Rambling about dad

BPO - My father joined the army when I was just 20 years old. The night before the enlistment, my grandfather brought a tray of betel leaves to talk to my maternal family, saying that he would ask for a few words of marriage and ask my mother to marry him. That year, my mother was just eighteen, and many people were infatuated with her. And then my father left for almost 20 years before returning. That promise from when we were eighteen or twenty only came true two decades later.

Báo Bình Phước•21/04/2025

When his peers had become grandparents, my father was able to hold his first child. I was the youngest child, the most pampered child in the family. When I was born, my father was nearly 50 years old. The age when the house was already full of children and grandchildren in the countryside. But at that time, there were many families who had late happiness like my parents, all because of the war. After liberation, my father continued to be assigned to work in the armed forces, but soldiers who had fought and died on the battlefield like my father only wished to soon reunite with their families, to return to the wife who had spent her youth waiting for him, and he asked to be discharged from the army to work in the mass organizations in his hometown.

People have often compared “mother is a lullaby” or “lullaby with autumn wind, mother’s hand fanning mother brings the wind back” but for me, my memory is always the image of my father carrying me on his shoulder, walking around the house while singing me lullabies on hot summer afternoons. From sour figs, sour peaches, from storks, herons, beggar fish…, from Kieu or mother Tom, mother Suot are all present in my father’s lullabies. Therefore, when I didn’t know how to read, I already knew To Huu’s poems by heart, knew how to recite Kieu, and compared folk songs.

I remember the summer nights when my father removed the wooden doors and placed them on the fence, underneath were a few pots of water, and the three of us lay down to enjoy the cool breeze. What I liked most was being fanned by my father while listening to him tell stories and recite poems… But what I still love most is the stories my father told about the battlefield, about the sleepless nights of marching, suffering from malaria… and what appeared in my mind were the images of brave soldiers, the beautiful camaraderie of comrades and teammates.

I still love rainy days, my father will definitely pick me up after school. He will lift me onto his back and put a raincoat around my neck, covering my head. I lie on his skinny back, inhaling the strong, salty, muddy smell of sweat, my father must have just come back from the field but was in a hurry to pick me up so he didn't shower. I tell him all the stories, and from time to time I ask where he went, he carries me on his back and holds on to his feet on the slippery road full of buffalo hooves while patiently answering. Perhaps these are the beautiful moments that will stay with me forever, those moments have nurtured my childhood, my soul, and now, after half a lifetime, I still keep in my heart the image of my father with his pure soul.

In the 4th grade, I was chosen to compete in the Vietnamese language competition. The homeroom teacher wanted me to come to her house to study extra on the weekends. The distance was long, so my father quit his farming job and took me there every day. Rain or shine, for months on end, on a male-framed bike that used to be a pack bike, he carried me along with him to conquer the world of letters. My father was old and weak, but his will and courage were stronger than steel. He was the one who enlightened and gave wings to my dreams. At that time, I only wished to grow up quickly and be successful so that I could buy my father a beautiful bike and give him the best things, but by the time I could buy one, he had already passed away.

The day my father left was a windy night, bitterly cold. It was a stormy day, the trees on both sides of the road were uprooted by the wind. Even though I caught the fastest bus possible, I still didn’t have time to talk to my father one last time, didn’t have time to feed him his favorite piece of Che Lam cake. That is the thing I regret the most in my life and it still haunts me to this day.

My father, the man who may not be perfect to the world but is always great and wonderful to me. His life is a beautiful violin!

Hello love, season 4, theme "Father" officially launched from December 27, 2024 on four types of press and digital infrastructure of Radio - Television and Binh Phuoc Newspaper (BPTV), promising to bring to the public the wonderful values of sacred and noble fatherly love.
Please send to BPTV your touching stories about Father by writing articles, writing feelings, poems, essays, video clips, songs (with recordings),... via email [email protected], Editorial Secretary Office, Binh Phuoc Radio - Television and Newspaper, No. 228, Tran Hung Dao, Tan Phu Ward, Dong Xoai City, Binh Phuoc Province, phone number: 0271.3870403. The time to receive articles is from now until August 30, 2025.
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Source: https://baobinhphuoc.com.vn/news/19/171812/tan-man-ve-bo