Grandma and her combing mirror box
Ningbo University of the Elderly Literature Society Zhou Xueqing
As a child, I remember my grandmother having two wooden combing mirror boxes, one brown and the other jujube red inlaid with white patterns. The mirror box is about eight inches long, five inches wide, and no more than four inches high. The lid is double-layered, with hinges at both ends, one end is connected to the mirror box, the other end is connected to the two-layer lid, and the inner layer is equipped with a mirror, which is opened in a herringbone shape on the mirror box, and the mirror surface is just right to illuminate people.
There are also two drawers on the lower level of the mirror box, and the outside of the drawer is equipped with a round bronze piece as a handle, half of which is fixed and the other half can be shaken. In the drawer, comb tools such as small wooden combs, bone combs, grates, long and short bone needles are enlarged, and hairpins, bun covers, hair forks, hair ropes and the like are also placed. A small mirror box with everything you need. There is also a mirror in the mirror box, and after the head is combed, the two mirrors can be reflected back and forth until they are satisfied.
Grandma lived in a small town ten kilometers away from the city, and her old man was very fond of cleanliness, and she remembers that at that time, she often repeatedly told us not to sit on the bed during the day, for fear of soiling her bed. At that time, most people used this white earthen cloth, and the sheets, quilts, and pillows on Grandma's bed were always white all year round, and when we left, she would definitely remove and wash the bedding and so on that we had slept on.
And the things outside the home are placed very organized, not to mention the room, that is, the broom between the stove, a pair of shoes worn when the back garden goes to the field (the so-called "field" is just a little open space by the river behind the house), it is also placed in a fixed position, saying that there is no need to look for it when it is used. For the two mirror boxes that have always accompanied me, I especially cherish them.
Grandma's combing mirror box was placed on a table in the Ming Xuan room. Every day, after the old man got up and washed up, she first burned tea, and after offering morning tea in front of the bodhisattva, she recited the sutra for at least half an hour. After doing the morning's "homework", I sat comfortably at the table and opened the mirror box and began to slowly comb her long, dark hair. Grandma's hair was so bright that she died of a stroke at the age of seventy, and she couldn't find a trace of white hair on her head.
Grandma is very precious to these two mirror boxes, normal to keep clean needless to say, there is a small bamboo brush broom, specially used to wash combs and grates, can not be combed with a hair and dirt. The combing tools inside the mirror box are also placed in an orderly manner, she said, so it is easy to pick up. When I was a kid, I used to fiddle with the case and the contents and think it was fun (actually, there were no toys in the childhood of our generation.) ）
I remember that one of the drawers contained some gadgets: a glass fake diamond, a copper snuff bottle, a broken brooch, an empty medicine bottle, and a few glass beads, all of which were useless, discarded but discarded. When I am bored, I often take them out and play, especially the fake diamond of the size of the bayberry, the shape is indeed a imitation diamond: one side is pointed and conical, the other side is multi-sided, and when it is brought to the sun, the prism will emit multicolored light, which is very beautiful.
Unfortunately, once when I took it to play in the alley outside the house, I fell to the ground by mistake, and unfortunately rolled into the crack of the stone slab, and then my grandmother asked the neighbor boy Bang to pry up the stone slab, but finally did not find it, and it was estimated that it was trapped in the sludge of the gutter. In addition to regretting it, my grandmother was very angry and said that I was always a troublemaker, a troublemaker. Although I was frustrated by my grandmother's rebuke, I was a little reluctant inside: just a piece of glass, as for this! Many years later, I realized that my grandfather had died before I was born, and my grandmother cherished this family, and had always pursued integrity for everything in the family, and could not tolerate a little defect, so she would go to the public to seek people for a worthless piece of glass.
Although my grandmother hurt my eldest granddaughter very much, every time she went to the house, her old man was always happy to take out dried rice cakes, fried beans and the like to eat, once there was really no snack, immediately built a fire to cook a bowl of rice cake soup, there was an egg lying on it, she sat across the table and smiled at Mimi watching me eat. In spite of this, if I make a mistake, she will never tolerate and connive, saying that children cannot lack tutors and go out to make people laugh, but I always make her old man sad and angry.
Once I found a small ball of velvet thread from the cupboard, and then secretly took two bone needles from the mirror box and ran outside to play with the wool, because the heart was hidden in the clothes and ran out, and the wool and bone needles were lost. That time Grandma really got angry, saying that although the bone needle is not valuable, it has been used for decades and has been very smooth and smooth, how can the new one be compared? Sure enough, the bone needle that my mother bought from Ningbo later had a rough and dull surface, a sharp head, and it was extremely uncomfortable to use.
The loss of the needle made me feel so sorry that decades have been unforgettable. After all, this bone needle was originally placed in the drawer of the mirror box, and I finally with the consent of her old man, it was wrong to take it out privately to play, and as a result, I lost it, to know that this mirror box and everything inside has accompanied her old man through decades of ups and downs, how can I not cherish and miss it.
Combing mirror boxes are indispensable items in Grandma's daily life, but there is one more indispensable thing: the sticky nipple tank. Sticky nipple tanks are generally made of hammer, round or oval, about two inches high, and contain sticky sap.
The so-called sticky milk, in fact, do not know what kind of tree pole, with carpentry planing into wood flowers, take this shavings in the jar soaked in water, soon this shavings will become sticky, but also emit the fragrance of trees. This shavings water is generally called sticky milk, with an old toothbrush dipped in sticky sap shabu hair, the hair is both shiny and disorderly. In the old days, women from poor people's families used it instead of hair oil. This sticky nipple jar is normally placed together with the combing mirror box.
Sticky milk can be dirty and smelly after a few days, especially in summer, so it must be re-brewed with shavings often. At that time, the town where my grandmother lived did not sell it, and there was a shop in the city that sold this kind of shavings. The shop sells the shaved strips of shavings into a small roll, which is very cheap, and one roll is only one or two cents. At that time, my grandmother often told us not to forget to bring a bag of "shavings" when we went.
Whether it is a mirror box or a sticky nipple tank, it has been eliminated decades ago, and now if there is, I am afraid that it is worth a hundred times and is treasured as an antique. The years are like flowing water, decades have passed, grandma has long passed, but her old man's kind smile and the two mirror boxes have been deeply remembered in this life.
The years are like songs, and the classics last forever
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