Six months after my grandfather was gone, he finally entered my dream. In the dream, I also knew clearly that he was going to go away, and he was just here to say goodbye. In the dream world, everyone is lively and joyful, vivid and moving, and he walks with a crutch, and looks at us with confused and curious eyes. I walked up quickly, this time without stingyly hugging myself, and I took his arm and guided him to our midst. We didn't have any conversations, he sat in the middle of the crowd, only responsible for watching, and said nothing. I am glad to have such a buffer zone, and I feel relieved and happy.
I always dared not write articles in memory of my grandfather, and I had to write; I was afraid of forgetting, and I was afraid of not being able to forget. Grandpa left last November at the age of 89 and left the house peacefully. After a short stop, the 120 ambulance finished measuring the ECG and left again. Then we contacted the funeral company. First came two morticians, dressed in suits and white gloves, very young men. They removed grandpa's watch on his wrist, and my dad took it with both hands, cramped and uneasy not knowing what to do with it. The young man said, "The old man likes it, he can stay and put it together with the ashes." As soon as this sentence came out, I suddenly froze, and then I couldn't stop the tears, and gradually peeled away from the fantasy that Grandpa was just asleep. The mortician discussed the style of the birthday dress with grandma, and grandma firmly chose the Zhongshan suit, which was the style that grandpa liked before he died. The mortician said that the shou robe has five layers, shirt, shirt, shirt, cotton coat, cotton pants, and coat. There are also matching hats, shoes and socks, covers, and cushion covers. Regardless of spring, summer, autumn and winter, you must wear cotton, from the inside to the outside, you must wear all the clothes of the year.
"89 years old, happy and mournful." The staff either comforted us or talked to themselves. "Blessed is the old man, there is no pain, and he walks very peacefully." They have seen too many accidental deaths, some of whom are still very young. For example, a young man who died in a car accident a few days ago had his face deformed, and it took nearly two hours to sort out his makeup. The shou robe is difficult to put on, and every time you move your body, you are careful, pulling the hearts of your loved ones, causing wave after wave of howling and crying, and there is almost no way to continue.
In the past six months, Grandpa was admitted to the hospital because of a low blood sugar confusion, and although the back was well adjusted, his body has not been as good as before. Like a piece of decaying wood, it suddenly grew old, and there was no room for maneuver. For half a year, I was so busy at work that I often forgot to go to their house on weekends. I called them, Grandma from the old "You young people go busy, don't have to be old." It became, "Come on, come over on the weekend when you're free." "It was Grandma who had a premonition that Grandpa was not in good health, and she was afraid. Me too, I'm particularly afraid of ringing in the middle of the night. One night I was woken up by a harassing phone call in the middle of the night, thinking it was from my grandparents, and after putting down the phone for a long time, my heart beat very hard, and I couldn't sleep.
On the day Grandpa left, I bought him a thermos cup as a gift to see him, full of joy in his eyes. Grandpa was always like a little kid, the last time I went to his house, I gave Grandma a homemade lipstick, and Grandpa stared expectantly at my bag and asked me why I hadn't given him a gift. I rummaged through it for half a day and couldn't find a gadget to comfort him. That time home, I thought about how to bring a gift for my grandfather next time, and then Bought a manual counter on the Internet to make him happy, but I did not arrive on the way to the delivery. Approaching the weekend, I couldn't wait, so I placed an order in Jingdong and bought a thermos cup for my grandfather.
It was a pity that this gift did not wait for his master.
■ unsent gifts
After contacting the funeral home, the four big and small staff sent Grandpa away, and the moment they left the house and entered the elevator, my heart was violently tugged. This time it was really gone, the bed was empty, the residual heat of the quilt was gone, and Grandpa had lived at home for decades, and this time he would not come back. But why are there traces of him in every corner, the clothes thrown on the sofa, the uneaten meals in the refrigerator, the newspaper in the study that has read half of it, the brushes that have not yet dried the ink, the slippers under the bed, everywhere that reminds me that he has not gone away.
The staff arranged all the details of the last trip for Grandpa, set a wreath, wrote a tie, the Grandpa's living room quickly changed its appearance, and the TV that was still lively and lively in the morning was moved to the bedroom. My grandparents prepared their own photos a few years ago and entrusted their children to buy the cemetery. People will eventually leave, plan their own places, but have more calm and relieved. The staff told the family about the funeral and worship items, all kinds of exquisite and taboo, the first seven to seven seven, we all remembered one by one. On the TV cabinet, the posthumous photos were placed, and five large plates of fruit snacks were laid out; the incense burner in the middle was filled with millet and burned with requiem incense; the long lamp was lit, and for three days and three nights, the lamp could not be extinguished, which was a guiding light for the deceased relatives.
My daughter, the great-granddaughter of my grandparents, knelt in front of the statue in a daze. The last time she knelt before her grandparents was last year's New Year's Eve when she collected the money. I am relieved that the tradition of bowing to elders has been preserved so that it is not until the first time when the elders die. When our whole family knelt in front of the statue, my mind kept recalling the scene of my daughter kneeling in front of the two of them laughing and laughing at the New Year's Eve last year. I didn't dare to look at the picture of my grandfather, sadness and relief were intertwined, and I kept my head down when I gave him incense, and tears fell heavily on the ground.
In November last year, the epidemic in other provinces showed signs again, and Xi'an also had a few sporadic confirmed cases, and Beijing was about to convene the Central Committee, and the control policy was tightened. Fortunately, the children from other places have rushed back with great hardships, and the relatives of the grandparents' hometown have also arrived. Grandma, who had been going in and out of the busy schedule, finally lay down on the bed with relief, saying, "Very good, all back." ”
"Let me tell you about your grandfather's life." Grandma said to me. At the funeral the day after tomorrow, I had to write a eulogy, and I would first draft it and then hand it over to my father, second father, and aunt. When I look back on the past, Grandma is smiling, and so am I. When Grandpa was young, he was an old revolutionary who had joined the army and then from Wen, full of spirit and full of arrogance. In 2019, at the age of 87, he received the Medal of Honor for the 70th Anniversary of the Founding of the People's Republic of China, which was the highest praise for his revolutionary career. A person's life, with just 300 words can be summed up, the wonderful length is only more than 100 words, when people return to dust, recall the past life, whether it is a celebrity or an ordinary ordinary person, the past experience is condensed on a thin piece of paper.
■ Old Revolutionary Medal
On Monday morning, before 7 o'clock, all the relatives who worship at home gather to pay their respects and kneel down to bid farewell. After the ceremony, we boarded the scheduled bus and headed to the funeral home. As the eldest granddaughter, I walked in front of the hat, followed by my grandparents' children holding the portrait and urn. There was rain in this forecast, but the sun was out of the blue, and the glimmer of the morning with cool air sprinkled on the body. The funeral home is large, there are many people coming and going, and at this moment, the human grief is common. In front of the crematorium is the last farewell, relatives line up to bow, and the last time to see Grandpa. At that moment, I deeply understood the meaning of entering the mortician, respected this profession in my heart, and the last thing I saw was the peaceful face of my relatives, which was also the last memory left in my heart, which would be kept in the depths of memory for a long time, always remembered, never forgotten. Fifteen minutes after waiting for the cremation, I stood outside the cremation hall, and the memories kept looping in my mind like a movie.
My grandfather and I have always had a good relationship. When he was young, he was open-minded and humorous, like an old child, and often reasoned with me and advised me. When I was in the first grade, he rode me home from school, and I would tell him a lot of funny things that happened at school, and he would plan my birthday party; my childhood was always influenced by my grandfather. When I grew up, I went to their house, and he always bought my favorite snacks and sat early at the door waiting for me. When I got home, he would jump into the elevator and coddle me and tell me to come back quickly. For nearly a year, Grandpa's health is not as good as before, sitting on the sofa every day watching TV and dozing off, the back of his ears is strong, the granddaughter looks at him, he has difficulty understanding the cheerful language of children, but he still enjoys the joy of life. Every New Year's Day, the granddaughter's red envelope is prepared early, which contains new money withdrawn from the bank, and he always has a sense of ceremony.
It's just that this year he can't give him any more money, so we send him money.
Last year, Grandpa was unusually obedient and willing to hang out with us. One day after eating, he pointed to the KTV in front of the house with great interest and said that he had watched young people go in and sing all day and wanted to go and see it. I happily hurried zhang Luo, and grandpa sang several revolutionary songs with pleasure, and he was very angry, and he was a few years younger in an instant. Everybody coaxed him to be happy, he sang a lot, and we made a lot of videos. But I've been afraid to click on the video, and now I don't dare. The only thing that can comfort ourselves is that in this year, we have also gone to several places, and we can also be regarded as filial piety to our granddaughters. On a sunny day during the eleventh holiday last year, Grandpa finally agreed to sit in the wheelchair we bought for him and pushed him to Xingqing Park, where the facilities of the park were very convenient and pushed the wheelchair unimpeded. On that day, he was also very interested and patient, and spent an afternoon with his granddaughter, curiously huddled in the crowd to watch the show. At that time, I didn't dare to look at his back, and I always felt that he could leave at any time.
Grandpa never bothered anyone else in his life. Even when I left, I chose to do it on Saturday afternoon, as if I just didn't bother us. He was dressed neatly, his hair was meticulous, and he lay on the bed and walked quietly. The night Grandpa left, he lit a long lamp. My heart was always beating fast and I couldn't sleep. Afraid that Grandma would be sad, she helped her sleep in another room.
I went to my grandparents' bedroom and sat on the bed and read the photo album, and I didn't feel scared at all, and looking at the title page of a photo album, or the words I wrote to my grandfather in junior high school, I felt the warmth enveloping me. Grandpa's ink for writing brush words has not dried, although he has rarely written in the past six months, he is often confused, half of the writing and then go to find medicine to eat, Grandma told him that he had just eaten not long ago.
I grabbed the brush and wrote a few words aimlessly, jumping out of a familiar scene: Grandpa suddenly grabbed my pen, and as soon as I let go, the pen was pulled into his hand. Grandpa smiled and said that your pen holding position is not right, and the correct posture will not be easily snatched away by people. I laughed, I haven't learned to hold a pen until now.
Sometimes I think about it, Grandpa is 89 years old, and he walks very peacefully, which is not a sad thing. But I was still sad, and when he left, I immediately believed in the afterlife. If so, in the dream I did not skimp on my own hugs, making up for the regret that I was always ashamed to express my feelings in the real world. Grandpa in another world must have received my hug too.
Author | Jade | Literary and artistic female middle-aged