Grandma's small mountain village

Sometimes I dream of returning to this place, which is really a very remote village, at the junction of Yiyang, Changde and Huaihua. No matter which city I come from, it's a long, long way. Many young memories have been blurred, but they are particularly clear here. It may be that I often catch fish in Qingxi in front of my house, and I also saw my grandfather's unexpected death when I was a child, so the memories here are both beautiful and bitter.

When I was a child, my grandmother's house was a far place. Although the straight-line distance from my home may be more than 20 miles, at that time, I drove for more than three hours in the deep mountains and forests because of the bad roads and many bends and slopes. I was carsick when I was a child, so it was hard to go there. When I was young, I went to the mountain road with my parents. I had to climb a very high mountain and pass a Taoist temple called Qingyun Temple. It took me half a day to get there. At that time, I was still young, and sometimes I had to be coaxed by my parents to walk a long way. My mother once said that my grandmother was young when she immigrated. She asked my grandfather: Go straight to the mountain. When are you going? Finally, I came to the end of the valley before I stopped. I remember going to my grandmother's house to pay a New Year call one winter. Just after it snowed, Chu Qing set off. The snow at the foot of the mountain melted, but there was still a lot of snow when we walked down the mountain. In the shade of the mountain, when I came down, it was a cold road. Everyone took off their shoes and climbed down in socks.

Later, I went to my grandmother's house by bus. At that time, the shuttle bus only went to the township government once a day, and then it had to walk ten miles. The shuttle bus turns in the valley. I usually get carsick in less than ten minutes. If you sit behind the bus, you will feel people hanging outside the road when you turn, and there is a cliff 100 meters high under the road. A few years ago, my father bought a tractor to save money, so that we could drive the tractor ourselves. Although it is very cold to drive a tractor in winter, fortunately, you won't get carsick if you don't walk. I especially like riding my father's tractor. There is a paddy field in front of grandma's house, and the gate faces the entrance of the valley. Every time I go to my grandmother's house, I can see her from a distance. If we drive a tractor, grandma can see us from a distance right at the door, and there was no telephone at that time, but we also know that we will go to pay a New Year call a few years ago and grandma is waiting for us.

Grandpa is the boss, as if he had four brothers. Every time he visits New Year, several grandfathers visit New Year. He is very prestigious in the village, and he is very strict in his impression, but he is very kind to me. Grandma is a very kind person. She is very enthusiastic about people. Every time she eats, she will give you a lot of dishes and fill your bowl with delicious fish and meat. That year, my father and I took a tractor to my grandmother's house to pay New Year's greetings. I sit next to my father. It is still dangerous to sit next to a tractor with a long front, but I really like the feeling of driving next to it. Driving on the road, a car behind said that several big screws were dropped on the road and asked if they were dropped in our car. Father stopped to check and found that three of the four screws on the rear wheel were missing. We didn't know it at that time, so we stopped at once, looked back for the next screw and put it back. This delayed for more than an hour. When we got to grandma's house, grandpa had already finished lunch and went to the back mountain to clear the way. No sooner had I parked the car than I heard someone shout that Grandpa had an accident on the mountain. I didn't even enter the house, so I ran directly to the back hill with my father. On the way, I saw everyone carrying grandpa out on a stretcher. Grandpa's head was covered with blood and bandaged with gauze. He saw me and called my name and said, Hongfeng, come here. This is the last time I saw my grandfather. If the car hadn't broken down that day, we could have arrived at my grandmother's house at lunch time, and my grandfather would have accompanied me instead of going up the mountain to clear the way, so the accident wouldn't have happened. So in my memory, there are always indelible regrets, as if somehow, there was a force that made all this happen, and Grandpa left forever.

Probably because there is no stream near my home, I especially like to go to my grandmother's house every summer vacation. The door of my grandmother's house is the source of the gurgling stream, which is very clear and flows all the year round. When you sleep at night, you can hear the sound of the stream, as well as the calls of birds and wild animals on the mountain. It's cold here at night and in summer, so you need to cover yourself with a quilt. You can catch fish, crabs and swim in the stream during the day. The water is not deep either. There are some ponds washed out at the corners of some streams, less than one meter deep, so there is no need to worry about safety. My two sons and I often catch fish here together. To catch fish in a stream is to use a dustpan. You can put it under some stones, or you can put a fence around it and drive the fish to the exit. Put a dustpan there to catch some fish. A few times, we went back to this stream and played all the way up the valley. Of course, catching fish is only a sideline, mainly to release cattle. Grandma has a big buffalo, and its black horn is almost round. The buffalo is a female, very docile and has a wide back. There is no problem in having three children sit on her back. There is also a small buffalo that is much more naughty when it is a few months old. It often goes to other people's vegetable fields, so be sure to look after it. Once, we were herding cattle in the valley, and suddenly it began to rain, so we hurried home. I sat on the back of a big buffalo and ran with it. My cousin sat on the little buffalo. The little buffalo was not used to being ridden. It ran so fast that it almost fell. We flew all the way home.

In fact, this is the most reluctant memory. Because of the mother's genetic disease, the two sons were paralyzed in bed before they were 30 years old. My cousin died of complications in his thirties. My cousin died in a fire when he was warming himself in his canteen downstairs last winter. I remember their lively figures as children so clearly, and then I happened to be studying and working outside when they were sick. I seldom go home, so I seldom see them. In recent years, because I drove home for the New Year, every time my mother would say, "Let's drive to grandma's house for the New Year, and our family will go to grandma's house together." I don't know what to say every time I see my cousin. Although he is completely sane, he can only sit in his canteen all day. Grandma is almost ninety years old, and her uncle is over sixty. Because their two children are paralyzed, neither of them has lived a quiet life, and now they have lost it one after another, and my uncle doesn't know the meaning of the rest of his life. These are two old people in that remote mountain village.

Grandma has seven children, the oldest two are daughters, and my mother is the second, so I have five uncles and a big aunt. My aunt teaches outside, my third uncle is a doctor, my second uncle is a civil servant of the local government, my fourth uncle runs his own wood processing factory, and the other three uncles and five uncles are at home. In fact, my fifth uncle is also a private teacher, but he retired when he merged the school, leaving my third uncle to farm at home. Although it is in the mountains, every household has many fields, all of which are terraced fields in the valley. If you climb far behind the mountain, there are large terraces, and when the rice is about to be harvested, it is a harvest scene of golden terraces. According to my mother, my grandfather chose to immigrate here because he likes the good mountains and water here, so that farmers won't go hungry if they have land. It is true that there is never a shortage of water in any drought, and the water we drink in summer drought is a problem. It's just that every time I plant land and collect rice, I have to walk a long, long mountain road There is a cowshed beside the rice field on the mountain. Cattle are kept here when the farm is busy and kept at home when it is idle. Uncle, while they were busy in the fields, our children were playing in the straw in the cowshed upstairs. Grandpa's grave is on the hillside next to the field, guarding this piece of land cultivated by himself. Grandpa is famous for his geomantic omen. Later, I heard some stories about him from different people. I don't know if it is true or not. Now the road is built here. Last year, I drove here to sweep the grave. I had prepared firecrackers, paper money and incense sticks, but I dared not light them. The field in front of the grave is barren, and there are weeds one meter deep everywhere, for fear of causing mountain fires. We must clean up, visit and leave.

It was a remote mountain village, and there was no signal at grandma's house. You can walk to the hillside behind the house with a phone call and make a phone call under the big maple tree. The distance from our home to grandma's is more than twenty miles in a straight line, but it takes more than sixty miles by car. The road twists and turns in the valley and is very dangerous. However, the first time I drove home, I went to my grandmother's house. That was when the odometer of my new car was less than 2000 kilometers. The first time I opened this mountain road, I was nervous and excited. But the existing pavements are all cement pavements, which are already very easy to drive. Turn a corner and pull over. Walk slowly. Be careful and honk the horn more to remind you. When I drive, my mother sits in the front row, because she sometimes gets carsick, and my father sits in the middle of the back. He likes to see the scenery on the road and can tell some memories almost everywhere. There are several steep slopes, which are often difficult for tractors to climb, especially when it rains or snows, and the road surface is dug out by tractors.

There are many memories in the mountain village, but I don't know if it's because I went less or too far. Sometimes it feels like a dream home, especially after coming back from a busy city for two days. There is no signal on the mobile phone, no internet and no neon lights. Here, every family burns firewood, smokes bacon and bakes charcoal fire. Together, they also chat and play cards in their hometown dialect, isolated from the world, and time seems to have stopped here. The small mountain village may be the hometown that my grandmother and uncles can't live without, but it is the hometown that I, a wandering wanderer, can't go back.

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