On the day of the Dragon Boat Festival, my old mother unfortunately passed away. When I was packing up my mother's belongings, I found two "treasures" - my sister's sewing machine and my father's bicycle covered with sheets in the corner of the inner room. These two old objects brought back memories of my youth. These two "treasures" have too many stories.
’s sister has never gone to school, but she is very good at crafts and can cut window grilles in a stylish way. When my sister was twelve years old, her mother sent her to a tailor shop in the town to learn sewing skills. Because she was illiterate, it was very difficult to learn sewing. It took a lot of effort to learn how to make clothes, so her sister always She told us to study hard and never be "blind" like her. Ever since my sister learned cutting and sewing skills, she really wanted to have a sewing machine of her own. The hard-working father saw through his sister's thoughts. In order to realize his sister's dream, he sold the donkeys and pigs at home, scraped together, and finally bought his sister a dark and shiny "Gongnong Brand" sewing machine.
At that time, we couldn't afford new clothes, so my sister went to the market and bought a coarse cloth of similar size. She measured the size for us with a ruler, then used chalk to draw various lines on the cloth, and then used scissors to After cutting it, and finally by operating the sewing machine, the clothes for our brothers and sisters were formed.
Sister not only makes clothes for her family, but also for her neighbors. In my memory, my sister is always busy, especially during the Chinese New Year, which is her busiest day. Fabrics for making clothes from relatives, friends and neighbors would be delivered one after another. As long as someone requested, my sister would always agree. She would work in the fields during the day and be busy making clothes at night. My sister doesn't charge a penny for making clothes, so the fellow villagers will bring some peanuts, melon seeds and other New Year's goods to show their appreciation, but my sister always politely declines. My sister always feels that it is the happiest thing to sew clothes for all the neighbors in the village. This made my father feel proud and proud, and he often taught me and my younger siblings to learn from my elder sister.
I will never forget the heavy snowfall and biting cold wind on New Year’s Eve in 1983. In order to allow the neighbors to wear warm new clothes during the New Year, my sister sent a large pile of clothes from door to door until they were all delivered. Breathed a sigh of relief. But on the way home, my sister accidentally slipped and fell off a cliff. She died of severe injuries at the age of 22. The whole village bid farewell to their sister with sadness. During the Spring Festival that year, the whole village did not set off firecrackers.
Although my father has passed away for more than thirty years, the story of his father and his bicycle is still fresh in my memory. It was 1980. Our whole family saved up money for two years before buying our first bicycle. It was also the first bicycle in the whole village. My father kept the car polished all day long and tied bright red silk on the back of the car. Although my father cherished this "car" very much, as long as neighbors came to borrow it, they would readily agree without hesitation.
As a party member and deputy secretary of the village, my father often got up in the middle of the night to go to distant places to open up wasteland and cultivate land, leading the villagers to make a fortune. That bike is his most loyal "companion". The bicycle had a strong carrying capacity. Cut sorghum and bags of dried sweet potatoes were tied up with long ropes on the shelves. The father pushing the bicycle could not be seen from behind. Every autumn harvest time, my father would push his bicycle to help the elderly, weak, sick and disabled people in the village transport crops from the fields to their homes. When we shipped our own dried sweet potatoes, the dried sweet potatoes that took three days to be dried were already soaked by the heavy rain. When I was young at that time, I always complained in my heart that my father only knew how to work for other people and completely ignored my own food situation.
This bicycle, which carries my father's hopes and is full of goods, has become the "hero" of my family. My father’s biggest wish is to feed and clothe the whole village. I don’t know whether it was the early death of my sister that was too hard a blow to my father, or whether my father was overworked. My father died of illness in 1989 with regret and left us forever.
Nowadays, my sister’s sewing machine and my father’s bicycle have also withdrawn from the stage. The clothes at home no longer need to be made by hand, but new clothes can be bought directly. Bicycles are no longer rare treasures. Every household has a private car, and ordinary people’s lives have changed. It gets better every year.I will inherit my mother's last wish: to keep these two treasures and pass on the feeling of being charitable and helpful to others.
(Author: Zhang Xingfen, Linqu County No. 3 Experimental Primary School)
Source: "Learning to Strengthen the Country" Weifang City Linqu County Communication Station
Author unit: Linqu County No. 3 Experimental Primary School
Editor in charge: Qiu Lin, Mo Yuanjing, Tao Yunjiang, Zheng Zhixia
Reprint: Hao Fengting
review: Hao Lin
