On April 27, 1969, Shanghai Zhiqing Zhang Hongxing and more than a dozen junior high school classmates came to The Fine Scale River Commune in Yanji County, Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture, Jilin Province, and thirteen of them were assigned to join the fifth production team of the Xiangyang Brigade.
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In late April in the northeast, the weather was warm and cold, and after Zhang Hongxing and they came to the Xiangyang Brigade, Captain Zhang of the Fifth Team divided the thirteen Zhiqing into three groups and temporarily went to the members' homes to borrow them, and Zhang Hongxing and his five male Zhiqing temporarily lived in the home of the member Li Dongming.
Li Dongming's daughter-in-law died unexpectedly many years ago, and he lives with his two sons. The Zhiqing came to his house to borrow it, and Li Dongming asked his two sons to move to the main room to live with him, gave the two newly built West Wing rooms to the Zhiqing to live in, and also gave Zhang Hongxing the reed mat that he had been reluctant to lay at home. Looking at the living conditions of Li Dongming's family and his two sons, the intellectuals are very sympathetic to Li Dongming and very distressed about Li Dongming.
The eldest of the two sons of Li Dongming's family is called Li Jifu, who was eighteen years old, and the second was called Li Jilu, who was seventeen years old at the time, and the two sons of his family have some problems with their IQ, slower than others, and do not like to talk and talk. Li Jilu is also stronger, he can also count, he knows that ten plus ten equals twenty, fifty plus fifty equals one hundred, and he also knows to greet acquaintances. Li Jifu doesn't know how to count, you stretch out five fingers he knows it's five, and then stick out five fingers, he doesn't know how many. Although the brothers have a bit of a problem with their IQ, they are very powerful, they will carry water, they will go up to the mountains to collect firewood, and they can also go down to the ground to do farm work, and the brothers can only do some hard work without technical content, the male members earn ten divisions of labor a day, and the team only gives his brothers five divisions of labor, which is less than two divisions of labor than female members.
Later, the intellectuals learned that the IQs of Li Jifu and Li Jilu followed their mothers. Li Dongming's wife is a half-woman, who can't even cook rice, can eat three big nests in one meal, and can drink three bowls of corn batter. In the early autumn of the year when Li Jilu was eight years old, a heavy rainstorm came unexpectedly, and Li Dongming's daughter-in-law actually took advantage of Li Dongming's absence to lead her two children to the river to catch fish in the torrential rain, and as a result, she was swept away by the turbulent river, and the two children would have died if they had not been rescued by the villagers who came in time. Since then, Li Dongming has lived a difficult life with his two sons, and life is very difficult.
Zhang Hongxing settled down in their accommodation, bought pots and pans and other daily necessities, rested at home for two days, and then threw themselves into the spring ploughing and spring sowing production work. Captain Zhang saw that the zhiqing could not cook, so he arranged a female member to temporarily help Zhang Hongxing learn to cook, and the help and teaching time was half a month, and after half a month, the zhiqing had to learn to cook by themselves.
On the first day of participating in the labor, it was to transport soil and fertilizer to the south of the village, and considering that the young people would not pick up the burden, Captain Zhang arranged for Zhang Hongxing and the members to use the rack car to pull the dung together, and the three people had a rack car, and Zhang Hongxing and Li Jifu and a member of the club were separated together. When the empty car returned, Li Jifu rushed to pull the car and let them both sit on the car, and he pulled the rack car alone and ran back to the village. Looking at Li Jifu, who had a hot face and a smirk, Zhang Hongxing couldn't say what it was like in his heart. In the morning, Zhang Hongxing pulled five trucks of soil and fertilizer, and the other rack cars were pulled four times.
After the end of the work every day, Li Jifu rushed to fetch water, first filled the water tank of the Zhiqing people, and then filled the water tank of his family, Zhang Hongxing wanted to carry water, Li Jifu did not let it, and hid the bucket.
Not long after, Li Jifu and Li Jilu became familiar with Zhang Hongxing, and sometimes took the initiative to greet the Zhiqing, although his brothers' language expression ability was not good, but when they saw the Zhiqing, they smiled and asked: "Have you eaten?" ”
Later, at the request of Zhang Hongxing, Captain Zhang added two divisions of labor to each of The li jifu brothers, and the brothers, like the female members, could earn seven divisions of labor a day.
That autumn, during a break from work, Zhang Hongxing was playing with a young member of the club, who threw Zhang Hongxing to the ground. Li Jifu, who was sitting on the field to rest, suddenly ran over, picked up the young member, fell the ground, and picked up a stone and smashed it on the leg of the member. Since then, the members of the society have not dared to play with Zhang Hongxing, and everyone is afraid that Li Jifu and his brothers will come out to help Zhang Hongxing.
Also in the autumn of that year, Li Jilu went to the neighbor's house to steal the plums from the tree, and was caught by the neighbors, Li Dongming was very angry, he picked up the flat burden and beat Li Jilu, while beating him, he asked him: "Why did you pick so many plums?" "Give, give to Zhiqing to eat." Li Jilu choked and said. Seeing that scene, Zhang Hongxing burst into tears, he went forward and grabbed the flat burden in Li Dongming's hand, and took Li Jilu's shoulder and went home.
After the autumn of 1971, the team built houses for the Zhiqing and established the Zhiqing Collective Household, and Zhang Hongxing and they all moved to the collective household to eat and live. After the Zhiqing moved away, Li Jifu and Li Jilu went to the Zhiqing Collective Household to play with Zhang Hongxing after dinner, and when the brothers came, they sat on the edge of the kang for a while, did not say anything, sat for a while and went home, almost every day. Later, one of the Zhiqing was annoyed and said a few words to his brothers, and the two brothers did not come to the Zhiqing collective household to play.
In the Spring Festival of 1972, Zhang Hongxing went back to Shanghai to visit relatives for the Spring Festival, returning from Shanghai, he took Shanghai specialties to Li Dongming's house to visit the door, Li Jifu brothers saw Zhang Hongxing, not to mention how close they were, when Zhang Hongxing left, Li Dongming pulled two hares out of the snow pile in the courtyard, and had to let Zhang Hongxing take it back to the Zhiqing collective household, he smiled and said: "This is set in the forest before the Spring Festival, we are not willing to eat in the New Year, and we have been keeping it for you." ”
In the days that followed, Zhang Hongxing often came to Li Dongming's house to play for a while in his free time to see the poor father and son. Once Zhang Hongxing came to visit the door, Li Dongming went to the outhouse (kitchen) and boiled two eggs for Zhang Hongxing, not for Zhang Hongxing to eat. Embarrassed, Zhang Hongxing tearfully ate a boiled egg and secretly put another boiled egg aside. Although an egg is not worth much money, Li Dongming's father and son have never been willing to eat boiled eggs, and his hens have to accumulate eggs to be exchanged for money at the market, and the money for eating oil and buying salt is saved in this way.
That autumn, Li Dongming asked the matchmaker to introduce JiFu to the object, the girl had a leg disability, her appearance was not good-looking, and she was only one meter and four meters tall, li Dongming felt that no matter how good it was, if he could marry a daughter-in-law to his son, he would be solid in his heart. On the day of the blind date, Zhang Hongxing also lent his new clothes to Li Jifu to wear, but the woman's family was unwilling, one was that his family was poor, the second was that his family did not have a hostess, and the third was that Ji Fumu was slow.
In the winter of 1973, Zhang Hongxing successfully passed the conscription physical examination and political examination, and he put on the green uniform and became a glorious soldier of the People's Liberation Army. On the first day of leaving the Xiangyang Brigade, Zhang Hongxing gave li Dongming his bedding, warm water bottles, washbasins and extra clothes to Li Dongming's family, and also gave Li Dongming ten pounds of national food stamps. That day, Li Dongming gave Zhang Hongxing five yuan, saying that he wanted him to buy water to drink on the road, Zhang Hongxing did not want it, Li Dongming cried, he choked and said: "You are going to become a soldier, this is a good thing, it is a happy event, five yuan is not much, this is my little intention, you don't accept it, you just look down on my family." You're leaving, I feel strange in my heart, if you don't accept these five dollars, my heart is even more uncomfortable. ”
Zhang Hongxing was not good enough to resign, and he accepted the five yuan with tears. When leaving the Xiangyang Brigade, the villagers and Li Dongming's father and son had been sending Zhang Hongxing to the main road at the mouth of the village, and everyone was thankful to say goodbye. Looking at the tearful appearance of Li Dongming's father and son, Zhang Hongxing had a faint feeling of pain in his heart.
After serving as a soldier for more than ten years, Zhang Hongxing returned to Shanghai and was assigned to the public security sub-bureau as a director. When he was in the army, Zhang Hongxing sent money and clothes to Li Dongming's family, and also received a reply letter from Li Dongming looking for someone else. Later, because he was busy at work, he also broke off contact with Li Dongming's family.
In the autumn of 2020, Zhang Hongxing and the five Shanghai Zhiqing who had settled in the Xiangyang Brigade returned to their second hometown to visit the villagers, saw the changes that had taken place in the second hometown, and everyone was very happy in their hearts, the villagers' lives were rich, everyone lived a good life, can the Zhiqing be unhappy in their hearts.
Accompanied by the village director, Zhang Hongxing and they came to Li Dongming's house. Li Dongming's house is very beautiful, it is newly built with the village's funds, and the four houses are spacious and bright, but the yard is dirty. Although the ninety-two-year-old Li Dongming has a strong hunchback, he can still take care of himself in life and remember Zhang Hongxing, the intellectual youth of Shanghai. But when it comes to other intellectuals, Li Dongming has no impression. Li Dongming's two sons were beaten with bare sticks, Li Jifu and Li Jilu's hair was also white, his brothers' bodies were OK, they could also cultivate responsible fields, and they recognized Zhang Hongxing at the first time, but his brothers' words were less and their reactions were slow.
Seeing this poor grandfather, Zhang Hongxing felt very uncomfortable in his heart, and he was really worried about the future life of this grandfather. Zhang Hongxing expressed his worries to the village chief, and the village chief smiled and said, "Although you can rest assured of this problem, both of them have a minimum insurance and also have rural cooperative medical insurance." The village has long mobilized his grandfather to go to the township nursing home to spend his old age, but Uncle Li (Li Dongming) does not agree, saying that if he can still take care of himself in life, he will not cause trouble to the government. ”
Zhang Hongxing asked Li Dongming: "Uncle, your body and bones are still good, is there any difficulty in life?" Li Dongming said: "My body and bones are OK, and if I can't do it, I have to live, I have to cook for Jifu and Jilu, and I have to take good care of them." I'm dead Jifu and Giroe what to do? I can't rest assured of these two children. I have no difficulties in life, every month there is a low security deposit, the New Year festival village also sends rice and soybean oil, eat and drink without worry, that is, these two children are my heart disease, is my heart and spleen, I can not die ah. Listening to Uncle Li's words, Zhang Hongxing felt very uncomfortable in his heart, it was really a pity for the parents of the world, Uncle Li was at this age, and he was still worried about his two children.
On the day they left Xiangyang Village, Zhang Hongxing left 10,000 yuan for Uncle Li Dongming, and also left a contact number, and also left the phone number to the village director. Several of them had already discussed that in Uncle Li Dongming's lifetime, they would try to come back and see as much as possible. Because this is their unforgettable second home, here are their loved ones and eternal concerns.
Seeing that it is almost the Spring Festival again, Zhang Hongxing is very worried about the father and son of Uncle Li in his second hometown, although he often calls, he is still not at ease, and the landlord's family has become a worry that Zhang Hongxing is difficult to give up. If it were not for the impact of the epidemic, Zhang Hongxing would have returned to his second hometown to visit Uncle Li's family.
Author: Grassroots writer