青柳诊所手记47

转眼就是深秋季节了，我常常会坐在诊所的窗前，痴痴地看着那些层层叠叠的深红与浅黄。

有个病人到我们诊所来，他一见到我们就说：“其实我来的主要目的就是跟你们聊聊，因为我知道你们跟我一样，会注意到空中那些飘舞的红叶。”

今天诊所只开半天门，还差五分钟就要关门了，一个妇女却匆匆忙忙奔了进来。大师兄已经在清洁了，他看了看我，无奈地笑一笑。

其实也算不上什么急诊，不过是一个急性面瘫而已。做完治疗之后她说已经好了百分之八九十了。我舒了一口气。这天是很重要的一天，我要去公墓拜访去世的父亲。他刚刚过生日，头几天太忙了，没有抽得出时间去拜访，今天无论如何得去看看了。

坐地铁时天气还好，可一出地铁站就碰上了瓢盆大雨。有相当长的一段路要走，我们只带着一把小小的伞，不一会儿，就已经淋得够呛的了。我的鞋子也不防雨，我一边走，一边听到脚趾头下面发出咯吱咯吱的声音。

这个雨中的场景让我记起多年前的一幕。我那时才不过6岁的样子，弟弟想跟我分吃我手中的地瓜干。我弄不断它，就把厨房里切菜的刀拿了过来，一刀砍下去，结果我左手的食指也随之掉在了切菜板上，立刻血流满地。

父母都不在家中，吓呆了的弟弟在大声哭泣。我竟然知道要从抽屉里找出干净的纱布，将切断的指头用纱布紧紧地缠绕在手上，然后才跑到院子里大声哭叫，寻求邻居的帮助。现在想想，我今天做一名中医师实在不是一件偶然的事，多年前，我的性格中已经显现有冷静坚韧的一面了。

那天父亲一回来就背着我去医院。狂风暴雨，天气出奇地恶劣。我一边哭一边把脸埋在父亲的脖子里，手上的血把他的衬衣都染红了。随着一声震耳欲聋的霹雳声，天空裂开了一个巨大的洞，雨水便从那个洞里决堤似的汹涌澎湃出来，落在地上的哪里哪里就冒出一个深坑儿。父亲给我套了一件雨衣，他自己却没有任何防雨的设备。他一步一步走得非常艰难，鞋子有时候深深陷进泥土中，他不得不弯下腰去使劲把它们拔出来。

因为父亲，我的左手食指保住了，尽管它现在还有一个很深的刀痕。

而今天，我就用我的左手握着给父亲的花，将湿漉漉的它们放在墓地上。

父亲一辈子都是一无所有，现在他走了，我清理他的东西，也还不足以一书包的遗物。人走之前有时会有回光返照的现象。父亲也有。他走前一星期前还靠在床上，向我平静地口述他的家族故事，我坐在他的床前，把它们一个字一个字地键入我的电脑里。

“我没有什么可留给你们的，就只有发生在我生命中的这些小浪花了，“他抱歉地微笑着说。

有一个朋友告诉我，他的母亲回光返照的那一刻，她把孩子们叫到跟前，交代他们无论如何要去催收某个人多年前曾欠她的一笔债。

这天晚上，回到家中，我在泡脚的时候，心里忽然想：当一个人生的时候，全心地爱着，全心地度过生命中的每一分钟，那么，就算他一无所有，是不是也是个不平凡的人？

        Whispering of Willows 47

It is already half way through autumn. When our clinic is quiet, I sit in front of the window, gazing at the surrounding layers of deep red and light yellow.

A patient came up to us and said, "Actually, the main purpose of my appointment is to chat with you, because I know that you, like me, notice the red leaves flying in the air."

Today, our clinic was only open for half a day. Five minutes before closing, a lady rushed in, asking for our help most earnestly. Dr. Daniel, already doing his routine cleaning, looked at me, giving me a wry smile.

The lady had acute facial paralysis. After the treatment, she said it already felt 80 to 90 percent better. I breathed a sigh of relief as I was ready to leave. It was a very important day. I was going to visit my deceased father at the cemetery. His birthday had just passed, and I was too busy to go visit with him. I knew I must make time today.

The weather was fine when we took the skytrain, but it rained mercilessly as soon as we got out of the station. We were still quite a distance from the cemetery, and we had to go on foot. Sharing a small umbrella, we were soon soaked. My shoes were not rainproof, and I could hear a squishing sound coming from between my toes as I waded through the flooded ground.

This drew my mind back to a scene many years ago. I was only about 6 years old, and my younger brother wanted to share the dried sweet potato I had in my hand. I couldn't break it, so I took out the kitchen knife to cut it. In a flash a large portion of my left index finger fell on the cutting board and immediately blood was running on the counter.

My parents were not at home at the time, and my younger brother was frozen there watching and wailing. I stood still, with a pale face, and fumbled a clean gauze from the drawer, picked up the severed portion of my finger and wrapped the gauze tightly around my hand. Only when this was done, I ran outside, and cried for our neighbour’s help. Thinking about this now, I realize it is not a coincidence that I became a Chinese Medicine practitioner. For all of these years, in extreme circumstances, I had demonstrated the calm and tough side of my character.

As soon as my father came back that day, he piggybacked me to the hospital. It was a stormy day, raining cats and dogs. Burying my face in my father's neck I cried the whole way, and the blood from my hand dyed his shirt red. With a deafening thunderclap, a huge hole opened up in the sky, where torrential rain gushed out and wind whipped the ground, leaving deep holes here and there. I was wearing my father’s raincoat, leaving him without any rainproof gear at all. Every step was a torture; his shoes sometimes sank deeply into the mud, making him need to bend down and pull them out with force.

Thanks to my father, my left index finger was saved, although it still bears a permanent scar.

And today, I held the wet flowers for my father in my left hand to place them neatly on his grave.

My father collected nothing in his life. When he died, I cleaned up his things, realizing that a backpack easily contained all of his belongings. Before a person dies, often people experience so-called Terminal Lucidity. My father also experienced this. A week before he died, he was leaning on his bed, calmly dictating his family story to me, where I sat, keying every word into my computer.

"I have nothing to leave you, “said he apologetically with a smile, “only these wavelets in my river of life, to share with you – events that happened in my life."

Conversely, a friend told me that when his mother was near death, she called all her children over, only to urge them to go collect a debt long owed to her by a friend from many years ago.

When I returned home from the cemetery, soaking my feet in herbal water, suddenly a thought leapt in my mind: When a person lives his life wholeheartedly, loves wholeheartedly, and spends every minute of his life wholeheartedly, then, even if he has accumulated nothing, he is still a rich blessing, isn’t he?