions their mother, have a very difficult and unusually tough life, and there is not much difference in feeling except for the difference in the story. Therefore, I had to put some words that were similar to others in my heart, and watch other people's words to express my sorrow.
Shame on her old man, not only because of her own excuse, but also because she can write a little text but did not write. And the mastery of these words is all due to the indulgence and tolerance of the mother.
The little mountain village where I grew up was never connected to electricity, and the lighting was made of kerosene lamps, and kerosene was available in limited quantities. Therefore, everyone is not necessary, and most of them do not light the lights at night. But my mother never restricted me from lighting the lamp, because I had a grand-sounding and unapologetic reason—to read a book. My mother did not have much culture, and it was precisely because of this low culture that she was sent back during the three years of natural disasters and took me to the hometown of my father, whom she had never had before. Maybe my mother thinks that as long as there is culture, I can jump out of this small mountain village, and for this reason, my mother has never opposed it, and she is very supportive. Kerosene lamp is transformed with ink bottles, not much oil, soybean large lamp seedlings, in other people's homes may be able to order ten days and half a month, but in my three or two days of the situation, sometimes see the rise, a night a lamp oil is also there. When she added kerosene again, her mother only smiled and said, "People have ink in their stomachs, and your stomach may be full of kerosene." But when the oil bottle was about to bottom, I could still see a faint helplessness and uneasiness in my mother's eyes. At that time, I was young and willful, and who knew that my mother still had to borrow the indicators of other people's homes to buy oil, and who knew that this "borrowing" that came and went was going to suffer from blank eyes. Now I was also afraid of asking people to do things, and at that time I really didn't understand things.
But my mother never blamed me for reading, and the only thing that interfered with my reading was waking up in the middle of the night to see that the lights were still on, gently calling my nickname, and knowing that I was still awake, she stopped caring about me. At that time, my mother was very tired, in addition to taking a few of our brothers and sisters, every day she had to go to the ground to do the same work as the male laborers, from morning to night, after breakfast, after sending us to school, we went to the ground, came back at noon, made lunch and then made dinner, and then went to the ground again, and also raised pigs to feed chickens. While I was still immersed in the joy that books had given me, my mother was already dragging herself to sleep with fatigue. If I shouldn't, she'll have to get up and help me turn off the oil lamp.
Because of my mother's indulgence, I have not changed the problem of staying up late, but I know that my mother at that time was not deliberately indulging, but thinking of being a person with achievements in the future, rather than having to work all day in the barren hillside like her, for a small harvest.
Thirteen years ago, the mother was in a hurry, with no greetings, no warnings, and not even a single child by her side. The nightmare time has been decided by the doctor. Although we are all reluctant to accept this fact, the fact has not changed after all.
At that time, I didn't have a single tear. The first time I shed tears for my mother was more than ten months later, Chinese New Year's Eve. According to custom, photographs of deceased ancestors are enshrined during the New Year, and that afternoon, I gaze at the pictures of my parents and recall the sufferings they endured during their lifetimes, and I can't help but shed tears and can't help myself. And the saddest and most vivid time of crying was actually when attending the funeral of the mother of a good classmate, and that time he cried so much that those who wanted to persuade him could not work and walked away.
Since then, every year at the Chinese New Year's Eve, I have personally placed pictures of my parents. Then he lit incense candles and looked at them, not feeling the tears overflowing his eyes. When the granddaughter first understood things, she once whispered to her wife: "Grandma, what is Grandpa crying?" The wife said, "Grandpa's mother is gone, he misses her." My granddaughter seemed to understand and tried to wipe away my tears with her small hands, but unfortunately she was too young to recite the verse "Thinking of my relatives every festive season", but she could not understand the meaning, nor could she wipe away the regret in my heart for the premature departure of my parents.
But in my heart, the mother did not really leave, whenever the night is quiet, when I am still staying up late, there is always a voice in the faint whispering my nickname, the tone, the tone, it is clear that the mother woke up in a deep sleep, not far away, not hurried, not high, not low, just so I can hear. Did the mother really not leave? Do you really remember that oil lamp that follows my waywardness? Are you still worried about my life?
It's another year of Qingming Festival. Tomorrow is the day to go home and burn paper for my parents, and all I can do now is to burn a pillar of incense and burn a few thin sheets of paper at my parents' graves according to the local custom. Once, an elder of the clan went so far as to say: The elders will not enjoy the paper money burned by the younger generation, but only keep it for safekeeping, and whoever burns it will belong to whom in the future. I listened, and the wooden stick that pulled the paper money in my hand paused for a moment, and I felt that burning the paper money had increased the burden on the parents of the kingdom of heaven. They have paid too much for their children when they are alive, so why can't they worry about leaving?
But what else can we do for our parents? In addition to this, what else can we repay them?
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Author and anchor profile ▼
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About author:Zhang Yutang, a native of Qinshui County, Shanxi, is a member of the Communist Party of China, a member of the Shanxi Provincial Writers Association, a director of the Changzhi Writers Association, and a senior career instructor. His published works include "Laifu" and "Fangdi Yinghua", and many works have won awards.
Anchor Profile: Hou Jian, graduated from Shanxi Media College, worked at the Rong Media Center in Shangdang District.