Dry coconuts fall in the wind in the garden

The dry and arid April and May, September started to rain, and December was approaching, and the cold was biting. At night, mixed with the sound of bats flapping their wings to find ripe fruit, was the sound of dry coconuts falling in the wind in the garden. Mom told me to pick up the fruit tomorrow, and she would make oil to save for Tet. I don't know how much sleep Mom got that night, but whatever she said, I picked exactly that many in the morning.

My childhood was filled with such simple joys.

After the nights of falling wind, the dry coconut trees in the corner of the house grew more and more. Some had fallen since February and March, lying at the back, and by the time Mom brought them out, they had quietly turned green. Dad planted them, and the garden kept getting thicker, following the style of a mixed garden, planting whatever trees were available, and planting whatever was empty. On a cold November morning, Mom told the brothers to take the coconuts out to the yard, and Dad would cut each fruit and share the coconut meat. Mom used a sheet of corrugated iron with many tiny holes, grinding each piece of coconut meat to squeeze out the coconut milk. When she saw the fruits that had fallen for a long time, with white coconut lungs inside, sweet and juicy, the brothers were filled with excitement.

Then Mom poured all the coconut milk into a large copper pot, used the same spoons of the dried coconut that had just been peeled, and lit the fire to cook the oil. When the coconut shell had just burned out and the skull was soaked with charcoal, the oil began to boil, and the aroma of the coconut oil wafted up. Mom constantly stirred the pot to prevent it from burning, so that the oil that floated up was neither white nor amber. Mom scooped up the oil and poured it into bottles of different sizes, until the oil was just right and had a light yellow color. After filtering all the oil, Mom added a little molasses to the coconut and it became a "coconut candy" that was so delicious that even now, just remembering that peaceful scene, I feel like that childhood taste still lingers on the tip of my tongue.

Mom sealed the oil bottles tightly with dried banana leaves. The next day, under the cold air, they had solidified into white wax. Mom carefully stored them in the kitchen, as if they were hers. And Mom always kept a bottle aside to give to the old lady next door. The old lady did not use the oil for cooking, but to apply to her hair, which had turned as white as the wind and frost!

Every time she cooked rice, my mother would take a bottle of oil and put it near the stove. When the rice was boiling, she would roll it over the coal ash and the wax in the bottle would melt away. The smell of coconut oil when it reached the fire had a distinctive aroma. So every afternoon, when the kitchen smoke had just drifted over the thatched roof, carrying a lingering aroma like a signal to come home for dinner, we cow herders would call each other to herd the cows home.

After many seasons of sunshine, rain, and frost, the time has come for us to leave home, where the dry coconut trees in the corner of the garden still silently fall in the wind. The months and years are like a passing wind, and then the time comes when our father and mother’s shoulders are as thin as smoke, leaving the dry coconuts to grow green naturally without anyone to collect them. The day of building new rural concrete roads, donating as much garden land as we want but having to cut down the old coconut trees, we are filled with nostalgia. Although we know that nothing lasts forever, there are things that have become a part of our childhood memories that are not easy to forget. So that when we return home to the old roof with our father and mother, in the deep night, we still seem to hear the sound of dry coconut trees falling in the wind from that day...

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