When I was five, my father retired and stayed home to grow vegetables and raise chickens to earn extra income. All day long, my father was busy with the vegetable beds, sometimes whittling bamboo to weave baskets and trays. My father was busy all day long, while I hung around him, chattering away about all sorts of things. When I was little, I had no friends, mostly just hanging around my father's legs like a puppy around its owner's legs. Sometimes I asked my father to carry me on his back like a horse, other times I whined and asked him to make a kite out of paper to fly. On days when my father was free, I would hop around and listen, even though I didn't understand anything.
Every morning when my father went to the market to sell chickens, he would carry me on the front crossbar of his faded bicycle, with two chicken cages behind him. While waiting for my father to sell, I would run around the stalls. There were banh duc, banh beo, banh bot loc, che tam cam, xu xoa… After finishing one dish, I would whine and ask for another. One time, at noon, when there were no customers, I nagged at my father’s ear, so he got a little angry and took the banana leaf next to him to threaten to beat him. My father’s business partners loved me so much that someone covered me up to protect me from the beating. That afternoon became a funny story that people still talk about later.
Although the generation gap is quite large, my father and I are very close. Perhaps because the youngest child is often pampered more. On nights when I study late at night, my father rides his bike to buy me some balut eggs or grilled corn. Having my father stay up late with me, I seem to have more motivation to try to study hard. During my high school years, I brought home many certificates of merit, which my father hung all over the walls of the house. It seems that my father is very proud of me, smiling happily every time he goes to parent-teacher meetings. Having a daughter who studies well makes him show off to all his relatives.
In my memory, my father's hair was always streaked with gray. Day by day, his hair became grayer. But I was not perceptive enough to notice. I thought he would always be like that, slowly accompanying me through the years. That afternoon, the pain suddenly struck and knocked him down. The father was old and the child was young, the child had not yet grown up when he was near death. I was in my third year of university when I received the news of my father's death. On the day I said goodbye to my father, I really wanted to keep my promise that I would not cry. But my father's youngest daughter was still as weak and easily hurt as before. Because from now on, there would be no one by her side to comfort her like before.
It has been 9 years since my father left. Every time I come home, I no longer see him leaning against the door with the familiar question: "Have you eaten yet?". There is only one person waiting, one voice asking, one look full of trust and love missing, and the house is empty and sad. Nothing can fill that void.
By the time I grew up and was strong enough to take care of my father, he had already passed away. Now I can only look for him in the chaos of memories that remain and in my tearful dreams every night.
Hello love, season 4, theme "Father" officially launched from December 27, 2024 on four types of press and digital infrastructure of Radio - Television and Binh Phuoc Newspaper (BPTV), promising to bring to the public the wonderful values of sacred and noble fatherly love. |
Source: https://baobinhphuoc.com.vn/news/19/173964/cha-gia-con-mon
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