[Emagazin]: Summer days are passing by

When cicadas chirp in the canopy of the tamarind trees, it's a sign that the sun is slowly setting. I've experienced so many summers like this, my heart filled with longing as I remember that poignant nostalgia, like a melody of a rural evening, with its clear, expansive blue sky.

My mother carried grass home from the dike slope, her shadow stretching long on the hillside with each quick step. She turned left onto the dirt road, her cloth shirt soaked with sweat. My grandmother came out of the kitchen carrying a basket of freshly boiled sweet potatoes. The whole family gathered together, and I recounted my last days of school in third grade, the red blossoms of the flamboyant tree falling in the schoolyard. The flamboyant tree always blazed with the red of summer, like the yearning of school days and the longing of those years.

In third grade, just past my eighth birthday, I often went to Ha's house next door, playing endlessly with the neighborhood kids until nightfall. Ha picked jackfruit leaves to make money, Nhung set up her toy stall to sell. A few finely ground bricks were used as rice, and Duy molded pots and pans from dried clay. Duy was clumsy but skillful; the lifeless lumps of clay transformed into shapes and forms in his hands. How could I forget his squinting eyes when he smiled? Duy said that when he grew up, he would ask Ha to be his wife. Ha, pretty with big round eyes and a clear smile, nodded in agreement. Duy happily molded a flower from clay for Ha; Ha, being kind, bought the flower back with all the money she had earned from the jackfruit leaves she had just picked from the garden.

Early summer sunlight seemed brighter, illuminating the dewdrops clinging to the blades of grass. We children, on school break, would gather by the pond near Mr. Ban's house, by a sparsely fenced hedge, to catch dragonflies and let them nibble on our navels to practice swimming. Ha said dragonflies were rare, and whoever caught one would grow up to be a fairy. I believed Ha, so I tiptoed cautiously, my bare feet blushing in the sunlight, trying to catch the dragonfly that had just perched on a branch of the fence. The pond's surface rippled, and the dragonfly flew away. I regretted that it didn't land between my fingers, my eyes following its delicate wings as it fluttered.

My mother used to say that dragonflies flying low meant rain, high meant sunshine, and at a moderate height meant cloudy weather. I grew up listening to her lullabies, the endless sounds of her lullabies beside the hammock. Fairy tales told me stories of benevolent spirits and fairies granting miracles, and of the kindhearted Cinderella emerging from a persimmon fruit. After many sunny days came the rainy days, the summer rain pouring down, weaving across the white horizon. Throughout my life, I remember those rainy days, wondering why there was so much thunder and lightning back then. My mother would come home from picking beans, caught in the rain, getting completely soaked. I would sit with her, cooking fragrant, sticky rice in the kitchen, where soot drifted gently.

That day, she asked me, "Na, will you let Mommy get married? Mommy is still young; after I get married, I'll come back to visit you." I didn't know sadness yet, so I nodded in agreement to make her happy. The old tiled roofs slipped away with the falling raindrops, and the dry straw stalks burned themselves to ashes to become a flame. I walked along the path throughout the summer, remembering and giggling, cherishing my childhood memories.

On the day my mother got married, a summer rain tore through the river, the boat rocking precariously as it left the dock. I stared after her, bewildered, unable to feel happy; sadness welled up in my eyes and on my lips, threatening to burst into tears. My mother missed her daughter and often came to visit me, her shadow stretching long on the dike slope as she wheeled her bicycle along, like a slow sunset. My whole family sat by the warm kitchen, a fire burning from dry straw. Who could have foreseen the vicissitudes of life? The hardships were etched on my mother's calloused hands. She suppressed a sigh, and the summer afternoon drifted by; I recited my memorized lessons from my textbook and showed my mother my 9 on my literature exam. My mother smiled gently, stroking my chubby cheeks; my eight-year-old self was slowly slipping away...

The flamboyant blossoms turn crimson with the seasons, and we grew up with time. Nhung – my childhood friend, with whom I used to play with dolls and clay – moved with her parents to a remote new economic zone, and we haven't seen each other since. Ha didn't continue her studies and married someone on the other side of the river. That day, Duy cried bitterly, blaming Ha for breaking her promise. Duy will always remain a childlike friend, never truly growing up, even though he's now over thirty. He can never fully understand the complexities of life, his tears always salty from tasting all the bitterness and hardship.

Summer has arrived again, the buzzing of cicadas evoking memories of a bygone era. The river carries heavy loads of silt, Mother no longer toils back and forth between two villages, her shadow no longer stretches long on the dike slope in the afternoon sun. I grew up surrounded by the sounds of children calling out to their friends, by the warm kitchen filled with my grandmother's teachings; and by the afternoons spent waiting for Mother from afar, my heart filled with the joy of summer's sunshine.

Content: Thanh Nga

Photo: Quyet Thang TH Internet

Graphics: Mai Huyen

Source: https://baothanhhoa.vn/emagazin-nhung-ngay-he-troi-253193.htm