The Day My Father Celebrated His Fortieth Birthday (发表于10年前)

 时间: 2014-01-17 11:38am
Today is my birthday. Now I am a woman of forty. Last night my eleven-year-old little boy asked me shyly, “Mom, what I am going to do about your birthday? I don’t have your birthday present ready. I haven’t got a chance to go out with J. alone yet.” [1] (J. is my boyfriend) I gently smiled at him, “Oh you got me a present already,” I then pointed to the fridge, “see those wonton in the fridge – you made half of them. That’s your present: you always help me do the house chores, and I treat the delicious wonton as my birthday gift from you.” His little smooth face lighted, murmuring unconfidently, “Really?” So I gave him a big hug and whispered “I love you, baby”, followed by a little kiss on the cheek.

This morning I was thinking about the dinner menu. I like seafood but my two men (you know, my son and my boyfriend) do not touch it. To be exact, my son does eat some fish, only when it was wrapped up and named “fish and chips”. But for God’s sake, if a fish dish on the table that does not have a head or a tail, I mean, without its full length, it can be hardly called a fish in my notion of a fish dish. So I knew for sure we were not going to have a steaming fish for dinner, however I could not help starting to fancy those nice freshly steamed fish I used to have on my dinner table no so many years ago. Immediately I recalled the fish and bone on my father’s fortieth birthday.

Unlike my younger sister, I did not like fish at all when I was a little girl. I had been a slender slouchy melancholy young lady all the years before fourteen. I gained so much weight at fourteen, but that is another story I do not want to share. Anyhow, despite the fact that I hated to touch the ugly slimy creature, I had noticed my father was so fond of it.

Back to thirty years ago, the whole country [2] (mainland China) is in poverty. Most of the necessaries were rationed, including rice. City residents were entitled a small coupon book by household on which stated how much rice, or cooking oil, or pork you were allowed to purchase monthly at a regular price. If you wanted more, you had to buy from private sellers at a way higher price. In 1983, my parents were not professors yet; whoever was teaching before 1986 was addressed as a teacher because the Ministry of Education in China did not start ranking instructors. Their salaries were pretty shabby, lower than general labors. My mother told me that my father once went to a student’s house to offer a two-hour private lesson and came happily home with four soft sweet-smelling buns in return. My parents worked six days a week at their danwei, [3] (my father taught in a college, and my mother taught in a high school) but we were still very poor, not enough money to own two bicycles. When the country policy loosened a little and allowed citizens to work on their spare time, my parents sought every opportunity to teach at different places, evenings and Sundays. They spent scarce time on communicating with me, so I had to use dinner time to tell them as much what happened in school as I could, and kept grabbing their attention from my sister who is so adorable and pretty according to my mother. I was so not interested in what I threw into my mouth that many times I could not even remember what I had eaten right after dinner. To be honest with you, I had treated my dinner time as a show time and had been carefully observing my parents’ reaction so I could jump the topic in time to fascinate them.

Fish, normally weighing one pound, was not frequently presented on our dinner table – perhaps once a couple weeks in summer and autumn, and once a month in spring and winter. When we had a fish on table, my father always earnestly asked me and my younger sister to try it. “In my hometown,” he would repeat, “there is a famous saying: ‘Daddy gets the head/son gets the meat/and little tail is saved/to the poor mother.’ That’s parental love, you know? Eat the fish; be care of the fish bone!” I then would be nodding my head hard as a sign of understanding and reluctantly taking an appreciating bite.

Sometimes my mother would pick some fish fillet and put in my bowl. “Fish is nutritious, and people who eat fish are smart. Eat it; you are too skinny.” She did not bother doing the same thing to my younger sister because there was no need; my sister had no prejudice on any food with adequate soy sauce and sugar.

I had a feeling that my father was never really contented with his share of the fish dish. I had noticed how his chopsticks went directly to the central part of the fish, and then diverted clumsily to the side before it landed, accompanying with a momentary hesitation and a self-conscious smile. And, as if to prove my judgment, he always took the long pale spinal bone to the kitchen and burnt it on a small coal stove after all the meat part was gone. When he was back, that main bone was partial black, looked crispy and greasy, and spreading an odd smell, stinky and fragrant. My eyes were full of sorry each time I watched him chewing the burnt fish spinal bone carefully. One day he caught my eyes, so he explained that he honestly loved the burnt fish spinal bone, and its taste was so wonderful. He did not invite me to take a bite to prove the ‘unique wonderful taste’, however next time I saw him eating the burnt bone, I was happy for him that he could enjoy such an unusual thing; and he seemed did enjoy it.

My father’s birthday is in the beginning of winter. In the early winter of 1983, he invited one friend to come over to dinner. When we started eating, I heard the guest saying that he felt so sorry he did not know it was my father’s birthday; otherwise he would have brought him a nice present. Immediately I realized I should give my father a birthday gift, even though I was only nine years old and I did not have any pocket money. For a big girl in grade 4, words like “happy birthday; I wish you a healthy and long-life” should be tagged with something tangible, something real and he would like. But what was that?

I had been always so proud of my ability of quick thinking, and for the first time the fish on dish looked pretty and shining in my eyes. Its white eyeballs were watching me and I heard it taunting “Dare you take my spinal bone to kitchen and burn it?”

I ate slowly and waited patiently until the meat were gone, then I briskly put the fish spinal bone in my bowl when the adults were discussing something exciting, moving to the kitchen. My heart beat so fast and I had to hold my breath. Forgot to tell you, we lived in the ground level of a two-storey apartment, and our kitchen and bathroom were not inside the apartment, they were all adjacent. I found a kettle on the coal stove and it was too heavy for me to remove, so I secretly went to my neighbor’s and ask my girl friend to help me. She was my age, actually one month younger, but was way taller and stronger. She was so curious about what I was doing, so I said: “Stay with me. I’d like to show you how a nice daughter I am!” I used the fire-tongs to clip the bone, cautiously put it on the stove, watching carefully to make sure both sides were heated evenly and not overcooking. I did not smell anything stinky at all when doing it, only the fragrance.

I came into the living room followed by my friend. By the dining table. My father was still talking with his friend. Like a surprise I presented the sweet-smelling cooked bone to my father. “Here you are! Daddy, happy birthday to you!” My father was shocked for a moment, and he was only looking at the bone while I was a little bit upset waiting for his reaction. Then he asked, “What’s this?”

“Fish bone! Your favorite! I made it for you today!”

“Nonsense. Take it away, I don’t eat this.”

“How come? You told me you liked to eat it!” My ears were burning.

“Silly girl! Your memory is wrong. I don’t eat this.”

I turned my face to my mother; she knew I was not lying. But my mother was only smiling. “Naughty girl,” she explained to the guest, “she is just playing with her father.” Then she soothed me: “Leave the fish bone on the table. You want to play with your friend? You can play outside for half an hour.” So I came out the living room, disappointed and sad. When my friend asked me what we were going to play, I had an urge to cry.

That was winter of 1983, and I was nine years old girl, lonely and short.