Wild ginger flowers
Wen 丨 Lin Qingxuan
Walking in the Tonghua Market, a breath of fresh air suddenly flew out of the crowd, making people feel refreshed; following the incense, I found an old man selling flowers selling wild ginger flowers he had picked from the mountain, each with five flowers and ten yuan.
The old man said that his family lived on the hillside, and when he went out to plant every day, he always had to pass through the slope with wild ginger flowers, and he never felt that wild ginger flowers were precious. I just think this flower has a special fragrance. This autumn, he was tired of farming, took a nap next to the village, and when he woke up, he found that he was full of aroma, and the fresh air was particularly sweet. The old man thought: This kind of fragrant flowers growing in the field, maybe some people like it, so he cut a hundred wild ginger flowers to Tonghua Street to sell, always sold out in an hour, the old man said: "There are many people who love flowers in Taipei, and it is better to sell flowers than to farm!" ”
I bought ten handfuls of wild ginger flowers, thinking of this lovely old man, and remembering that the people who bought wild flowers may love flowers, and there may be a sweet memory buried in them; it is like listening to an old song, the song has gone away, the sound is left, every time I listen to the old song, I think of those friends who sang an old song together, their nebula scattered, making those old songs more profound.
The first time I knew the cuteness of wild ginger flowers was an experience many years ago, when we were walking in Muzha Drunken Dream Creek, and a young girl told me: "The flowers of wild ginger flowers are like small white butterflies parked on green trees, and the leaves of wild ginger flowers are like boats, ready to sail far away." "Then we sat together on the bridge and floated a petal of the plucked wild ginger flower down the stream, like a butterfly dancing; throwing the leaves into the stream, and going with the stream, it was like a green boat. The girl also told me: "Men with hazel eyes are doomed to wander." Then we said goodbye softly and never saw each other again.
Nowadays, the years fly like butterflies and flow like boats, and I have spent a long period of wandering years, leaving only the happiness of wild ginger flowers in the autumn of each year. Later, I lived on Muzha Mountain, just behind the house there was a deserted hut, in the spring the moon peach blossoms hung like a string of crystal white pearls, and when the autumn wind blew, the white elves of wild ginger flowers flew in the wind. I often sat alone at the foot of the decadent wall, and when I sat down, I felt that the mood of autumn could be described by two poems: "At the end of the song, no one is seen, and there are several greens on the river." ”
Memories are like flowers, and warm memories are like flowers, which will be released in the cold night sky.
I put the wild ginger flowers I bought in a huge clay pot, and the hut was entangled with aroma, and when I went out, the aroma was like dragging a tail far away, and when I went far, I followed. I thought that even such a small thing as buying flowers has many valuable experiences.
Once I was going to catch a train to see a friend from afar, in front of the train station was stopped by a child selling daffodils, insisting on asking people to buy flowers, I bought a large bouquet of daffodils, I didn't expect that the bouquet of daffodils would become the best gift, and my friend mentioned the bouquet of daffodils every time he came back, saying: "I didn't expect you to be so hearty!" ”
Another time I was going to see an elder woman who had had a beautiful and glorious time when she was young, and when I walked into the alley, I suddenly had a clever move and went back to the flower shop to buy a bouquet of roses, a total of nine flowers. I said, "Youth lasts forever." She said, "No one has sent me roses for more than ten years. After saying that, she sobbed softly, I almost in this mood to see the years creeping like cat steps, silently and quietly walking by, two weeks later I went to see her, those roses are still not exhausted, it turned out that she put the roses with the vase ice in the refrigerator, trying to catch the end of youth, it is painful to see.
Every day when I go to work, I will pass by Fuxingfu Road, just on the fast lane of Fuxing South Road and Nanjing East Road, there are often some people selling magnolia flowers, there are children, there are girls, there are middle-aged women, they will string four magnolia flowers into a string, when the car passes by, knock on your car window and say: "Sir, buy a string of fragrant magnolia flowers." "It makes it a habit for me to buy a bunch of magnolia flowers every day, and I like the feeling that someone knocks on the car window and sells you a bunch of flowers, and then the ends of the world are wrong, as if walking through a rural road, along the road is full of flowers and birds."
The most impressive one was a trip to Dong'ao Township in the east, where all the cars on the Suhua Highway had to be mistaken. There was a little mountain boy with a pair of big eyes selling wild lilies he had collected from the mountains, and the lilies that bloomed in the mountains were particularly small and emitted a faint fragrance. I bought all the wild lilies, sat at the coastal window, looked at the blue of the distant sea and the whiteness of the lilies in front of me, and suddenly arose the idea that these lilies were very lonely in the deep mountains, and only when someone appreciated its beauty and its fragrance increased the meaning of its existence, and even the best flowers bloomed in the mountains, if they were not seen, they were thankful, which detracted from its beauty.
Therefore, I am always grateful to those who sell flowers, they and I are not acquainted, because with the flower soul, we can have a spirit at any time and place, and the little handful of flowers comes from the power of having it.
When we are walking at will, we meet people who sell flowers, maybe spend very little money to buy a handful of flowers, sometimes keep them for their own appreciation, sometimes give them to friends, no matter how to deal with it, it will always be worth the price!
Lin Qingxuan, a famous writer and essayist, was born in 1953 in Qishan, Kaohsiung, Taiwan Province, and graduated from the World Journalism College in Taiwan.