Today my uncle went out of the funeral. An ordinary farmer, ordinary to some relatives do not necessarily know his name, from this dust to dust, soil to the soil, back to the embrace of nature, eternal death in the transfer of stars and moons and the change of seasons, life is fixed at a certain moment in his 74 years and a certain month, a snowy day in the winter of 2022: January 26 of the solar calendar, the twenty-fourth day of the lunar month. Buried three days later on the same day with heavy snowfall.
For my uncle, there was no event that could have been specifically recorded, but his death made me particularly sad. Maybe it's because of our deep affection for blood, or maybe it's because people in middle age understand that they are as ordinary as he is. What particularly touched me was the misery he had tasted in the same life. He grew up poor, did not enjoy much happiness, but also to do farm work, with younger siblings; when he was growing up, he experienced the 60s of the last century and experienced the taste of extreme hunger; after he became an adult, his family was poor and almost unable to start a family, and he had to sacrifice the lifelong happiness of one of my aunts, he turned to his daughter-in-law, and he also had to work hard to feed and support a family of six in the soil; after the children became a family, the wife was sick and could not take care of herself, and the son and daughter-in-law went out to work to earn money, and also had to take care of grandchildren and family affairs—— That was the norm for years before he was diagnosed with cancer. His life was busy and endless, it can be said that he had worked hard all his life, and he did not enjoy a day easily. His life was barren, he had never eaten the delicacies of the South China Sea and the North, did not wear beautiful clothes, did not visit the great rivers and mountains of the motherland, and did not even go far, and the life path was basically within a few miles around the village. The farthest place I went was where I lived now, but I was not out of the province. He has no power and no power all his life, and he will also be bullied by rural scoundrels. Because of the deception of unscrupulous matchmakers, his eldest daughter betrothed to a poor family member. Later, I heard that the boy was not diligent and self-motivated, and his widowed mother had a bad reputation in the village and wanted to retire. The man went to his house every day to make trouble, threatened to kill people and set fires, and had no choice but to marry his family. After marriage, the eldest son-in-law is the most infuriating. His family was poor and white, just taking care of food and clothing, but a few acres of thin fields were not easy to take care of. Other men go out to work to earn money, he does not go. Sister Lobby is also often bullied by her husband's domestic violence and mother-in-law. Sister Lobby was beaten to run away from home to work, and was found by the rogue man who tried every means to find him and work to support him. He slept in the rental house as a man. The house that has been married for more than 20 years has not been renovated, resulting in the son's elderly inability to marry his daughter-in-law. If I dare to say divorce, I will come to the door and kill my uncle's family.
His life will make people doubt the meaning of life. This makes me very sad to think about it.
But he should also have happy moments, right? Otherwise, what did he rely on to survive the toils of adulthood and the successive unsatisfactory? Will you still be nostalgic for life after discovering cancer, knowing that the children's burden is very heavy, still do not give up treatment, and travel between city and county hospitals many times for more than a year, until you die on the hospital bed?
He should be a happy husband, right? My aunt, who was also a bitter child who had lost her father and remarried with her mother since childhood, heard that she had a good relationship with him. As can be seen from the fact that they have four children, their married life should be happy and satisfying. With four children, three daughters and one son, he should be a happy father, right? His youngest child, my little cousin, had heard that some waywardness should have something to do with his spoiling. Although the marriage of the eldest daughter is not too satisfactory, and the second daughter marries a husband with a slight disability, but when the children bring their grandchildren together, he should be a happy grandfather, right?
Because I grew up living in another place, I didn't have much to do with him. However, because my father was very affectionate and had a lot of contact with him, my relationship with him was not unfamiliar. He was also very affectionate, and over the years he asked his sons and daughters to visit my father. When our sisters and brothers went to his house, their lives were obviously not rich, and when the money was still relatively valuable 30 years ago, my aunt would take out a hundred yuan bill when they met, indicating that they were not stingy people. But his life was visible to the naked eye and was very embarrassing. The family is surrounded by disciples, and the children have not received a good education and have their own families. Each had a hard time. Basically, every family has left home to work in the south, and some families have experienced accidents such as car accidents and physical injuries, and they have come to a very poor place. Since I was a child, my impression of him is that he wore dirty and tattered clothes from winter to summer, from young to old. When he was 71 years old, he told my father that he had never been far in his life and offered to come to the place where I lived. It just so happened that my mother-in-law was sick, and my father took him to visit my mother-in-law first, and then brought him to play with me for a day. When I arrived, I found that the clothes he was wearing were still dirty, and my father couldn't help but sigh that he went out to his niece's in-laws' house to visit relatives, why didn't he change his clothes, and said that if he knew, he would bring his clothes to him. It shows that he has changed clothes less, and second, he is too tired to clean up. I showed him the famous sights and invited him to eat some delicacies. I wanted him to stay a few more days, and he said that my aunt still needed someone to take care of at home, and went back with my father early the next morning. He also brought me a box of eggs when he came, presumably for many days. Later I went to see him, and he was going to bring me something back, and I never wanted it. His son and daughter-in-law have been working outside for many years to earn money to support their three children, and the other daughters have gone through their own families, and the family has difficulties and cannot give him much support. He is more than 70 years old, and he has to take care of his sick wife, his grandchildren, and his family affairs, and he has to get a little thing, which is already a lot of effort, and I can't bear to take him away. After learning that he was sick, I took him some money to talk about his heart. Because of the repeated epidemics, I did not see him in time. When the epidemic is not too tense, but think that his illness will not develop quickly. Unexpectedly, between the repeated epidemics, but for more than a year, he was not able to carry the disease and pass away. As a niece, I mean nothing more than that to him. It makes people feel sad to think about it, and I don't know why life has come.
He was my father's brother, and his death made me realize that my father was also an old man in his 70s, and even more surprised to realize that the relatives around me were more and more withering, and the elders gradually disappeared from my life and were never seen again... As I grew older and older, I began to experience one life and death after another. A cute, respectable smiley face began to remain only in my mind, making me trance into the reality of the past. Skywalker is constant, never changes, only people change. Man is as small as dust in the long river of history. "What does life look like everywhere? It should be like a Phenom stepping on slush. Occasionally left finger claws on the mud, Hongfei that recounts things? "The number of people who remember me and the people I remember are decreasing, and gradually I will return to dust and earth until I am lost in the long river of history, as if I have never come to the world."
Ordinary peasants like my uncle may not remember much more years from now, as if I don't know my grandfather's name now.
Today, at least I remember him, my uncle, who came, lived, loved this world, who walked through my life... He hadn't been so quickly lost in the shift of things.
His death made my anxious heart calm down a little, thinking more about what I wanted, what I could want, what I should cherish, and what I should do. In this way, he means more to me than I mean to him.
May the gods bless his soul! May he rest in peace!
2022.1.28