As a child, he was the one who left the deepest impression on the village.
No matter whether it was winter or summer, he always wore tattered clothes and a pair of rotten shoes on his feet. He was already in his 40s, but because his brain was not very smart, he didn't know what it was when he counted to 10, so no matter whether it was adults or children in the village, he was always called Haohao, which was his nickname. He didn't get annoyed when he heard it, and he didn't know what to say with a laugh.
My father never allowed me to call him by his name, asking me to call him uncle. It turned out that he was the uncle of my distant aunt.
I remember when I was a child, there was a quarrel with my aunt's son Tao. Although I was thin and weak at that time, my mouth was so powerful that Tao couldn't fight back. After a long time, I held back a sentence: "No matter how good you are, there is still a fool uncle."
As soon as he said that, I couldn't argue anymore, and ran home crying to learn his words to my grandma. Grandma didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Uncle Hao Hao was Tao's uncle, and Tao never called him uncle, but called him by his name, and sometimes even called him a fool.
I heard from the people in the village that Uncle Hao Hao had a privileged family since he was a child, and his brothers and sisters also had a successful career and lived a good life. But he was the only one who was not very smart. After his father passed away, the brothers and sisters all lived in the city, and only he and the old mother depended on each other at home, living a dim life. During the holidays, the brothers and sisters did not come back to visit.
Everyone saw that they were pitiful. Usually, whoever made delicious food would give some to their mother and son. Uncle Haohao also knew how to be grateful.
Haohao was very filial. His old mother was already 80 years old, and she used to take care of him. Ever since his mother was too old to move, he had imitated her and started cooking, doing laundry, and helping her turn over.
One day, his mother, who was lying in bed, sighed and said, "Try rolling out the noodles. How can you stand the batter all day long?" The next day, Uncle Haohao found his neighbor's aunt to teach him how to make noodles. The aunt taught him very seriously, but Uncle Haohao studied for a whole week, but he couldn't mix noodles, either because there was too much noodles or too much water. The aunt finally told him, "Don't learn, if you want to eat it in the future, tell me, I'll make it for you." But Uncle Haohao shook his head and said, "My mother wants to eat what I made, I must learn."
No one knew how much effort it took him to finally learn how to make noodles. When the noodles were brought to his mother, she cried and said, "My baby can cook, so smart, my mother didn't raise you for anything."
The elder brother of Hao Hao works in the provincial capital and is said to be the boss of a company. The age gap between him and Uncle Hao Hao is also very large. I heard that when Uncle Hao Hao was young, he encouraged other siblings to work for their parents more than once, asking them to throw away the burden of Uncle Hao Hao, but his mother did not agree. It may also be that for this reason, he has never seen him go home for many years, and other siblings do not come back very often. Even my aunt, who lives in the same village with us, rarely visits them.
For so many years, it was Uncle Haohao who had been accompanying his mother. Once, there was a married girl in the village, and Uncle Haohao went to clean the pig hair for the family. When the host thanked the guest, he served braised pork. Uncle did not eat a single bite, but wrapped two pieces of meat in his handkerchief. He said he would take it back to his mother for a taste, and her mother hadn't eaten meat for half a year. After the wedding banquet, the owner brought a bowl of meat for his mother to bring back, and his tears brushed down. He trotted all the way and ran home with the bowl. Looking at his back, everyone's eyes were sour, saying that he was not stupid. How can a filial son who respects his mother say that he is stupid?
Haohao had an illness. He had a cold, but because he didn't know how to take medicine, he got heavier and heavier. He lay down and couldn't get up, and everyone thought he couldn't do it. His mother lay in front of him, and the white-haired old man was trembling and crying all the time. Some old people in the village even started helping him prepare for the funeral. However, after sleeping for two days and two nights, Haohao woke up. He said that he couldn't let go of his mother, and he left, leaving his mother alone, so he had to live.
The days passed like this, from summer to winter, to the twelfth lunar month, the whole air was filled with a sweet smell, and people were busy preparing for the New Year's goods. Because the pigs were going to be killed, everyone thought that they hadn't seen Uncle Haohao for a long time, because in previous years, every family killed pigs, he always helped others to pluck the pig hair.
The neighbor went to his house to find him, but he couldn't knock for a long time. Finally, he pried open the door from the outside, only to find that Uncle Haohao's mother had passed away, and Uncle Haohao knelt in front of the bed, and when he touched it, he was dead.
Uncle Haohao's brothers and sisters all came back, and the funeral was very lively. The banquet was eaten table by table, and large bowls of braised pork were placed on the table, and the guests were all satisfied. As for me, I thought of Uncle Haohao running home with that bowl of braised pork.
It was at this time that everyone learned an amazing news. It turned out that Uncle Haohao picked him up. He was thrown to the roadside by his biological parents because of his mental retardation, and it was his mother picked him up later.
But everyone said that Uncle Hao Hao's mother picked up a dutiful son.