Author: Zhu Baoshu
【Idler's Heartwriting】
"Thinking of my mother in the summer heat, unforgettable mother's banana fan". When we were very young, in the years when the family conditions were extremely difficult, in those hot and steaming summer nights with mosquitoes infested, it was my mother's banana fan that kept us cool and sent us to a beautiful dreamland. For decades, whenever it was a hot summer, I would think of my mother's worn-out banana fan. Yesterday, I sorted out the computer documents and accidentally found an article "Mother's Banana Fan" written 11 years ago, and I am now sharing it. Remembering the souls of my parents and older sisters in the sky, not forgetting the difficult and difficult years, remembering the era when the night was not closed and the blind date was harmonious, and remembering the mother's banana fan.
— Epigraph
The temperature lasted 378 degrees, which is rare in decades. The constant heat and we stayed in the air-conditioned room all day without much torture. But when I saw my relatives and friends working sweating under the scorching sun and in the steamer-like store, I felt their hardships and said that they had worked hard. Walking in Willow Bay at night, I saw migrant workers living in low-rise rental houses on the side of the road, setting up pots and stoves in front of the door to cook, eat, bathe, and enjoy the coolness, and I also thought about how relatives and friends who do not have air conditioning at home endure the high temperature at night. At the same time, it reminds me of more than 40 years ago, in that scorching hot season, during the day, my parents and brothers had a shoe stall under the eaves of the street door, using two ropes and two bamboo poles to prop up a shabby bed sheet as an awning, braving the scorching heat and sweating like a rainforest for a day of sewing and repairing shoes, and could only barely earn enough to barely sustain the whole family for one or two porridges. I remembered that in order to let the whole family eat a porridge, she used to borrow two liters of wheat and three bowls of noodles from relatives and neighbors with a basin, and watched us eat while she sat on the side smoking a cigarette rolled with local tobacco leaves and was silent; I remember that on that steamer-like night in the hot season, my mother held the worn-out banana fan that almost never left her hand and fanned our brothers and sisters all night to repel mosquitoes.
When I was a child, my family was extremely poor, and my parents, brothers and sisters, eight or nine people, lived in two and a half thatched houses. Our family lives in Chahe Old Street South Street, which is only five or six meters wide. On a hot day, every day when the sun was just setting west, my father urged us to sweep the ground at the door and carry water to cool down. Make a bed with a plank, a "cool bed" made of rope and a wooden frame, and remove the front and back door panels of your home and erect it on a stool to make a bed. Other families are similar, with all kinds of beds lined up in front of their homes. In addition to the bed, there is also a low dining table at the door of each house, and the porridge basins such as wheat paste or corn paste that have been burned early are placed on the table to cool. There are a few small benches next to the dining table. At that time, our family, like most people, could only eat porridge in the morning and evening, often only two meals a day, and occasionally ate one or two wheat cakes or corn cakes to be unhappy, and eating white flour cakes and white rice was a luxury enjoyment. Despite the hard life, our brothers and sisters have never fought for food and drink, and we have never quarreled for you to eat more and eat less, and we always prefer to eat less by ourselves, but also take the initiative to let our brothers and sisters eat more. During the New Year's holidays, the family occasionally makes a little delicious, parents always want our children to eat more, we also hope that our parents eat a little, the result is always you let me, I let you, and finally even if everyone tastes a little bit, there will never be a person missing. Every time someone in the family celebrates a birthday, even if the parents borrow money, they will make a big bowl of white noodles for the birthday person to eat, and as a result, the birthday person will give you a little bit of noodles, give me a little, and finally it must be divided into many portions, and everyone will not miss a person even if they only eat a mouthful of white noodles. Despite the hardships of life at the time, the family was very happy and happy.
It's like this in our family, and it's the same with our neighbors. Families generally take advantage of the fact that it is not dark to have dinner and save some oil for lighting at night. When eating, it is often Uncle Zhang who comes to the table of Aunt Li's house with a big bowl of wheat paste porridge that can almost illuminate the human figure, bends down and stretches out chopsticks, carefully picks one or two cucumbers with sauce, and says to himself: "It's delicious, it's better than my family......." Li Laosan, holding the empty bowl that he had just eaten, walked to the table of Wang Laoer's house, Wang Laoer picked up the spoon in the porridge basin and served Li Laosan half a bowl of corn porridge. Li Laosan said while drinking, "It's still corn porridge fragrant ......" and the neighbors are like big families.
Our family has a large population, and almost all of the hard work such as grinding batter, making batter porridge, washing dishes, and boiling bath water every day is done by parents, brothers, sisters-in-law, and sisters, and it is not our turn to do it for our younger brothers and sisters. When it was getting dark, my father urged us to line up to take a shower. At that time, bathing was very simple, men, after dark, they turned the back off, stood on a fixed big rock in the backyard, and washed it with water. Ladies, in the bedroom and kitchen, next to the stove, a basin of water and a wooden bucket is a bathroom. My father is a very clean person, and he is the first to take a bath every day, and after taking a bath, he washes his sweaty clothes in the water, and takes them to the river to shop. Mother was the last person in the family to take a bath, because she had to finish all the chores and wait for us to get a chill before she could take a bath. Every day, when my mother was the last to come out of the steamer-like pot house, when she came to the door to enjoy the coolness, she would take out her special banana fan. At that time, our family, including the pu fan, could not reach one per person, although some of them had their names written, they still often took mine and I took yours. But my mother's banana fan is usually not taken, because once she has time to sit down, she must look for that fan, because she wants to use that fan to fan us and repel mosquitoes.
My mother's banana fan has been used for several years, and the edges of the fan have been broken many times, and they have been repaired several times with strips of cloth. At that time, there were no electric lights, no radios, and no televisions, and everyone sat or lay on their own cool beds every day, and some slept on the beds of neighbors and friends, listening to the old people singing old plays, telling jokes, and telling stories to pass the time. There are a lot of mosquitoes at night, and there are very few mosquito nets, and they all sleep in the open air. Generally, there is a reed wood mat on the cool bed, and there are also thin mats, my parents have made up several thin mats on the big bed, and the reed mats on the small cool bed often scratch the skin, and some put a torn clothes or old sheets on the bed. Mother is the last person to sleep in our family every day, the people at the door to tell stories, tell jokes, coax children The sound gradually stopped, and when the snoring came and went, the mother used to walk to the cool bed, help the child cover the sheets, help the child fan a few mosquitoes, and finally lie on the big bed while shaking the fan to fan us, while she also began to rest. We slept every night and didn't go a night without waking up as many times. Either woken up by the crying of the neighbor's child, or woken up by mosquito bites, or woken up by heat, in short, it is impossible to sleep in an air-conditioned room until dawn like now. No matter what time we wake up at night, we will feel our mother's fan constantly fanning, fanning us to repel mosquitoes, and the breeze will make us quickly fall back to sleep. If you wake up and feel that there is no wind, open your eyes and look at the side, in the dark of the night, we must see a spark shining in front of the bed next to the cool bed or in front of the bedside of the bed, that is, the mother is smoking to relieve sleep, and at the same time using the old banana fan to fan the wind and repel mosquitoes.
Decades have passed in the blink of an eye, and the parents have ascended to heaven, and the eldest brothers and sisters have also gone with their parents prematurely, and they are not blessed to live the good life they have now. Although our family now lives a modern life with no worries about food and clothing, I often remind myself: don't forget the difficult years in the past, and don't forget the kindness of my parents, brothers and sisters. We need to do what we can to do for our big family to comfort our parents and deceased relatives in heaven. I miss that era when the house was never closed, peaceful and tranquil, I miss the harmonious living environment of the neighborhood, I miss the brotherhood and brotherhood of brothers and sisters, I miss the parents and brothers and sisters who have endured hardships for us and have long since left us, and I miss our mother and her old man's banana fan that constantly fanned the wind and repelled mosquitoes for her children.
Happiness Fangyuan (Zhu Baoshu)
June 2024
Beijing Kuanxinju
About the Author
Zhu Baoshu, who has worked in the bank for 40 years and has loved words for 50 years, has been working hard for the pen. He has published nearly 100 articles in newspapers, and nearly 10 of them have been included in economic and financial monographs such as "China Financial Library" and "Chinese Financiers on the Reform of Commercial Banks". He has shared more than 300 essays, travelogues, poems, etc. on platforms such as "Huaiwang Literature". Write my heart, remember my deeds, record the beauty, and share the touch.
Related works are recommended
Huai'an eggs entertain the capital
Zongqing, Zongyi, Zong, home
Old Street Four Bridges
Old willow twigs
Tribute to the "chrysanthemum" gardener
Shang-po-hsien
Ten years in Beijing
Thanks for the Chinese New Year
I celebrate my mother's 100th birthday
.用筷八不要
Raise your hand to welcome New Year's Day
It's not easy for young people either
Red Old Street
Mid-Autumn Festival re-ascends the Moon Tower
The water in my hometown is clear, and there are more fish
The teacher, the god in the child's heart
Red Flag Hostel
On the shore of the hanging lake
Birthdays are really unhappy
The reincarnation of reeds
Big brother
Sun Ai's hometown "braised powder skin"
Du Sanye Du Sanniang
The most memorable day activity Halfway through, young parents say to each other that "long" is good
Xunhe Wharf
Walk to count steps
Over the age of sixtieth year, there should be a childlike heart
Cherish "Today"
Hot rancid porridge with leeks
Flowers fall and bloom
My balcony bird's nest eggs blackbirds
Thanksgiving hometown
I smelled the smell of my mother's food and rice
Hometown slate bridge
【Elsewhere】Reed flowers
Listen to the rain
The Mid-Autumn Festival moon is the roundest
Canal rhyme
The hope of picking spring
The joy of autumn
Pick up canal text
In order to better expand the influence of the articles published by this official account, from now on, this official account will be settled in 360 personal libraries, and all works will be automatically synchronized to the lifelong collection of 360 personal libraries. Those who do not agree should not submit, and the contribution will be regarded as a tacit acquiescence to this decision.
The only submission email address for this official account [email protected]
[No longer accept personal WeChat contributions]
Friendly Reminder:
1. Prose and microfiction of more than 1,200 words; Poems are in groups, with no less than five modern poems and no less than ten metrical poems. Please attach a personal introduction and 1 photo within 100 words when submitting. (If there are too many words in the introduction, please delete it by yourself) 2. Please proofread the manuscript by yourself, no typos, the editor is not responsible for proofreading;3. The submission must be original and has not been published in other public accounts, both are indispensable.
You'll look better