I wondered why my father kept lighting the duck egg lamp. He patted my head and said, with a bright lamp, you will be able to see far and fly high. At that time, I did not understand what he was saying, and naively said, you are not a bird that can fly. My father smiled and said, "You will understand later."
Durian tree
Every full moon night, the sky is bright and full of moon. When the moonlight shines through the rubber leaves, creating a peaceful and quiet scene, my father often pulls me out onto the porch to tell stories of the past. The stories he tells only revolve around familiar things about childhood, then the time when he started his career, but he draws me into that simple, rustic story. My father used to live in Phu Yen , because my grandparents died early, he wandered to this Dong Nai land to make a living. My father met my mother when he had nothing in his hands. At that time, my mother's family was also poor, so they couldn't help my parents, they just silently accepted the relationship.
My parents got married and moved out without any land to live on. My father had to build a small temporary hut in the middle of a vast rubber forest. The hut was roofed with leaves and bamboo. That was my parents' first home at that time.
Mom said that when she was 7 years old, in addition to going to school, she asked to tap rubber with her uncles and aunts in the neighborhood to earn extra money for daily fish sauce and salt and for school books. People took pity on her, hired her, and then assigned her lighter tasks that were within her strength.
Every durian season, my father sells durian to earn money to support my siblings and me in school. The image of my father carrying two baskets of durian on an old motorbike, leisurely in the middle of the forest on both sides of the road, with rubber trees and durian trees interspersed, and the red dusty soil is an image deeply imprinted in my childhood memories. Looking at the two wheels of the motorbike covered with red soil, my father's sandals with a thick red color, I felt so sorry for him.
No one knows that during the war against America, my rubber garden was a place of fierce fighting between us and the enemy. Somewhere in the soil, there seem to be the bones of brave soldiers. Is that why each durian tree in my garden has nurtured itself through the wind and rain, preserving the source from the red soil and then blooming brightly pink as if to express gratitude to the soldiers who died for the Fatherland...
Finally, my parents' hard work and efforts paid off. My family's economy improved. My house was rebuilt to be more spacious than before.
I grew up with my father's stories and the fragrant herbs that this Eastern land brings. My family lives on this land with constant efforts.
It was only later that my father told me. Before I was born, one night he saw a man in military uniform giving him a seedling. Knowing that it was a good omen, that the old man wanted to help him, from then on he tried to take care of the garden, the fruit trees in the garden and kept the habit of lighting the oil lamp.
"The oil lamp in front of our family altar is like a lighthouse that everyone can see from afar," my father said. Whether alive or dead, people need a lighthouse in their hearts. My father's lighthouse is the belief that life has a beginning and an end. If you live with all your heart, you will eventually reap sweet fruit. Just like the duck egg lamp my father placed on the altar every evening, it is to warm the souls of our ancestors, and also to thank heaven and earth, to thank this land.
I suddenly remembered the old days, the nights after work, my father would light incense and make offerings before the altar. Suddenly my eyes were red, mixed with the scent of incense, the pungent smell of red soil, the strong smell of durian. I felt that my father was thanking and giving. His words seemed to echo in my ears: Giving is a happiness. Giving in the right place, the right place, the right person, is even more peaceful. Yes, my father was right. That fragrance was like my parents and this land gave me a complete childhood, so that I grew up with full of dreams and never stopped searching for good things in life.
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