The happiest memory of childhood-the smell of grandma's old house

My mother is a 54-year-old horse She was born in a poor and remote mountain village. She is the eldest, with three younger sisters and two younger brothers. Big brother is the same age as my brother, and my brother is the same age as me.

My mother has only been in primary school for two years. At the age of sixteen, she was recruited by the railway bureau, and her grandfather signed her up. She walked out of the mountain and became a railway worker.

My mother takes my sister and me to my grandmother's house every summer vacation. Before leaving, she will go to the town fair to buy tea and wine for grandpa. Tea is ordinary green tea, and wine is Yanglin fat wine. This wine is bright green and very beautiful. Mom also wants to buy some snacks, biscuits and twist, a kind of sugar with the word "Bo" on it, and a few pounds of pork.

At that time, grandma's family didn't have a highway, so she had to take the green leather train, get off at Ganhaizi in ten minutes, and then cross the railroad tracks and take the mountain road. My mother is carrying a basket, followed by my sister and me. It takes about two hours to walk by mountain, and you can see a river. Shrub-like bamboos are planted on both sides of the river, as far as the eye can see. When crossing the river, there is a dirt road leading to the village. There are crops on both sides of the dirt road.

Because my mother is one of the few migrant workers in the village, as soon as I entered the village, all the villagers I met warmly greeted me for dinner at home. My mother smiled and talked with them, and my sister and I ran to my grandmother's house.

July is the busiest season in the village, because the flue-cured tobacco in the field can be harvested. Take back the flue-cured tobacco, weave the flue-cured tobacco on the pole with hemp rope, and then put it in the flue-cured tobacco room for baking. Adults are busy knitting cigarettes, so we children go to vegetable fields to pick pumpkins, green peppers, dig potatoes, and then bury them in the ashes under the fire in the flue-cured tobacco room. The first time I visited roasted peppers, it was slightly pungent and mixed with the aroma of flue-cured tobacco. It was slightly choking, but it was the best smell in the world.

Baked potato, outer jiaolisha, mixed roasted pepper, the collision of two different flavors, let the taste buds get unprecedented satisfaction at that moment. The pumpkin is complete. Dig a hole, the pulp inside gives off heat. Dig a piece with a spoon and put it in your mouth. Sweet pulp can be eaten with the tongue.

As night fell, the room darkened. Grandma lit a kerosene lamp, and the dim light made the dark beams and surrounding siding in the room dizzy. We sat around the fireplace and watched grandma cook on the fireplace. The fireplace is a square pit full of burning firewood. A chain is hung on the beam covered with oil smoke and cobwebs, and a hook is hung at the end of the chain, so that the pot for cooking can be hung on it.

After dinner, grandpa will tell us a story. He is the branch secretary of the brigade and can read. I always like to tell ghost stories, such as the red-haired ghost in the tree at the head of the village, the ghost drowned in the river near the village, and the hairy man on the mountain behind the village (a kind of ghost, I don't know what it is), which scares us children from running around at night, and adults follow wherever they go until they get into bed and sleep until dawn.

It was dawn, and the air and the ground were wet, so I was surprised that it rained last night. This is the day to pick mushrooms.

Through grandma's kitchen, there is a small wooden door. Pushing open the wooden door is an upward road. After walking the path, you are suddenly enlightened, and endless mountains suddenly appear in front of you. The trees and green leaves all over the mountains are hung with water drops, which suddenly catches your eye and is very shocking.

After years of experience in picking up bacteria from my third aunt, I basically know all the edible bacteria, such as Penicillium, Boletus, Chicken Brown, Dried Barley and Lactarius. Children can't see the bacteria in their eyes, really, because the unknown trees, grass and flowers all over the mountain have already hooked their eyes away. Suddenly I saw one, plump and tender, screaming all over the mountain.

The river rose after the rain. After eating a delicious mushroom dinner, we brought a mat overnight, brought bedding to the river, set up a net, spread a mat on the beach, lay down on the mat smoothly, and spread the bedding. The smell of the river is wrapped in the humid air after the rain. We can't see the bamboos on both sides of the Qinghe River, but only two rows of black ones, protecting us like soldiers on guard.

I can't sleep, talk excitedly and talk about all kinds of interesting things. At about midnight, we got up and closed the net, all of which were river shrimps. Take the shrimp home and we'll go back to sleep. When I woke up, grandma had already cooked the shrimp, and it was another delicious meal.

The flue-cured tobacco in the field is running out. To collect rice in the field, my sister and I are young and don't have to work. We spread a mat on the edge of the ridge, play an umbrella, or sit or lie down and watch the adults cut rice. The ridge is very narrow. Turning around, I accidentally met my sister. I heard a plop. My sister fell into the ground. A little mud child stood up in tears and took her home with a smile. My chubby little sister sat on the threshold, and all the other adults went home and ignored me.

The favorite thing this season is burning plant ash. When the crops in the field are harvested, some dried bean stalks, potato stalks and corn stalks will be burned to ashes and scattered in the field as fertilizer. The village is full of vegetation fires. There is no open flame in the fire, only smoke. We will put a small bag of dried corn, squat down by the fire, dig a small hole with branches and throw some corn in. Soon the corn will turn into white and fat popcorn, which will be blown out and thrown into our mouths. The smell is unforgettable.

Thirty-seven years have passed, and my grandmother has been dead for many years. Now my grandfather lives with my brother. Three aunts are married, two uncles have separated, and grandma's old house has been sold.

Inexplicably, a bitterness welled up in my heart, for the old house that carried my happy childhood and for the childhood that I couldn't go back.