Appreciation of Cao's Prose Under the Ginkgo Tree

In winter, the impression is always bleak. But grass and trees are psychic and really talk to me and tell me the truth.

Those ginkgo trees always stand tall and quiet as water.

I can't help going downstairs for a walk. The drizzle is soft and boneless, and it is still cold and refreshing on the face. These ginkgo trees are so quiet in the rain and fog in winter. When I was under the tree, I looked up and stared at the well-dressed ginkgo tree, and suddenly a touch of sadness crossed my heart.

Just when I was absorbed, a piece of Ginkgo biloba leaves floated down from the tall branches, slowly, like a boat floating in the air, flying around in my sight, and finally landed on the decaying lawn, like a faint gossamer sigh, blending with thousands of Huang Die that had already floated down.

The process of falling leaves is so fleeting and silent.

Looking at this small ginkgo leaf, I looked up at the canopy of the rainbow and suddenly realized that this was the last burning of Fanghua, and all the leaves survived here. They are surging, exciting and magnificent, and they are the last gift of life to the earth and the sunshine and rain that nourish them.

two

Spring has gone, autumn is still far away, and the solstice of winter has come. I ran aground under the ginkgo tree again. In the past, the innocent little girl in the water village was already the mother of a teenager and the teacher of many children.

I still clearly remember the first time I saw ginkgo trees. At that time, it was early summer, and Ginkgo biloba leaves swayed in the breeze like green palms, as if waving to us. In the former Suzhou water town, there were peaches and poplars everywhere, and ginkgo biloba was extremely rare. Several girls twittering like birds discovered the new world, stopped jumping instantly, gathered under the ginkgo tree and looked up strangely. Obviously, we are tightly locked by its unique leaf shape, and we know that there is such a tree with tangible leaves in nature.

Ying said that leaves are handfuls of small fans; Hua said that it was a hundred locks worn around the baby's neck; I said, this is a beautiful piece of jade ... we argued endlessly, held our own words and daydreamed heartily. That little palm, handfuls of locks, pieces of exquisitely carved jade and clouds of Lv Yun inadvertently landed in my heart.

When more than 20 years have passed and the opportunity is right, I once again stopped under the ginkgo tree when I was a child, and the painting suddenly revived in my memory, as if it were yesterday.

Perhaps, all tangible and individual things will naturally leave a deep impression on people. Deep down, we actually like and yearn for tangibility and individuality. However, due to various factors in reality, after adulthood, what is more added in body and mind is the vulgarity of human nature, while personality is gradually obliterated. Sometimes, we humans are really inferior to a tree in some ways.

These ginkgo trees presented to me today are completely different from those I remembered when I was a child: one is full of vitality and furry in early summer, and the other is green and brilliant in late winter; One is growth, and the other is ending; One is to join the WTO, the other is to be born ... but both of them gave me inner excitement and throbbing.

Different seasons bring different beauty. Beauty has always been colorful. Unfortunately, time, no matter how hard we try, can't compete with the pace of time, just like ginkgo flying and falling, rushing by.

As far as I can remember, we always shuttle from this village to that village. Almost every village around us has our young figure, but we only found ginkgo. Every time I walk past it, I can't help looking at it. Later, a group of little girls dropped out of school, dropped out of school, studied and worked, and the ginkgo tree was gradually forgotten by us. Finally, we all got married and flew to cities or other villages like dandelions in the village. Since then, we have taken root in various places and formed our own families. Ginkgo biloba, which we once paid attention to, has long since disappeared. Just like playmates who grew up, we gradually lost touch with each other as time went on.

They don't even remember ginkgo trees. Or will someone, like me, see such splendid ginkgo in winter and suddenly remember the scene when we looked up at ginkgo when we were young?

I don't know. I only know that the once familiar and intimate relationship can't stand the erosion of time in the end. We grew up, went our separate ways, and finally got separated in the sea of people. My heart was instantly clouded by several pieces of disappointment.

three

The most painful thing is that Ying has left us forever.

On the summer vacation of 20 1 1, I returned to my village, Qianjiamao. My mother told me that Shen Ying died of leukemia in early July. She was treated for half a year and spent a lot of money. In the end, she failed to escape.

I was stunned for a long time, like a bolt from the blue. I saw a smiling face that was always rosy and delicate when I was young, and a handsome and lively figure. However, how heartless the years are, how can you take away such a kind and virtuous woman? I suddenly realized for the first time that death is so close to us that it could take a person's life at any time.

Ying was my inseparable partner when I was a child. Every morning, I will go to her house and wait for her to go to school together. After school, we do our homework together, jump the tendon, and have a holiday with several partners. We went to pick green beans in the fields, played hide-and-seek in the rape fields, and played happily in the cool river of Beihejing. At the Children's Day celebration in the sixth grade of primary school, I sang shyly and took photos with Ying and Hua ... Later, I went to Jiangsu Wujiang Normal University to study, and her family moved to Suzhou, so our contact was less.

The last time I saw her was after I joined the work. I remember that it was a sunny early autumn, and she returned to Nanhetou Village, where she was raised and raised, to visit her grandmother. She just got off the bus. I went home and had a good lunch, and I was anxious to go to school to teach by bike.

"Ying is back." I greeted her with a smile, and they smiled at each other, and all kinds of goodwill and joy rippled in our hearts instantly. She has become more beautiful and slim. She is no longer a childish girl, but as shy and charming as a hibiscus flower, graceful and radiant in the sun.

I looked back at her delicate figure and they passed by. I didn't think it would be farewell. At that time, I always felt that we had too much time, and our gathering would be as endless as the Yangtze River. If the world can be predicted, I will have a long talk with Xiang Ying when I was a child, and it will be fun.

But who can predict our fate? Who would have thought that one day time would end on one person so soon? In the years when she moved to the city and left us, I heard a little news about her one after another. Her mother later died of cancer. Several years later, her father died in a car accident. And her brother is careless in making friends and gambling. Three years before her death, she settled in Shanghai with her husband who was an official at Shanghai Airport and became a full-time wife. I thought I could settle down from now on, but I ended up in such a disaster.

I didn't know much in those years when I was physically and mentally exhausted in England. I know a little occasionally, and I didn't try to get her contact information. In fact, it is not difficult. However, I did nothing. Perhaps it is because after leaving these years, everyone has their own experience and life, and they have forgotten their childhood affection; Perhaps it is the tempering of the world that makes people become strange and indifferent; Maybe it's guilt When I returned to teach in a small county after graduating from normal school, my parents asked the matchmaker to intercede for me, my brother. Her brother was also my primary school classmate, but he dropped out of school after junior high school. I didn't promise. Here, I always feel a little ashamed to meet English families. My parents and family loved me so much when I was a child, but love, marriage, friendship and nostalgia are two different things.

Now that people are in middle age, they should understand me if they want to come to Britain. I'm sure she won't resent me either. We should have contacted earlier. However, there is no such thing as if. If you miss it, you miss it. Some of them are gone, forever. Conscience introspection and torture have no real meaning for English. Nothing can make it up.

Ying, when her parents first named her, they wanted her to be as fragrant as a spring flower forever. But in the colorful late spring of that year, her condition was already very serious. She didn't survive the summer. At the time of the most lush vegetation, she left her lover and young daughter alone in the bustling Shanghai in a different place, as if a ginkgo leaf that we had paid attention to withered prematurely, lost the green of life and withered alone into a child. She was only 33 years old that year.

I didn't know all this until later. However, the people of Sri Lanka have passed away and everything is just a memory. Can the solemnity and serenity of a tree express the nostalgia and grief for a person? Ginkgo is silent, and the sky is silent. Only I feel sad under the ginkgo tree.

four

With Ying gone, Tweed became a stranger to me.

Last winter, a few days before Qianjiazhu was demolished, the villagers all chose a day to make the last sacrifice to the ancestors in this village. I went back, just like when I was a child, coming out of the first house in the west of the village and going door to door. Walking to Nakamura, I saw the arch bridge that once crossed Beihejing in front of the village. Now there are only two piers left, which are already decadent and a bit bleak. Then go to the east village and turn back. Meet the villagers, talk about the nostalgia, and let the village leave the final mark on the map in my mind.

Hua is going back to her mother's house. I didn't recognize her when I met her in the village. She is wearing a fur coat, and the gorgeous fox collar sets off thick powder on her face, bright yellow hair and dark eye shadow. She is coquettish and kitsch, and her eyes are not as pure as when she was a child.

I live in the same village as Hua, and the two families have a good relationship. We were still deskmates when we were in junior high school, but she dropped out of school in the second day of junior high school. I went to her house to persuade her in the summer vacation on the second day of that year, but she was tired of studying. In the mid-1990s, silk reeling began in rural areas of Suzhou, and a silk reeling belt sold to Japan can earn five or six thousand yuan. Many rural girls like Hua dropped out of school early and followed the women in the village into this wave. Flowers cannot resist the temptation. However, four years later, the silk reeling industry gradually declined. Because Hua doesn't have a regular job, she spends all day in the mahjong pile. Two years later, she married a carpenter in another village who was one year younger than her and lived a quiet life for several years. Later, I heard that Hua began to promote Amway products and met many bosses in our furniture city. She thinks her man is incompetent and often doesn't go home for several nights after buying a car. Go home occasionally and sleep in separate beds with men. The marriage of flowers is like a piece of tempered glass full of numerous cracks but never completely broken. When we meet again, we have nothing in common, and we don't know what to say to each other or how to persuade them.

The past is empty. Flowers are no longer pure flowers. She doesn't remember our laughter, innocence. Time is gone forever, no one can step into the fleeting years of the past, and no one has the power to stop the changes brought by time, especially the interests of people.

The leaves are falling, and I am in the distance.

five

For a long time, I woke up from my immersed thoughts.

I turned back and suddenly saw a touch of new green six or seven steps away from me. Although it is only a small, tender and dotted piece, not as high as nails, it is particularly precious in the winter rain, which makes people shine at the moment.

I walked over gently and moved carefully for fear of accidentally stepping on them. Just bend over and squat slowly in front of the crowd. Compared with this grass, I am a giant. This is a piece of grass that just sticks out of the soil. Just like a newborn, he opens his eyes full of curiosity about the world, jumps out as much as possible, holds his head high, straightens his body and rejoices, as if every muscle, tendon and cell has a growing and stretching vitality. Although it is weak enough, it is happy enough to support them to enjoy themselves in this season. Just like when we were kids.

They are born with four leaves, and the round leaves shine like four drops of spring water. Despite the thick soil as hard as a hard shell and the wanton invasion of winter cold, such a small piece of humble grass shows a life instinct and strength in the endless exhaustion around it, lighting up this delicate but strong green to the earth and the sky.

Winter is deep, but they are full of energy. Under the tall ginkgo tree, this little green is in sharp contrast with the fallen leaves on the ground, or more. I can't help but respect them How humble the vegetation is, but it is also moving.

When the flowers bloom for a certain period, the leaves fall silently. Ginkgo or green grass. Sometimes it is dry and glorious, and the spring and autumn are boundless. The cycle of life, nature is always endless, and each season has its own characteristics. Even in the cold season, there is no shortage of beauty, beauty and life. Not far away, Cinnamomum camphora, Osmanthus fragrans and Magnolia grandiflora are still lush.

Life is like four seasons, glory and loneliness, joy and sadness, purity and vulgarity coexist, and no one can guarantee that every season is immersed in the same color. Life is full of mixed tastes, but the world is full of temptations, life is fragile and temperament is changeable. How to manage yourself, grasp life and be calm and serene to the greatest extent is really a subject that needs serious study.

Ying, Huadu and I are ordinary children in thousands of water towns. We all grew up drinking the water from Beihejing, but our life paths are completely different. Why? Faced with such a grand and profound problem, I am so powerless and helpless. Under the ginkgo tree and beside the green grass, you can only think silently.