Chapter 8

Passing on to the next generation

The autumn wind of 1998 swept across the countryside of Suining. The village school's new teaching building glowed with a pale yellow brick hue under the sun, replacing the leaky adobe classrooms of the past. Bright glass panes lined the windows, the desks and chairs were brand-new wooden ones, and even the blackboard was painted with?smooth green. This year marked Grandma's fortieth year of teaching. Her hair had turned as white as winter frost and snow, yet she still arrived at the school?promptly at 6:30 every morning, wiping the blackboard?with her rough palms. Her movements were as similar as tending to the chopping board at home.

Yuan Yuan, a young teacher newly assigned to the school, had just graduated from a normal university. Dressed in a crisp suit, she stood at the classroom door at a loss. Faced with a group of first-graders rolling on the floor and crying to go home,she shouted: "Stop making noise! Sit down quietly!"?The childrenturned a deaf ear. Some tugged at her sleeves, others kicked their legs while lying on the ground. Grandma happened to pass by with a thermos. Instead of stepping in to interrupt, she leaned against the door and watched silently.

When Yuan Yuan?ran out of the classroom with red eyes, Grandma walked over and handed her a cup of warm water. "Children are not soldiers. Rather than orders, a way that follows their nature fits?them."?She pulled Yuan Yuan?back into the classroom,not scolding?any child,offered a few fruit candies wrapped in colored paper from her pocket. They were gifts from students who had visited her a few days earlier, and she had been saving them. Squatting down, she said to the little boy who was crying the loudest: "Look at this candy wrapper, doesn't it look like the butterfly you picked on the field path yesterday? The teacher?will teach you to fold it into a butterfly, okay?"?The little boy's cries gradually subsided, and he nodded with tearful eyes. Seeing this, the other children swarmed around. The commotion in the classroom turned into chattering curiosity.

Grandma turned to Yuan Yuan?with a smile and whispered: "Country children are used to being wild. Maybe you think they are?ignorant of rules, but the truth is they haven't found something that captures their attention."?She taught Yuan Yuan?to turn the new characters in the textbooks into ballads familiar to village children. For example, when teaching the character "rice", she sang "Rice ears grow in the fields, bend down to harvest the grains". When teaching "ox",let the children?imitate?the sound of an ox mooing. She also handed Yuan Yuan?her thirty-year-old lesson plans. The notebook with a worn cowhide cover was filled with dense annotations on every page: a boy has a short?attention span, so we can use corn cobs to spell characters to attract him, a girl's?family is poor, pay attention to ask her more questions to encourage her...?When Yuan Yuan?opened the lesson plans, she found that each class session was marked with specific time allocations. There were even contingency plans for unexpected situations, such as "If it rains,it is perfect for teaching?'The Rainy Alley'". At?that moment, Grandma did not realize she was passing on more than just a lesson plan. She was planting a seed of inheritance.

Days slipped away amid the loud morning readings and lesson preparations in the twilight. Grandma's mentorship never ceased. She would let Yuan Yuan?prepare lessons first, then sit in the back row of the classroom to listen to her teach. After class, instead of pointing out flaws directly, she guided Yuan Yuan?to think with questions: "Why do you think that child wandered off just now? Was the content you talked about too far from his life?"?She took Yuan Yuan?on home visits. When encountering stubborn parents who said "Studying is useless, better to herd cattle early", Grandma did not argue with them. She just held her parents'?hand and said: "Look at Xiao Ming, whom I taught. He is now a doctor in the city and comes to see me every year. Children are not born destined to stay in the countryside. Rather, they depend on whether someone points them to a different path."?As the parents listened, their eyes gradually softened.

With the arrival of the retirement notice, the days spent on?the campus began to enter the countdown. Grandma walked around the campus every day, touching the window sills of the classrooms and looking at the old pagoda tree on the playground. She had planted it with her own hands when she first started teaching, and now it was lush and leafy. On her retirement day, the school held a simple ceremony. Students came from all directions, some bringing vegetables grown at home, others holding notebooks full of blessings. On behalf of the young teachers, Yuan Yuan?gave a speech. As she spoke, she cried: "What Grandma Teacher taught me is not profound teaching skills, but rather the sincerity of putting students in your heart."?Grandma took the flowers, did not say much, just walked to the platform and gently touched the blackboard. Tears fell on the emerald green lacquer, spreading into small wet marks.

The time after retirement did not dilute Grandma's concern for the children. Instead, it deepened this obsession. Every Wednesday afternoon, she would appear at the village school on time, carrying a cloth bag on her back filled with candies and a few fairy-tale books. The left-behind children had long been looking forward to her arrival. When they saw her figure from afar, they would run over and shout "Grandma Teacher"?around her. She sat on a stone bench on the playground, tutoring the children with their homework, teaching them to write their own names, and drawing simple figures on the ground with branches. There was a little girl named Niuniu whose parents worked outside. She was introverted and unwilling to speak. Grandma told her a small story every day and taught her to draw with colored pens. Three months later, Niuniu not only took the initiative to speak, but also drew a picture for Grandma. In the picture, a white-haired old woman was holding the hands of a group of children, with the village school's new teaching building in the background and the sky painted extremely blue.

As time passed, the seed of inheritance planted years ago had taken root and sprouted in her heart, turning into an inseparable concern. Once, Yuan Yuan?asked Grandma: "You're already retired, why do you still go to all this trouble to come here?"?Grandma sat on the stone bench. The sun shone through the pagoda tree leaves on her white hair, casting a soft light. She looked at the children playing and laughing not far away, and said softly: "Teaching is not a job that can be retired from. Instead, it is a concern engraved in the heart. As long as these children still need me, I will come."

As the sun set, Grandma got up to go home. The children held onto her sleeves reluctantly. She turned around and waved. The children saw her?figure gradually disappear at the corner of the village road. Behind her were the children's clear cries and the fragrance of flowerslingering in the wind. This original aspiration for education, persisted for forty years, was light yet lasting. It grew more mellow with the passage of time.