Leisure talk: Park the plank in the country garden

In the vast garden, under the shade of the trees that cast shadows on the pond, he set up many beautiful trellises. Some were erected with bamboo poles, wooden trees, and neatly arranged beams; others were made from bamboo clumps scattered across the shore, and on the upper floors were longan branches, seaweed branches, or out-of-season mulberry stems. He used everything to make places for climbing plants to entwine and for silken vines to hang loosely. I couldn’t count how many trellises were scattered everywhere from the upper garden, the lower pond, deep ditches, shallow streams… I could only see endless green leaves, blooming flowers, and laden fruits in the garden following the rain and sun. Every season, my wife would tirelessly plant one grove after another. What she couldn’t eat, she would take to the market to sell. Gourds, squash, squash, luffa, beans…

Every time I come back to visit, I still wander in the world of trees that I call "fairy garden". But my grandfather is not the long-bearded, white-haired Buddha from the fairy tales. My grandfather is a retired teacher, skillful, hard-working and extremely strict. All day long, he works tirelessly with the soil, with the mud, with the hoe... but he has his own rules and principles in his garden. So I both love and fear every time I explore this place.

It was only one summer when I came back and suddenly saw a trellis of planks next to the well yard.

The northern bean trellis was mainly to protect my wife from the sun and rain when she went to wash dishes and do laundry. But as soon as I saw it, I knew that it would be the place I would spend most of my time in the countryside. It was because it was the first time I saw a plank bean trellis. The plank bean trellis from Nguyen Binh's poems, which had been in my mind throughout my school days, now appeared right in front of me, so familiar and bright.

My family has a strawberry garden.

There is a trellis for planting planks and a pond for growing water spinach.

Spring blooming beans…

That time was the rice planting season, morning and afternoon I went to the field with my aunt, noon when I came back, my aunt and I cooked rice. Fish were just caught from the pond and fried, duck eggs were picked from the coop and made meat. My aunt asked what vegetables she wanted to eat so she could go down to the garden and pick them in a flash. I said I wanted stir-fried green beans and asked to go out and plant them myself. Under the scorching summer sun, I was lost under the cool green canopy. The small, pretty leaves were densely woven and giggled. I played tag with the rebellious rays of sunlight that filtered through the gaps between the leaves, dropping shimmering, half-smiling flowers onto the moss-covered well yard. While chasing the sunlight, I searched for the green beans hidden among the leaves. And luckily, sometimes I even caught a few late-blooming purple flowers. Were the flowers deliberately waiting for me?

Every time I had stir-fried green beans, he would praise them. Was it because I picked both the sweetness and the rich, fresh flavor of the well water; filtered the aromatic herbs from the soil and the garden and put them into that rustic fruit filled with love?

Now that he has gone far away, the garden has long been deserted. It has been a long time since I have returned to the old place, where there used to be "a trellis of planks and a pond for growing water spinach". He has taken away the trellises and the clear green sunlight. Forever!

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