I especially enjoyed chatting with my grandfather.
At first, it was to relieve his boredom, but gradually, I realized that his story was actually an extremely important part of my understanding of myself.
Growing up in a turbulent era, my grandfather's life was full of ups and downs, which was more exciting than in the movie.
The traces left behind by the years of hardship are imperceptibly passed down in this family.
Recently, I started to organize my photo album and flipped through a medal I took when I returned home.
Grandpa's. The 70th anniversary medal issued by the Central Military Commission of the Communist Party of China is numbered each.
I knew that my grandfather had joined the army, but when I was born, he had already retired from the army and was just an ordinary person.
So when this chapter was taken out, it really shocked our whole family for a while.
My grandfather's hometown is in Henan, and his ancestors are authentic farmers. A family relies on a piece of land to reproduce the family for generations.
The peasants had a very high belief in the land. Even if the land was barren, plagued by disasters and yielded very little, no one thought of leaving.
For as long as he can remember, my grandfather struggled to survive in the cracks of the war.
The Japanese enslaved the people of the village and put a group of children to help with the hard work. The movement was a little slower, and the sharp saber was immediately swung towards the neck.
Once, a Japanese slashed him with a knife, fortunately it was the back of the knife, my grandfather had a big life, his head was wrong, and he only cut his ear, and the blood did not stop in an instant, but fortunately it was not life-threatening.
At that time, he, like everyone else in the village, hated and feared these beasts, and hated to cut them with a thousand knives.
So, when the opportunity to join the army presented itself, he joined without thinking about it.
A gun and a military uniform were the best way to protect your family in that era.
(Grandfather's military uniform).
1942 was a year when my grandfather looked nervous every time he recalled it.
That year, the Yellow River flooded their village.
In order to survive, the family put food and children on the door panel and pulled them in the water.
The catastrophe was so devastating that it took three years to flee for the disaster.
My grandfather's family of more than a dozen people was displaced for three years.
When the flood waters receded, they returned to their original land, found their own piece of land, and continued to cultivate and pass on the tradition.
(This year was made into a movie "1942").
Back at his former home, most of his former neighbors and villagers disappeared.
My grandfather's family was extremely lucky to survive.
Every time he described the three years of suffering, my grandfather's expression was extraordinarily calm, as if he was describing other people's stories.
At first, I thought it was his way of coping with trauma: ignorance.
Later, I thought that not complaining may be the background color of the low-level Chinese of their era.
Decide that everything is fate.
Whatever fate gives, whether good or bad, they accept it calmly.
(A still from the movie "1942").
After returning home, my grandfather also reached the age of studying.
Children in the countryside are so extravagant to study, and they are still in such an era when food and clothing cannot be solved.
The boys in the family go to school, there is less labor, and there is no shortage of mouths to eat.
But if there is no literate person in this family, then who should write letters, write genealogies, and write couplets?
My grandfather is the eldest grandson of the family, and he is also a smart person, so this matter naturally fell on his head.
The place where he studied was in Kaifeng.
Not long after studying, the war of liberation became more and more intense.
Kaifeng became a battlefield.
The war-torn Nanguan Post Office Building (**Kaifeng.com).
My grandfather still remembers that he was hit by an air raid in the middle of his class.
The whole class was terrified, and a group of people were taken by the teacher to the stairwell in the basement of the school to hide, and they did not dare to show up for 3 days and 3 nights.
By the time they returned to the surface trembling, purgatory was in sight.
Most of the buildings in the streets had collapsed, the walls were mottled with darkness as a reminder of what had happened to the city, and corpses could be seen everywhere in the streets.
But my grandfather and classmates didn't have time to be afraid, because there were planes hovering overhead from time to time.
A group of them ran out of the city.
The farther out of the city, the more corpses on the ground, and the last place to put their feet was gone.
They could only walk forward with the corpses on their feet.
The corpse's stomach was soft, and when he stepped down, he instantly dented, and his grandfather pulled out his foot and continued to run.
This memory left a huge psychological shadow on my grandfather.
Later, he studied medicine and resolutely refused to become a surgeon.
He did not want to touch corpses, but developed in "pharmacy".
(At that time, there was a shortage of finished medicines, and most of the medicines needed to be prepared by themselves, and my grandfather's job was to tinker with a lot of bottles and cans).
My grandfather fled back to his hometown.
A position as a teacher was found at the school.
Here he meets a noble man who changes his fate.
A Communist Party cadre.
At that time, there were too few educated young people in the hometown, and the appearance of my grandfather made that person's eyes shine.
He asked his grandfather what his vision was for the future.
My grandfather said that he still wanted to study more.
The man was very emotional after hearing this, and immediately wrote a letter of recommendation to his grandfather, asking him to go to "Woniu Mountain" to find Zhongyuan University to see if he could be admitted.
(I checked, Chung Yuan University was a wartime university, which later became the predecessor of other universities).
There was an opportunity to study, and my grandfather naturally refused to give up.
He thanked the man again and again, and then hurried home to his mother and told him that he wanted to go to school.
Without saying a word, his mother pulled out three sweet potatoes and stuffed them into his pocket, and took another quilt for him to carry.
In this way, my grandfather embarked on an unknown road, going to a school where he didn't even know the location and didn't know what he was studying.
He walked for several days and nights before he found the location of the university.
On the same day, I took the recommendation letter and went to take the exam.
After receiving the notice of admission, the admissions officer pulled him aside and tried to persuade him to study at another school.
That school is called "Yuwansu College".
At the current school level, it is a junior college.
This man kept telling his grandfather that what he studied in college was meaningless, and he would not need it in the future, and that he could learn technology in that school, and that he would have no problem eating in the future.
My grandfather was attracted by the word "technology".
For a rural low-level child who has experienced troubled times, famines, wars and catastrophes, nothing is more important than surviving.
With a technology, there are far fewer chances of starvation.
At that time, he didn't expect that his thought would make his life take a big turn.
(Grandpa and comrades-in-arms).
That school was run by the Second Field Army at that time.
After my grandfather entered school, he became a student soldier, received a military uniform, and received a gun.
Soon after the start of school, the Battle of Huaihai began.
The fighting on the front lines was extremely fierce.
My grandfather had just entered school, and he had to go to the battlefield to rescue the wounded.
About the memories of front-line rescue, every time my grandfather said it vaguely.
No matter how I tried to ask in a different way, he seldom went into details.
I think my grandfather "forgot" a lot about this paragraph.
Every time he talked about those tragic experiences, he was always extremely restrained, calm, serious, and he didn't see any emotion.
These are actually manifestations of post-traumatic stress disorder in war.
After the Battle of Huaihai.
My grandfather followed the army all the way to the southwest, studying while fighting.
After the liberation of Chengdu, he moved in the direction of **.
This one has been gone for three years.
It's hard for us to imagine the hardships of this journey.
I have been to Tibetan areas in Sichuan, and the scenery is extremely beautiful.
At that time, we were driving a small car, the trunk was full of supplies, and we were holding other people's detailed strategies in our hands.
Where to eat and where to sleep are all clearly planned.
But my grandfather's unit only had a quilt and a kettle, and there was a shortage of food.
I also have to guard against the enemy's sneak attack, and I don't know where I have to fight with others, and I have no time to see the scenery.
(I don't know if it's my grandfather or grandmother in this one, **very, very small).
(Potala Palace many years ago).
The plateau is cold, and heating is a big problem.
At night, they would drive the yaks they had bought from the Tibetans together, and everyone would sit in the yaks.
If there is no yak, you can only huddle together to keep warm, and it is really hugging together.
When I arrived at the snowy mountain, I dug a few holes in the snow, and a few people squeezed a hole, so that it would not be cold.
Relying on great perseverance, the large army finally came to the ** smoothly.
The People's Liberation Army not only liberated Lhasa, but also fought all the way to Bhutan, fought against the Indian army, and recovered more than 200 kilometers of land.
Tired of running around along the way, my grandfather also met his revolutionary love.
I met my grandmother.
At that time, my grandmother was still a student in the army, and my grandfather was her teacher.
The two belong to the "teacher-student love".
They didn't leave until my grandmother was pregnant with my mom.
(Grandpa and my grandmother).
In my grandfather, I saw the word "inheritance".
Some of the qualities that his fate had given him had reappeared in me.
In fact, what everyone inherits from the family is not only wealth and genes, but also character and destiny.
It can also be said to be a family style.
A child will often identify with the most powerful person in the family.
My family is a three-generation family that is not very typical, and in terms of personality, I am neither like my father nor like my mother.
It's more of a generational inheritance, much like a grandfather.
It's a power of "identity".
(Grandparents have always cherished **).
When I was young and ignorant, I always blamed my parents for my personality.
In the past few years, I have conducted in-depth research and found that my own personality, and the fate determined partly because of my character, can also be viewed at the larger family level.
In the big picture, I can see it much clearer than in the past.
Seeing your own illness.
See your own strength too.
We are influenced not only by our family of origin, but also by our matrilineal and patrilineal families, and by our ancestors.
If you have elderly people in your family who can talk, listen to their stories from the past.
See your own character, your own heart, your own destiny.