walk with you

【Situations change as you wish】3

▲How high-spirited my parents were when they were young!

The eldest sister pointed to a banana and asked my mother what it was.

"Sugar cane," Mom answered.

"It's not sugar cane, it's banana." My sister said with a smile, and my mother nodded. Yes, Mom also knows about sugar cane.

The eldest sister pointed at Tao Zi and asked, "What is this?"

"Peach," Mom said. My sister laughed loudly, "By the way, you are very smart and you can also speak English!"

"How old are you this year?" Sister asked again. Mom stretched out her palm and said, "Five years old." She forgot her age at some point.

"How old were you last year?"

"Four years old."

"What about next year?"

"Six years old."

Hey! Mom can also do simple logic and arithmetic. Because she usually doesn't talk, her sister often asks her questions to see what she remembers. Listening to her talk, she found that she still had memories, which made her very happy. When I was a child, wasn't my mother so happy because she discovered what was going on in our heads and how our little mouths could speak new languages?

disappearing memory

My mother is ninety years old. Three years ago, we noticed that she spoke less and less. When we asked her what she had for dinner, she couldn’t remember, so she said, “Good stuff!”

Once upon a time when I came home, my mother would be sitting at the door waiting for me. She was so happy to see me and gave me a tight hug. Her eyes followed my figure, her eyes full of attachment and love. Her eyes were expressionless now.

I asked, "Mom, who am I?"

"Eileen," Ma said. Eileen is the eldest sister's daughter. She was raised by her mother and she is her most beloved granddaughter. When mom saw the girl at this time, she thought she was Irene, but in fact, she didn’t even recognize Irene. Apart from myself, I only recognize my father.

Most of Mom's memories have disappeared like the clouds in the sky. The body is still there, but she is no longer the same as before - I don’t know how many children there are, but they don’t remember the stories between us, they don’t listen to us, they never laugh heartily, and they no longer talk about our childhood fun.

She is very emotional and neither happy nor sad. The face that is getting thinner due to loss of appetite looks very delicate. However, she was like a rudderless sail in the sea, disappearing into the depths of time and space.

Mom doesn’t recognize us, but she still remembers the Three-Character Sutra and children’s songs she memorized as a child. "At the beginning of life, human nature is fundamental." The eldest sister recited the Three-Character Sutra to fill her up, while pouting and putting the spoon into her mouth.

"Open your mouth and take another bite... Yafei! The tricycle is running fast. Who is sitting on it?" The eldest sister yelled, sang and fed. My mother answered the question if there was one, but there was no one. . Sometimes my mother would fall asleep and my eldest sister would wake her up and continue feeding her. Sleeping like this, I couldn't feed him a bowl of pureed vegetables and rice for an hour.

▲The sister pureed the food and fed it to her mother.

▲Sister plays clapping game with mother.

Hard work and self-sacrifice motherly love

My mother was from a wealthy family in Sichuan. In 1949, she came to Taiwan alone to marry her father. Before leaving in a hurry, my grandfather said that the civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party would soon end, and the dowry would be paid for later; unexpectedly, this trip would be a farewell forever. Later, my mother dreamed of her family several times and cried loudly in her sleep. The loss of the country and the family was the deepest grief of her generation.

After giving birth to two children, my mother quit her accounting job and stayed at home to raise her husband and children. Mom’s ingenuity, creativity, and enthusiasm were applied to food and clothing needs. In order to make a living, my father raised hundreds of Leghorn chickens as a side job. Mom has to feed chickens, collect eggs, sell eggs, and kill chickens.

The neighbor’s mother knew how to make clothes, and she followed suit. As a child, I often fell asleep to the sound of sewing machines. Coats, shirts, skirts, pants or sweaters are often made by her. I still remember when I was in college, I came home on weekends and told my mother that I needed a shirt or pants, and she rushed to make them overnight so that I could wear new clothes back to school.

My father is from Shandong and loves to eat pasta. My mother learned to make steamed buns, steamed buns, and scallion pancakes. What I remember most is that she bought a small oven and learned to make Western bread and cakes. I brought shiny, golden, fragrant bread to school, and my classmates didn’t believe it was a home-baked product. In order to feed a family of six, my mother walked to the market every day and carried a heavy vegetable basket home. The hard work was not to mention.

When I learned to ride a bicycle, my mother followed suit. Her motor nerves were very underdeveloped, and she would sometimes hit a tree or ride into a ditch on the side of the road, resulting in bruises all over her body. She didn't know how to get in and out of the car, so she rode a particularly low car, sat on the seat so her feet could touch the ground, and then stepped on the pedals. After learning to ride a bicycle, grocery shopping becomes much easier.

We studied until late at night, and my mother made milk and boiled eggs for us as a midnight snack. When we feel sleepy, we tell our mother, "Call me at five in the morning." Mom will definitely wake us up. In this way, she selflessly accompanied us when we needed her, and later accompanied our children to grow up.

The second sister broke off their engagement, and her father regarded her as a treasonous act and strongly opposed her dating a new boyfriend. But the power of love is stronger than family affection, and the sister refuses to obey her father. In anger, my father almost stabbed my sister with a knife. My mother immediately blocked her with her body, knelt in front of her father and said, "If you want to kill me, kill me!"

At that moment, I understood what Jesus Christ died for our sins! From my mother, I experienced the self-sacrificing love of Christ.

▲Most of my mother’s memories have disappeared without a trace, but she always remembers her husband.

everlasting companionship

"Mom, your children are here to see you! Do you still remember your children? They are..." After my sister said this, she helped my mother to get up, "Come, I have to take a bath today, you want to be Princess Xiangxiang!" She helped me He walked to the bathroom with his mother.

"No, it's cold..." Mom made her usual protest and struggle. My sister heated up the water and put Mom on the chair under the shower head. Mom closed her eyes peacefully. She didn’t know the past, present, or tomorrow. Her life was extremely fragile and insignificant, but she was still God’s treasure.

My eldest sister takes care of our parents alone. We are so far apart from each other and go home for a week or two every year. We can only greet each other on the phone. Our elder sister’s hard work cannot be appreciated by our brothers and sisters who are far away.

The eldest sister was reluctant to send her mother to a nursing home. She said that her parents had spent their whole lives accompanying us, and now she was willing to take care of them.

At the corner of my mother’s life, I once again saw God’s unfailing love through my sister’s caring companionship.