"Mother-in-law, here." After school, I walked straight into Grandma Luhua's house and took out a handful of chalk heads from my pocket.
"Oh, so much! Put it on the stool first." Grandma Luhua, who was busy making glutinous rice cakes on the table, handed me a piece of yellow glutinous rice cake with her hands covered with pine flowers, said, "Your legs are so long, just in time to eat glutinous rice cakes. I will make a few more pieces, and you will take them to your grandma, she doesn't need to make them anymore when visiting the grave in Qingming Festival."
The warm glutinous rice cakes are glutinous and soft, and I ate two pieces in a row. While licking Songhua stuck to her lips with her tongue, I said, "Thank you, mother-in-law."
"What did you forget to call me?" She deliberately pulled down her face and pretended to be angry.
"Ah... Grandma Luhua." I changed my mouth and shouted. I used to be called "Mother-in-law Agen", but now I suddenly changed my name, which is really difficult to speak. I remembered the grandmother said that I could not call her name in front of my elders, and my heart was always a little weak.
"Hey, so well-behaved." Grandma Luhua's eyes turned into two crescent moons.
Just a month ago, a man from Hong Kong came to the village to find his aunt who had been missing for many years - Wang Luhua, who had been married from Wangjia Village. It is said that he set out from Wangjia Village, searching for each village next to each village. I have walked through many villages and asked many families, but I have said I don’t know, or I simply said that there is no such person in the village. The oldest man in the village asked, "Whose family is she?" The Hong Kong people said, "My aunt was not married yet when I left." Someone suggested checking the genealogy, and Mr. Mao smiled, "Which woman who married into the genealogy has entered the genealogy?" There is no way to ask about it from door to door to door. After the Hong Kong people left, the young man Ali went home and told his mother about this. His mother was stunned for a moment, then slapped her thigh hard, and suddenly burst into tears: "Son, I am Wang Luhua!" When they rushed to the entrance of the village, the Hong Kong people were floating without a trace like clouds, leaving no information. He is the only relative of Wang Luhua's mother's family. Wang Luhua didn't eat or sleep, and she was still silent, and she fell ill.
In fact, this is no wonder that others and Ali are. Grandma said, "I am going to be with Agen's sister. In the past, I only knew that her mother's home was in Wangjia Village, but I didn't know that her name was Luhua." In our village, women of the same generation as Luhua and Grandma seemed to have never had their own names, and people didn't need to know and had no chance to call them. There is only one girl with a skilled medical skills who died many years ago, and people from all corners call her "Mr. Lu". The rest are like Grandma Luhua. Her husband Agen called her "children's mother", and others called her "Agen's family", or "Sister Agen", "Agen Aunt Agen", "Gen's mother-in-law", "Ali Mother Agen", "Ali Mother Agen", etc. After this incident happened, Wang Luhua changed. When someone called her "Agen's family", she pointed to a dog or a basket and said lightly, "It's also from the Agen's family." When someone called her "Agen's aunt" and "Agen's sister", she told her word by word: "My name is Wang, Lu, Hua." Gradually, she became the only old woman with a name in the village.
On the day of visiting the grave in Qingming Festival, Grandma Luhua, who recognized a few words, stared at the words on the tombstone and read it gently. She knew that the tomb owner written on the tombstone had black characters and red characters for the living. She lit the red word "Wang" and said to her son: "The tombstone needs to be remade. I didn't write the three words "Wang Luhua" in it. I don't want to be buried here after I die."
Ali couldn't laugh or cry: "My mother, my father has been dead for more than ten years, so it's so unlucky to rebuild the tombstone."
The news that Luhua's grandmother asked her son to remade the tombstone was like dropping a bomb, and the whole village was in full swing. Ali asked my grandma to come to persuade him not to be so serious.
Grandma took me to Grandma Luhua's house. On the dark wooden door of her house, five large red chalk words were written at some point: "Wang Luhua's House". The crooked words are very powerful. Below the characters, there is a reed drawn with white chalk, like a straight tree.
Grandma went in, and said to Grandma Luhua, "As aged, her name becomes more and more precious?"
"My name is cheap. On the day I landed, the reeds in front of the house were blooming vigorously and the sky was floating. My father named me Luhua, and he said that as long as the girl's name is called, it's enough." Grandma Luhua said.
"At a young age, what's the use of fighting for a name? Which woman has not lived like this in her life?"
"Agen got tuberculosis at a young age. I am a woman's family. She gets up early and goes into the dark, farming, cutting rice, raising pigs, making seats, , building a house, which one is weaker than a man? If you don't even deserve a name, is this world fair? What's the point of being a human being?" Grandma Luhua's voice became louder.
Grandma doesn't say anything anymore.
On the way back, grandma asked me softly: "Do you remember my name?"
I asked, "Grandma, what is your name?"
Many times, I met Grandma Luhua at the entrance of the village. She stood there straight, looking at the mechanized farming road leading to the outside world. Once, I asked her, "Grandpa Luhua, who are you waiting for?" She sighed and said, "I'll take a look."
Later, there were suddenly more osmanthus, lotus, plum blossom, orchid in the village... (Author Jiang Jingbo)
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