The scent of grass on the shore of Ma Da Lake
Wen | Liu Jingxin
My family lives by the great lake.
The warm morning sun sprinkled the golden color of a lake, and a few wild ducks were pecking at a few ginkgo leaves that had just floated down. I avoided the crowds of morning exercises on the wide road and strolled alone on the familiar sheep gut path. Somehow I am tired of those beautiful and exquisite artificial landscapes, but I like this quiet and idyllic natural scenery. Soft grass, swaying willow branches, and the lingering smell of grass.
The tributary river in memory has been flowing all year round, with dark incense floating and continuous water flowing, flowing all the way to my house, and then singing all the way to Ma Dahu. The lake is fragrant with herbs, the most fragrant is calamus. I remember when I was a child, the shore of the river was full of calamus. The lush calamus is like a green barrier, which has become a unique and beautiful scenery of the lake area.
In the warm afternoon of the autumn sun, my mother took the scythe, pushed the cart, and set off toward the east lake of the village. I jumped up and down with the small kettle in my hand. I stopped catching a grasshopper for a while, ran to pick a few wild grapes, and let my mother stop and go, shouting my name.
When the lake arrived, my mother pulled out a sturdy "carpet thread" (a thread specially used to sew calamus crafts) from her pocket, tied one of the grasshopper's legs, let me hold it and play with it, and told me a few words. Then, picking up the scythe, I burrowed into the calamus bush that was more than a person tall, only to hear the sound of brushing and pulling pu leaves, and in a moment, a waterway more than one meter wide appeared behind my mother, and the white pupa roots of the brush were scattered on the surface of the water.
I don't know how long later, a green hill was piled up on the trolley. The mother put the strap on her shoulder, clutched the handlebars with both hands, and pushed the cart with a bow, taking a solid step towards the village covered in cooking smoke. I trotted all the way with a few sticks handed to me by my mother, the white flowers scattered by the wind, and with happy laughter, under the blue sky and on the grass, flying with the wind.
In the bright moonlight, my mother, despite her fatigue, used a knife with her father to split the wide soft emerald green leaves and the round and white roots in two. Pu leaves cover the entire patio, and pugen hangs on the steps on the east side of the gate. As a result, the courtyard and the courtyard are filled with a fresh fragrance of grass, refreshing the heart and lungs.
The sun-dried grass became a treasure in the eyes of the mother. She weaves all day and all night, mats, mats, baskets, delicate straw crafts born in her dexterous hands. These sought-after things were exchanged for the family's rations, in exchange for the tuition and stationery of our brothers and sisters. In those difficult years of lack of food and clothing, this ordinary grass became the "life-saving grass" of our whole family. ”
In the great lake of Ma, in the grass, there is an endless happy childhood. At noon in the heat, I made a few friends and sneaked to the lake. We propped up the brisk boat and rowed toward the endless reeds. Round wild duck eggs will be picked up in the shallow waters; there are many hairy crabs in the mud nests around the island, but they must be carefully tentatively reached in; the faint can only go to the lotus canopy on the lake. Water-based prefer to dive to the bottom of the water and dig up some white lotus roots. Hungry, washed in water, taking a bite, crisp raw, sweet silky, more delicious than anything. Back on the shore, the "booty" was sorted and distributed equally, and everyone smiled like a "triumphant" warrior.
How many nights when the fireflies flew, in the wide courtyard behind the house, lying on the fragrant mat, listening to the mother shake the fan to tell the story of Chang'e running to the moon. That wisp of incense, that motherly love, flowed in my heart for a long time.
Calamus leaves are shaped like swords, have a strong fragrance, and have the effect of detoxifying and dispelling evil spirits. Whenever I cut my hand or broke my skin when I cut the grass, my grandfather, who knew Chinese medicine, would always take pu huang and put it on the wound and wrap it with a clean cloth, and in a few days, it would heal. Convenient and cost-effective.
When the teacher's father told me: Calamus is a spiritual grass in the traditional culture of the mainland that can prevent epidemics and drive away evil spirits, and together with orchids, daffodils and chrysanthemums, it is called "flowers and herbs four elegant". Calamus first awakens at the end of winter, hence the name. Calamus is hardy and cold, peaceful, born in the wild is full of life, rich and moist, and the hall is elegant, flowing and handsome, and has been deeply loved by people since ancient times. His father was a man who was indifferent to fame and fortune and had high interests, and he often used the famous sentence of Yang Wanli of the Song Dynasty, "I know what to use in my life, but I have to be clear and beautiful for ten thousand years" to teach me to learn calamus and be a noble and elegant person.
The university was spent in Gangnam. Not far behind the school is a pond overgrown with reeds. Every time I go to the days of calamus, I go there almost every day. Seeing the familiar grass, it is as if you see the tired figure of your mother again; sucking on the familiar incense is as if you heard your mother's kind ding again. At that moment, the thoughts in my heart were as fertile as this grass.
It was another lush summer of calamus, and the seductive scent of Ma Dahu attracted me back to my hometown of morning twilight. As I walked into the courtyard door with my luggage and my tired body, my mother, who was sewing futons with flying needles, looked up at me in surprise: "You, are you really back?" "Getting into college and jumping out of the farm has always been my mother's biggest expectation for me. Holding my mother's rough calloused hand, pointing to the weaving products such as puwo and puti on the ground, I said loudly to my mother: "I want to make your masterpieces into golden food and go to the whole world!" Mother looked at me with a puzzled face and stared at me like a madman. In my mother's eyes, these cheap straw woven things can be exchanged for a few pocket money.
Can you blame your mother? In my mother's strange eyes, I read helplessness and responsibility. The 800-year-old craftsmanship and the rich wetland resources of the lake area have not changed the hard and poor days of the villagers for generations. The grass willow handicrafts that the villagers have painstakingly woven, environmentally friendly and practical, are either inexpensive due to several changes in hand, or slow to sell and hoard due to outdated styles. Having studied marketing, I seem to see business opportunities from a leaf and the hope of my hometown taking off.
I don't know when it began, more than a dozen new stores, a room, a computer, and a person have sprung up on the east-west street, known as "Taobao stores". My shop was in the south house on the street side of my house, and for a few days after it opened, my mother was sullen and unhappy, and she didn't believe how much the invisible store could sell. Until one day, an order from Shanghai made her heart flutter. A futon that used to cost a few dollars, now costing 25 yuan, orders 200 pieces at a time.
Beijing, Xi'an, Canada, the United States... Orders flew from all directions and all over the world to the shore of Mada Lake and flew to this ordinary street. From sofas and coffee tables to flower baskets and toys, exquisite grass and willow handicrafts have entered the city and countryside and thousands of households. A veritable "Chinese Taobao Village" was born.
A calamus changed the fate of the villagers and changed the trajectory of my life. Mother laughed, and so did I.
Touching the soft emerald green pu leaves, sucking on the thick pu incense, facing the turquoise water of the lake, I seem to see the leaves of the pupa in the morning glow turn into a golden phoenix that spreads its wings and flies, flying, flying, flying to the vast blue sky!
About author:Liu Jingxin, a native of Boxing, Binzhou, is a senior chinese teacher. He is a member of the Shandong Prose Literature Association, the Binzhou Writers Association, and the Beijing Miniature Novel Research Society. There are essays, novels, newsletters scattered in "Shandong Education News", "Yingchunhua", "Shandong Business Daily", "Bohai", "Lubei Evening News", "Dongying Daily" and other newspapers and periodicals, as well as Qilu One Point, learning to strengthen the country and other platforms. His works have been selected into "Selected 300 Selected Essays of Contemporary Chinese Prose" and "Biennial Selection of Yellow Sea Essays". Many works have won literary essay awards at all levels, and the essay "Unforgettable Childhood Lantern" won the third prize of the first Yellow Sea Prose Biennial Selection: the essay "A veteran's home and country feelings" won the 2021 Binzhou City Celebration of the Centenary of the Founding of the Party Theme Literature Essay Excellence Award: The essay "Poverty Alleviation Strong Woman and She Got Dayu'er Xiaoyu'er" won the 2021 Binzhou "Party Emblem Shines on My Heart" Essay Excellence Award. May life be recorded in words and illuminated with literature.
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