I spent my childhood on a construction corps farm in the Ili region of Xinjiang. Although life is hard, "teenagers do not know the taste of sorrow". The deepest memory of childhood is the happiness brought by the heavy snow.
The winter in Ili, Xinjiang, was particularly cold in the 1960s and 1970s. Temperatures are often minus 20 to 30 degrees. There are also many days of heavy snowfall. Sometimes, it snowed so hard overnight that I couldn't even push the door open. In the early morning, I was still lying on the warm bed, and I heard my father brushing the snow in front of the door. I also hurried up, put on my cotton clothes and pants, put on my gloves and scarf, opened the door, and cleared the snow with my father. At that time, the adobe house where I lived could not withstand the heavy snow, and I had to climb up to the roof to clear the snow. My father never let me go up and said, "It's too dangerous." And when I was young, I helped the ladder and watched my father carefully go up, extremely scared, and my heart was always hanging. It wasn't until my father swept all the snow off the roof that I ran to hold the ladder and watched my father settle down, and my heart landed.
On such a snowy day, parents will not go to work. Sometimes schools are closed. In this way, our family can enjoy the warmth and warmth together. I like to sit in front of the window and watch the snowflakes flying in the air outside, flying, falling on the roof, falling on the treetops, falling on the windowsill. Outside is a silvery white world.
And in the house, there is peace. My mother was either busy baking potato chips for us, or sautéing melon seeds or steaming pumpkins. The enticing aroma filled the room. The father took a child's book and leaned back on the bed to read it. My brothers and sisters and I were flipping through small picture books together, eating fragrant baked potato chips, bumping melon seeds, eating soft sticky sweet pumpkins, full of happiness; sometimes, my mother sat on a chair, stitching and threading us to make new clothes, or the soles of our shoes, I liked to sit next to her, watching the flying needles and threads, enjoying the love my mother gave me. The hearth of the home was lit with fire and radiated warmth.
Such a winter, such a snowy day, is like a picture deep in my mind. Whether I am at the end of the world or in adversity, this picture emerges, warms me and encourages me, and allows me to move forward.