The mother of a ninety-year-old soldier pays tribute to the motherland
Parents are here, and there is still a place in life. When your parents go, there is only one way back in life. ”
Frankly, this sentence has not really touched my nerves until today.
On February 21, 1977, the fourth day of the first lunar month in the Year of the Snake, his father passed away. It was the most sad Spring Festival for the whole family.
During the day, the family was heartbroken to handle the funeral, and at night they had to take off the green veil when they came home, and they had to endure sadness in the face of their grandmother who was paralyzed in bed. My father was sick and hospitalized for more than a year, and he would go home to see his grandmother for almost ten and a half days, and this time he had not been home for a long time. Grandma watched incredulously as we hurried in and out, muttering, "What's wrong with your dad?" "I'll be discharged from the hospital in a few days!" We coaxed her.
Later, grandma seemed to sense something, and she slumped against the head of the bed, staring blankly at us with puffy, cloudy eyes, and stopped asking.
The following summer, Grandma also died. She didn't know to her death that her baby was gone.
The fall of this big tree of father is undoubtedly a fatal blow to the happy extended family that was once happy and harmonious. In her memory, my mother was in poor physical condition at that time, her stomach was not good, and she often got up in the middle of the night to vomit. There are also gynecological diseases, people look thin and haggard, completely without the charm of "Zhao Fat" when they were young. I am the boss, returned to the city to work in the factory for less than a year, the monthly salary of 21 yuan. Two younger sisters work on Zhiqing Farm, three younger siblings go to school, and the youngest brother is less than eight years old. I will never forget that scene: at the memorial service, my mother took our six children to the podium of the commercial auditorium, bowed three times in front of the portrait of my father, and the thousands of participants in the food system immediately cried...
When my father was alive, his greatest wish was for his children to read more. His sudden death made everything come to naught. In order to make a living, the three sisters replaced, to the large collective to the large collective, even the fourth sister under the age of 16 also dropped out of school and entered the factory as an apprentice. I could only give up the opportunity to go to college at my fingertips, transfer from the company to my mother's side, and be in the same boat with my family.
Life has to go on. The forty-seven-year-old mother, who earns a monthly salary of more than sixty yuan, pulls six children, starts from scratch, and sets sail with difficulty.
Five years, ten years, twenty years, forty years, time flies. Everyone in the old Liu family is sailing against the current and forging ahead. The mother worked hard to raise several children to adulthood, and twenty years after her father's death, she married Zhang Bo of Chengdu as a good friend of Qin and Jin. Without their father's protection, the six siblings became stronger and more independent, each working hard to create a world and blossoming fruit, turning the former family of nine into a big family of four generations.
It felt like for at least twenty or thirty years, and I had been on the road. Work, get married, have children, work hard... Every day is spent in anxiety and tension, and the breathing and stability of expectation is always out of reach. Sometimes I was so busy that I forgot my son, and I didn't think much about my mother. What was she doing when she was alone? Is she lonely? Is she doing okay? Does she need help? I really don't have the energy to think about it. I only remember that when I was pregnant with a child, A person lived in a backyard bungalow of the Municipal Party Committee's Ministry of Agriculture and Industry, and my mother sent a small bowl of three-seven steamed chicken at night; when the child had a high fever, the mother would rush to the hospital at the first time; after a long time, the mother would call to "straighten out the hemp".
Strange to say, when my father was alive, my mother was often sick and ill. As soon as my father left, my mother was like a new person, except for one year when the pain of sudden ureteral stones was unbearable, and I was in the hospital for a few days, I never collapsed. When I was a child, I asked my mother if it hurt to get an injection? It doesn't hurt, it's fine in a moment. Growing up asking a mother if it hurts to give birth to a child? It doesn't hurt, and it comes out with a little effort. In my eyes, my mother seemed to have a high "pain" point, and nothing could hurt her and crush her. It may seem a bit exaggerated to describe it lightly, but it can be taken and put down, perhaps it is the "secret book" of the mother laughing at the ordeal all the way forward.
In my subconscious, the parental authority of the old Liu family is on the father, and the mother is just "Mommy", although she is in charge of financial power. I have always feared my father because I knew his majesty was irresistible. I showed my goodness to my father and vented my willfulness to my mother. I remember when I was in elementary school, I would often rush out of the house in the early morning for the sake of my mother's "harsh reprimand" and not eat breakfast, and then I would receive boiled eggs passed by my mother through the homeroom teacher between classes.
It wasn't until after my father's death, until I understood things, until I had time to calmly look back at life, that I began to look carefully at the mother who gave birth to me and raised me, an old man who had entered the old age.
Compared with the dazzling military merit badge on her father's body, my mother did not have much aura except that she had been a cultural instructor at the Naval Aviation School for a few years. After changing careers, he worked as a clerk for a lifetime, his salary was not high, he loved to nag when he was young, his hands were tight and frugal, and he loved to save money when he was old. But it is such an ordinary woman, in the years of up to twenty years, alone to pull several children into adulthood, one by one to start a family to get married and have children. She can not only withstand the noise of a weekend family reunion, but also withstand the loneliness of a long night of sleeping alone, and can also play with a group of friends in pain, and the taste of sour, sweet and bitter can be imagined. But that's how my mother came! A small old clerk, an old demobilized soldier with a meager pension, in the face of a group of children who are chattering and quarreling, and the days when others seem to be miserable, they quietly came over! How many stories should there be!
Two words came to my mind— "faith." If a person can not be afraid of hardships, endure hardships, be optimistic and open-minded, he must have "faith" in his heart.
Six children are the mother's beliefs and hopes. Whether the child is around or not, the mother's heart is always worried, and the mother's eyes are always staring. The child's hard work is the mother's pride; the child's understanding is the mother's pride. The child is out, that is the medal hanging on the mother's chest! Piece by piece, it hung heavily all over her mother's body, emitting a huge aura, full of the world's highest reward for her mother!
Parents are "umbrellas", "harbors" and "faith" to us. When we were young, our parents were an umbrella to shield us from the wind and rain, escorting us, and having our parents covered, carefree and fearless. Growing up, my father was gone, and my mother became the only harbor. Tired, go in to rest, bitter, go in to complain, grievances, go in and cry. In life, parents are a kind of faith, the heaven in your heart, the God in your heart. Whether you admit it or not, in your bones, the most trusting, loyal and revered ones are your parents. You can guard against anyone, but you don't need to be defensive against your parents, because they are the only beings in the world who will not harm you.
Mothers are also human, and there will be entanglements and confusion. But at the critical moment, the balance of the mother's heart will eventually fall to the blood and affection, and no force can change it!
All things are from heaven, and man is from his ancestors. If one day, the ancestors are gone, the "faith" will disappear with it, leaving only loneliness.
Let us hold up this "faith" together, and live forever.
（2020.11）
Mother wears a badge for the 70th anniversary of HNA
Commemorative medal for the 70th anniversary of the founding of HNA
Mothers use their mobile phones to chat with their children and grandchildren