Chapter 25 "Light of the Earth" last stop in Guangzhou

Last stop in Guangzhou (1) 6 The last stop of the exhibition is Guangzhou.It is very close to the city where I grew up in my youth, and the hot and humid atmosphere in the air is so familiar.The young and vigorous city is still transparent under the abundant sunshine all year round, like a city of glass rising from the desert. He arranged for his father to live in the hotel.I have been busy with exhibitions during the day and have no free time.Every night when I come back to my room, I feel strange to my old father lying on the bed watching TV.It is indeed strange. During the few days when I lived in the hotel with my father, my father snored like thunder every night, and Jian Sheng couldn't fall asleep at all.Lying on the bed, disturbed by his father's snoring, looking at the dark ceiling with a splitting headache.Jian Sheng went out to socialize for the art exhibition during the day, and was often exhausted. He returned to the hotel every night, just wanting to have a good sleep, but he didn't expect to encounter this embarrassing problem.He was almost driven crazy by the insomnia for several days and nights.He didn't know what to say to his father.

As soon as the lights were turned off at night, my father fell asleep quickly.With the sound of snoring, Jian Sheng was woken up, and then it was difficult to fall back asleep.Frustrated and sullen, he turned sideways in the dark, and looked at the strange old body lying on the other bed for a long time with infinite sadness, exuding the smell of musk plaster: snoring intermittently, falling into a deep sleep, Unaware of his own ugliness. Is this his father?That young, pale, stork-like poet whom his mother fell in love with at first sight?Write poems on birch bark, keep a pair of long clean hands for the youth who plays the cello?That father who gritted his teeth and put himself on the ground on the morning of parting in the thick fog, and then climbed into the back of the car with determination to leave?

This is the cruelest carving made by the blade of time on the concrete life. He knew clearly that in those lonely nights of his youth, he saw his father so clearly in his dreams.The image of a family member that he has used up all the beautiful fantasies of a child since he can remember.In some cloudy dreams.The teenager longed for his father to take him back to the waters of the Northland in his childhood.In the summer there, the sun is shining, the cicadas are noisy, and the trees are full of shade.Go swimming by the river and catch red dragonflies in the sunset.Then on a clear summer night, we set up a hammock together in the garden to enjoy the shade.Learn about astrology and pick up starlight that has fallen from the Milky Way.

And the never fulfillment of this illusion can only lead to disappointment and nothingness in the end. He suffered from insomnia all night in the wake of his father's snoring, and suffered from a splitting headache.He went to the bathroom to smoke alone.Looking at his bloodshot eyes in the big mirror due to continuous insomnia, he felt extremely irritable.Should I just rush over, shake him out of bed, and say, "Hey, did you know that your snoring keeps me up for four days!"? But no matter how negative he felt, this was his father after all.Give him flesh and blood relatives.And this may be the only time in their life that they meet and get along.Except for forgiving, he still couldn't bear him.

He decided to take his father back to visit his mother's grave tomorrow, and then send his father back to Chengdu.He would not want to live with his father.Other than that, there is no other better way. The next day, he took his father with him and boarded the intercity bus home.In the car, Jian Sheng was so tired that he fell into a deep sleep due to the insomnia for days.The turbulent dream is very light and light.He didn't know that his father beside him was motion sick all the time. Last stop in Guangzhou (2) My father lay beside him moaning, the back of his chair lowered, his eyes closed, his lips dry and white.Halfway through the drive, he felt his stomach churning. His trembling hands grabbed Jian Sheng who was still sleeping and shook him.Jian Sheng woke up suddenly, and saw his father beside him convulsively reaching out to grab the cleaning bag on the back of the seat, then tearing it apart in a panic, and immediately vomited into it.

Jian Sheng frowned.He didn't know what to do.My father suddenly turned around and said to him, help me... pat my back... pat my back... He patted his father's back hard, and his father immediately slumped and vomited violently, making a loud noise, and everyone in the car frowned and turned their eyes to them.Jian Sheng only felt nausea and shame. My father paused for a while, took a breath, and moaned, "It's too uncomfortable... It's so uncomfortable... As a result, before he finished speaking, he started to vomit again, as if he wanted to smash out all his internal organs.While patting his back, Jian Sheng unscrewed the cap of the mineral water bottle for his father and handed him a mouthwash.

After a lot of tossing, my father leaned weakly on the seat, moaning something incessantly.Jian Sheng looked at him, gritted his teeth, took the cleaning bag from his father and tied it tightly with a livid face, then stood up and threw it into the trash basket by the car door.Rinse hands with mineral water constantly. He sat back in his seat, pitiful yet sullen.It was at that moment that he began to despise him irrepressibly.His snoring, his vomiting, his mediocrity, his old age.It was indeed not his fault, including his cruelty, not at all.However, Jian Sheng has been occupied by a strong sense of denial deep in his heart.He was irritable, gritted his teeth, and turned his head silently to look out the window.Father was still there, moaning weakly.And he has no patience to understand.

It was evening when they arrived.In the twilight, the city looks cloudy and tired after a day of boiling, and the hot and humid smell in the air is very familiar.It has been more than twenty years since he was taken away from the countryside by his mother when he was twelve years old.After such a long absence, he revisited his father's old place by a coincidence of fate. The city has changed beyond recognition and is no longer what it used to be.Those flat and wide Kangzhuang avenues lead to an unclear future direction, and the traffic is constantly flowing blindly.The lush trees overhead fragmented the light, and the dull chirping of cicadas continued in between the engine noises.He took his father into the hotel and planned to visit his mother's grave tomorrow morning.

They had dinner in the restaurant of the hotel, and the two sat opposite each other without saying anything.The atmosphere was decidedly awkward and tense.Jian Sheng immersed himself in his meal, and soon after he finished eating, he put down his chopsticks, remembered something, and asked his father, did you bring your ID card.Father said, bring it. Give me. What are you doing?asked the father. Give me.do nothing.Jian Sheng replied coldly. Father took out his wallet from his trouser pocket, then took out his ID card and handed it to him. Just eat here and don't wander around.wait me back.Jian Sheng asked his father.It seems to be the usual attitude of a father talking to his son.

He turned around and left with his father's ID card, went to the civil aviation service counter in the hotel lobby and bought him a ticket back to Chengdu. That night, his father still continued to snore, and Jian Sheng was sleepless again.In the early hours of the morning, he left his father in the room and went out alone.Hit a car and drove to the beach. Standing on the quiet coast where the tide is ebbing, looking out into the darkness.The sea water is not clean, the fishy smell is very strong, and when you rush to the beach, it brings a damp and slightly salty smell.The waves push back and forth mechanically according to the gravitational force, rolling up long and winding white lines along the rough sandy beach.The voice is like whispering.

He stood on the beach smoking a cigarette. The night sky was thin and purple-blue, with no stars or moonlight.His mind was clouded with insomnia.Facing the sea, my heart is empty. The end of the sea level began to turn slightly white, as if a sword edge shining with cold light lay across the place where the water and the sky met, and dawn had dawned in the east.He dragged his stiff legs that had been standing all night, threw the last half of his cigarette on the ground in dejection, and turned to leave. disappearing into the crowd 7 Not a traditional holiday to visit loved ones who have died, public cemeteries appear empty.He and his father stood in front of his mother's grave.Look around.Over the years, the cemetery gradually filled up.He remembered that when he buried his mother, the cemetery was very empty, with empty graves and open tombs lying all over the place, without a tomb lid, as weird as a monster, opening its mouth to swallow a life. He bought two bouquets of violets in full bloom.White flower of silence, messenger at funerals.Looking at it makes people feel sad, but there is peace and forgiveness.Put it on the mother's white marble tomb, full of austere pathos.The tombstone is already covered with traces of moss bred by the abundant rain in the south, and the paint on the etched handwriting has peeled off, and a few words are choked up on it: Returning to sail from all over the world. Both he and his father were silent.Father stood there, looking old and tired.Tears are only in my heart, but they can't fall for a long time.Traveling through decades, returning to the night when we met for the first time many years ago, the shy and sweet girl playing "The Hawthorn Tree" on the harmonica can still vaguely appear in front of my eyes.Her braided hair like an autumn forest, her face and gaze flickering in the flickering candlelight of the wooden house.The bright and cold moonlight in the silent woods with no trace of snow, the reeds falling with the wind in the dense fog by the indigo lake, the melancholy cranes spreading far away with the sound of the wind caressing the water surface, and the first time The trembling and affectionate tenderness when hugging... The memory is too rich and huge, all of which have been bathed in the blood and tears of youth, and now I recall it like a distant illusion. The corner of his mouth squirmed, trying to say something, but in the end he didn't say anything.Is it because Shengfen's son is standing next to him, or because there are too many things to say, and he hesitates to speak. The three relatives were finally able to reunite.There are grievances between them, inseparable separation, estrangement, the end of love and death.For such a living person to have any remorse and expression for the deceased, it may be a difficult and almost shameful thing for him and for Jiansheng.So they chose to remain silent.And at that time, things have come to an end, apart from silence, what else can be expressed. After all, they are all getting old.This vigorous and non-stop running world is getting farther and farther away from them, and only some of the same old memories are left to accompany their dying steps.until it ceases completely. He said to his father, let's go.gone back. He and his father went back to the hotel.During lunch, he said, I have already bought you a ticket back to Chengdu at 2:00 pm.I will take you to the plane. Father is disappointed.He nodded silently.Jian Sheng buried his head and spoke to him lightly, but saw his father's hand holding the chopsticks.Brown wrinkled skin covered with varicose and raised purple veins, stubby yellowed nails, knuckles raised like tree roots. Whether he ever really had a pair of white and long hands, played the cello and wrote poetry.And after he turned away with his luggage indifferently, what kind of ups and downs and misfortunes did fate bestow on him, or as he himself said evasively - retribution, so that these hands and this body , honed into such an old and mediocre appearance.And such a transformation will always be helpless and sad. Just because he saw his father's hand, he felt a surge of nameless grief and was full of intolerance.At that moment, Jian Sheng closed his eyes sadly. Jian Sheng sent his father to the airport.Give him a canvas bag with simple luggage.Sit and wait patiently with him.I went to the sales counter at the airport to buy airsickness medicine and mineral water for my father, and fed him.Comfort him and say, it won't take long, you can get there in an hour. When he was about to send his father to the security check, he hesitated for a moment, and then stretched out his hand to pull his father aside from the queue. Jian Sheng took out the pad, tore off a piece of paper, and wrote down his phone number and address to his father.Then he took out a bank card from the wallet and said, the password is the last six digits of the phone number.He deliberately drew a dash on the last few digits of the phone number on the note. He stuffed the note and bank card into the inside pocket of his father's coat.Call me if you need something.Take your bank card and don't lose it.He said. But the father hurriedly pulled out the card and wanted to return it to him.The two argued back and forth and declined, which attracted everyone's attention at the security checkpoint.Jian Sheng was suddenly irritable again.He said in a strong tone, take it!As if scolding a child. Father was silent.He let Jian Sheng quickly insert the card back into his inner jacket pocket. Jian Sheng retreated far away, watched his father pass through the security gate, and waved to him hesitantly.But the father showed a child-like uneasy expression, trembling and looking back at him frequently.He is already so old. Jian Sheng watched his back disappear into the crowd.My heart is sad. make up your mind 8 He sent his father away, and then decided to meet Huai. As if it was something he had already made up his mind to, he was going to see her.Even after learning that she was married, they have been neglected.He didn't even know if Huai was still in the city, but he still wanted to go. He only had the address left on the envelope when Huai replied to her letter many years ago. He knew that she had moved by then, but he still planned to visit the Academy of Fine Arts where Huai had lived and worked before. He has had enough courage to walk into memory. In this way, he saw a piece of greenery again.Over the years, the outside city has changed beyond recognition, but inside it seems to be a virgin land that has never been brutally smeared by time. It still hasn't changed much, but its appearance is more beautiful.The green everywhere is more lush than before, like a charming indigo.The small three-story building where he spent his entire teenage years drawing and painting was still there.The brick-red walls are almost completely covered by verdant ivy, which looks like a delicious and fluffy green cake.He lingered in his memory, as if he had quickly returned to the distant and real age. He was still the handsome young man in a plain white shirt walking in the heart of his first love. Wandering around all night. But time has changed, and when he stood looking up at that building again, nearly twenty years had passed.Whether Huai is still there, and whether someone will put a plate of fragrant jasmine next to her pillow in the early morning, so that she can wake up with a good aftertaste.And with so many days and nights gone, will she be able to remember this person who is away from him. Jian Sheng went to ask the professor who had been his apprentice, and asked if Huai was still working here.The old professor told him that Huai had left after she got married, and she came back a year later, and she still teaches at the attached middle school.The old professor paused and said, but I heard that she has been ill for a long time. Jian Sheng only felt a mixture of sorrow and joy.He asked the old professor in panic, what disease did she have? The old professor said, sorry, I don't know very well. So where does she live now? The old professor replied that she was still in the old house where she lived a long time ago and moved back later.