A few days after my mother had done cataract surgery, we received the news that my third aunt had suddenly died, and because we were afraid of tears and hurting our eyes, we sent my third aunt away without my mother.
When I was very young, I can't remember what the festival was, but I knew that it was very cold, firecrackers were set everywhere, and when I was about to eat lunch, my family came to my house with a flower turban, wearing embroidered shoes, flower cotton jackets, flower cotton pants, but very beautiful guests, said that it was my mother's third sister, we honored her third aunt. Since then, I have known that my mother has a sister and that I have a third aunt.
She used a rolling pin to pluck a full (yuαn) horse hoof baked cake and came to my house to visit relatives. At this time of year, we can eat the local specialty brought by the third aunt from her in-laws who are far away (in fact, it is only a dozen miles, and it feels very far on foot) - horseshoe baked cakes, which are sprinkled with sesame seeds, and the surrounding strength is crispy in the middle, and the more chewy it is, the more fragrant it is, and I still drool when I think about it.
The third aunt had a very hard childhood, that was still when she was at her grandmother's house. When Grandpa died early, the five children all survived by relying on Grandma to escape the famine for food, borrow from the East to return to the West, save money and use thrift, tighten the belt of their pants and pull the handle. The most bitter year was the fifties of the last century, chewing on the bark and chewing grass roots are difficult to sustain, grandma only has to take the children to leave the hometown, go to the mountains (Shandong Boshan, Laiwu area) to escape the famine to eat, and the sisters are small, afraid of dog bites, several people pull the dog stick into the same door, even half a piece of dried sweet potato, half a pancake can not be, weak and sick grandmother is afraid of children starving to death, so she moved the idea of selling the child.
The mother and the third aunt were the most obedient and discerning children, and the grandmother wanted to sell them for a few dollars, but the main family saw that the two elves were strange and caused trouble in the future, and only agreed to do small work to help steam steamed steamed buns, eat and live but did not pay the workers, so that the villains left the people behind, and exchanged a pocket of grain, and then gave the youngest uncle and aunt to a lang as a stepchild. In the cry of flesh and bones, which are inseparable and only two are separated, Grandma left her four children and returned to her hometown of Pingyi alone.
It didn't take long, because the third aunt and her mother discussed running together and were heard and told to the main family, worried that they would not be able to keep people when they grew up, they had to throw them out of the door.
On the morning of the fourth day, they carried pancakes and dried sweet potatoes back to Dongweigou Village in Pingyi County.
In order to maintain their livelihood and supplement the family, after returning, they learned to sell steamed steamed steamed buns, and at first they walked the streets and alleys to drink and sell, and after slowly opening the sales channel, the guests ran to the home to queue up to buy, and after that, life gradually improved. After a few years of work, my aunt and uncle also returned, and my mother and third aunt also reached the age of talking about marriage.
At that time, looking for a mother-in-law, there was no dowry, as long as people were honest and responsible, don't be two or two eggs, workers and peasants are the same, and they can't tell who is poor and who is rich, from the sentence "first-level workers, second-level workers, not as good as peasants a ditch", you can imagine what the social background at that time was like.
The mother and the third aunt married successively, and from then on began the life of a peasant woman raising children and children.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the third aunt's family was poor, and she often ate the last meal and the next meal. The uncle is honest and honest, the childhood illness fell to the root of the disease, got the problem of asthma, the health has been not good, at home and outside the home, heavy work and tired work, basically the third aunt to do. With the production team to earn work points, the third aunt is used as the entire labor force, and the male laborers get up early and greedy, pushing the cart to pick up the burden. Nevertheless, throughout the year, the food distributed by the collective is difficult to fill the stomach of the family. In the event of a bad harvest in the year of disaster, you can get a scoop of wheat and half a basket of corn, and the adults are not willing to eat it, leaving it for the children to beat the tooth sacrifice. After the right to land contract management was transferred to individuals, the third aunt soaked in the field almost every day, dealing with crops, planting in spring and autumn, hoeing grass, pinching grain and raising fields, and doing everything in front of others. This year, the harvest was great, the grain warehouse produced by the third aunt was full, the urn was pointed, and from then on, life was not worried, food and clothing were worry-free, and the good life was one step at a time.
Under the careful care of the third aunt, the six children have grown up and established a family one after another, although they are not the dragons and phoenixes among the people, but when it comes to them, everyone they know will extend their thumbs...
And the third aunt is like being held by the stars, but also in the filial piety of the children, happy and happy to spend the old age.
Unexpectedly, on the afternoon of September 13, 2021, the third aunt quietly left silently, ending her 83-year bittersweet and bittersweet life journey.
Heartache is true, but who in the world ends up not taking this path? It is a pity that the good life of the third aunt who is bitter and then sweet has not been enough, and the joy of the children and grandchildren has not been enjoyed enough...
Here, I can only silently bless the third aunt: maybe there are still bumps and thorns on the road to heaven, I hope you will take care of your old age, take care of yourself, and walk through every period of your nostalgia for peace in the world!
(The details of this article are based on the mother's dictation)