Mom’s grocery store

Retired leaves were all over the corner of the front yard. My mom’s grocery store is under that old mango tree. Only a few dozen roofs are encapsulated in a small hamlet. Most of the families also work in the fields and have one more thing in common: they always love and care for each other like blood.
My mother’s grocery store is about a few square meters, but essentials and other items are available. The wooden table with the legs up high is the type of bottled water; aluminum cabinet with glass surface is for storing instant noodles, monosodium glutamate, granulated sugar, cooking oil, peanuts; In the left corner of my cheek are two big logs that are bags filled with rice. When the fruit is ripe, my mother takes a few more to put in the front porch of the shop. In the dry season, there is more chilled water, sugarcane juice cart for passengers on the road.

The opening hours of the shop can be at five o’clock in the morning or sometimes earlier. At five o’clock in the morning, Uncle Ba called to buy a pack of cigarettes. There are times when Mr. Bay comes over to buy tea bags and comes back to drink in the morning. Sometimes the night has completely sunk, the surrounding landscape has been quiet, the aunt of the two houses also often calls the door, buys a few packets of noodles, she complains that she has nothing to eat in the afternoon, so she “feels sorry”. My mother’s “notebook” is very thick. It was a student notebook, my mother used it to record who still owes some money from the shop. Every family in my neighborhood works in the fields, and it takes more than three months to harvest rice when there is a shortage of rice, fish sauce, monosodium glutamate, and sugar, so they have to “buy on credit” and wait until the rice season. Perhaps my mother’s way of doing business is very special, so when she has money or is short of money, everyone visits her shop. If you sell mango, add more mango, if you sell eggplant, add some onions, when you buy garlic, my mother will add chili. And yet, when anyone goes to buy things, carrying a child, when leaving, mom often carries a candy or a cake. The kids in my neighborhood love hanging out in front of my mom’s grocery store. When they were tired, my mother would scoop them up for a refreshing cup of iced tea. They like to enjoy a glass of shaved ice made by my mother. Because if you have money, you can pay it immediately, if you don’t have money, ask for another meal. Supermarkets are now full of big markets, but the whole neighborhood never forgets to support my mother’s grocery store. Because of the kilograms of “gratitude” rice when there was a shortage of rice, I sold it to the season. Or the meager tamarind to cook sour soup, my mother said, just a little bit, don’t take money. Or how can they forget that my mother’s love has taken all the money from the sale and lent it to Aunt Tu to take him to the hospital for an acute appendectomy… No matter how life develops, the village friendship is always cultivated as a beautiful cultural feature of the river delta of my hometown. People can’t live forever with nostalgia, but good memories can’t be forgotten. My four brothers and sisters have grown up with their mother’s hands, from the income of a small roadside shop. Miss my mom’s grocery store!