By Hai Dong

Father and His Old Mandolin

By Hai Dong

M y father was a self-taught mandolin player.He was one of the best string instrument players in our town.He could not read music,but if he heard a tune a few times,he could play it.

When he was younger,he was a member of a small country music band.They would play at local dances and on a few occasions would play for the local radio station.He often told us how he had auditioned and earned a position in a band that featured man as their lead singer.He told the family that after he was hired he never went back.Dad was a very religious man. He stated that there was a lot of drinking and cursing the day of his audition and he did not want to be around that type of environment.

Occasionally,Dad would get out his mandolin and play for the family.Wethree children:Hai Sha,Hai Hua and I,would often sing along folk songs suchasMyHome,theBeautiful Prairie,Alamuhan.We learned the words to the hymn when we were very young,and would sing it with Dad when he would play and sing.He knew we enjoyed the song and the program and would often get out the mandolin after the program was over.I could never get over how he could play the songs so well after only hearing them a few times.I loved to sing, but I never learned how to play the mandolin.This is something I regret to this day.

Dad loved to play the mandolin for hisfamily.Heknewweenjoyed singing and hearing him play.He was like that.If he could give pleasure to others,he would,especially his family.He was always there,sacrificing his time and efforts to see that his family had enough in their life.I had to mature into a man and have children of my own before I realized how much he had sacrificed.

I joined the Air Force in January of 1962.Whenever I would come home on leave,I would ask Dad to play the mandolin.Nobody played the mandolin like my father.He could touch your soul with the tones that came out of that old mandolin.He seemed to shine when he was playing.You could see his pride in his ability to play so well for his family.

His father was a farmer and sharecropped a farm for the man who owned the property.In 1950,our family moved from the farm.Dad had gained employment at the local prima ry school.When the school closed in August of 1957,he had to seek other employment.He worked for the production team in my hometown,western China's Gansu Province and then the junior middle school in my home town.While working at the junior middle school,he was involved in an accident,and Dad got the third index finger of his left hand mashed.The doctor who operated on the finger could not save it,and Dad ended up having the tip of the finger amputated. He didn't lose enough of the finger where it would stop him picking up anything,but it did impact his ability to play the mandolin.

After the accident,Dad was reluc tant to play the mandolin.He felt that he could not play as well as he had before the accident.When I came home on leave and asked him to play he wouldmakeexcusesforwhyhe couldn't play.Eventually,we would wear him down and he would say "Okay,but remember,I can't hold down on the strings the way I used to" or"Since the accident to this finger I can't play as good".For the family it didn't make any difference that Dad couldn't play as well.We were just glad that he would play.When he played the old mandolin it would carry us back to a cheerful,happier time in our lives.The old songs would again be heard in the little town.

In August of 1993 my father was diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer. He chose not to receive chemotherapy treatments so that he could live out the rest of his life in dignity.About a week before his death,we asked Dad if he would play the mandolin for us. He made excuses but said"okay".He knew it would probably be the last time he would play for us.He tuned up the old mandolin and played a few notes.When I looked around,there was not a dry eye in the family.We saw before us a quiet humble man with an inner strength that comes from knowing God,and living with him in one's life.Dad would never play the mandolin for us again.We felt at the time that he wouldn't have enough strength to play,and that makes the memory of that day even stronger.Dad was doing something he had done all his life,giving.As sick as he was,he was still pleasing others.Dad sure could play that Mandolin!

(FromGansu PictorialNov.5,2010. Translation:Jin Yu.Illustration:Jia Lin)