Text/Zhu Yufu
"New Year's snowflakes are whirring and fluttering, crackling and setting off firecrackers." The author was born in the late sixties, young childhood memories, there is a special emotion and aftertaste for the New Year, perhaps because of the simplicity and innocence at that time, the meaning of the new year, just means that there are new clothes to wear (new clothes are only the modification of the old clothes of the fourth brother), there are candy, snacks and Firecrackers for the New Year that cannot be eaten. (Skyrocketing). The taste and picture of the years in those childhood memories that have been lost still seem to be yesterday. At that time in the Gangcheng area of our hometown of Jinan City, we called the firecrackers woven together as fire whips, and the firecrackers that were fired one by one and lit after the sparks were called fireworks.
The second brother, who once went to junior high school to light ink, said to me: "Gunpowder is one of the four major inventions of China, firecrackers are the seeds sown by ancestors, it is an auspicious thing that sets off the atmosphere, it is like an invisible creature, it has been rippling the five thousand years of simple festival traditions and souls of our Chinese nation." "What has changed is age, what has not changed is the years, just a vein for the sake of inheritance; the moon is full and lacking, and people are missing and round." Years and years, years and years, although the sun and the moon are staggering, but life is still the same. Although the world is cold and things are weak, the simple village customs and customs are still the same, but the sound of firecrackers in the Spring Festival in my hometown always stirs my squirming heart. To this day, the dream is still faint, carefree childhood, the joy of the New Year is always indulged and the crisp sound of firecrackers is always linked. Although people now pay attention to environmental protection, air pollution (the country has an environmental protection law and an environmental protection compensation law), atmospheric smog, and feel people's wit and wisdom. Antique and ancient, simple spring breeze drunk tourists. The old home of Aishan, luzhong steel city, still maintains (preserves) the customs of pasting couplets, inviting family halls, and setting off firecrackers for the New Year. But the environmentally friendly, civilized, clean, green, low-carbon Way of the New Year has gone up to a new level. Because we have many brothers and sisters in our family, (we have six brothers and one sister), the probability of our mother's New Year is only a number of age. "People celebrate the New Year, we also celebrate the New Year, and anyway, the New Year cannot be isolated on the side of the Year." The helplessness and enlightenment of the mother give us a reason to be happy all the time. The joy of the poor, the rich and the rich. At that time, because of simplicity and ignorance, he never considered the difficulties of his parents, and only sought to eat, dress and play well in the New Year. Of course, the happiest thing for me is picking up squibs.
I often remember the situation: whenever there was a firecracker in the village, my first reaction was to identify the direction and run away. When the smoke cleared, I would have a lot of unburned squibs in my hands. Sometimes feeling that there were not enough "booty", I waited at the door of the door of the person who might set off firecrackers, patiently waiting for them to finish and wait for the exciting 'crackling' sound. After returning home, those (squib) firecrackers that belong to them have a new life, they are either re-exploded (lit with incense), or (broken) or broken, arranged in the shape of plum blossoms, and then lit in the middle (with lit incense), because of the inertia of gunpowder burning, one squib becomes a rotating red flame, and then the squib gunpowder is brought into a tin bucket, twisted a drip of gold paper, sealed with mud, and the tin barrel will explode high after ignition. It is in this simple happiness that the years I remember in my childhood are full of taste, and the past (time) and time are still difficult to forget.
However, this happiness ended when I was ten years old. The reason was that a firecracker was lost at home. This hanging firecracker was bought by the second brother, and the 100-ring high-tech district of The High-tech Zone Bian Jiaquan Village himself rushed to make a fierce explosive firecracker. The eldest sister gave her brother a dollar to buy a cigarette, but he bought a (100 rings) firecracker. Although the second brother is nearly 15 years older than me, he likes firecrackers as much as I do, and before he was a "little year", he impatiently bought a blast and hid in the wall kitchen where he lived with his parents in the north house. After finishing work every day, the second brother had to take out the firecrackers and dry them in the sun (showing a hand), and count them from beginning to end, one left and one right, and the afterglow of the squinting eyes was full of pride. Somehow, at noon on the twenty-sixth day of the twenty-sixth lunar month of that year, when he went to the wall kitchen to get a firecracker, the firecracker disappeared. He angrily told his father that he had six of our brothers lined up to check because my homework books and books were also in the kitchen, and my father finally confirmed that I had 'stolen' the firecrackers, and the second reason was that I knew where the firecrackers were hidden, and the degree of my penchant for firecrackers on weekdays was 'confirmed'.
However, I really did not 'steal'. Because I really didn't know it, I refused to admit it. My attitude was considered by them to be incorrigible, and dealing with an incorrigible person was of course a violent 'beating'. Slaps, soles, and gambits took turns creating innocence, pain, and coercion on my ass. My grumpy father even took a kitchen knife and said he was going to chop off my hand. It was a dim afternoon, and all five brothers had identified a false fact, but no one had considered my feelings. I gritted my teeth, no longer arguing, just silently weeping. Until I was so weak that I went to sleep and didn't eat dinner.
After that, in order to restore the truth, I quietly conducted a 'secret visit' and investigation, and it turned out that a neighbor's little friend stole firecrackers when he came to my house to play and saw that there was no one in the house. When I went to his house to play with him, I saw that he was dismantling the explosive battle one by one, which had appeared in front of my eyes many times when the second brother was drying, and I was most familiar with it, and his family could not afford to buy the explosive battle. When I told my father and second brother about this result, they were first in disbelief, then shocked, and finally silent. In their view, the matter is over, and even if I have been wronged, there is no need to apologize to a small child. But at that time, for me, this matter became an indissoluble "knot" in my heart; it was like a shadow in my heart. I began to become taciturn, and my soul was severely bruised and hurt.
So that in many years to come, during the New Year, I no longer dared to pick up squibs, and even when I heard the shouting firecrackers, I was frightened, headache, and palpitations. Even though many years have passed since that incident, the firecrackers often explode one by one in my wounded soul. A faint pain crept up from my ass to my heart. This pain is fifty years!
Time is like a manipulative magician, which can make unforgettable memories fade. Now, standing at the threshold of the year of sideburns and gray hair, thinking about it again, I have no resentment in my heart. Imagine if it weren't for the fact that our family was poor at that time, and my father and second brother would have made a big fuss over a firecracker? The father had six sons and a daughter, and he was busy on the land all year round, paying tuition for the children in addition to the food and clothing they earned. Why wouldn't my father want to put up a pair of couplets and set off a firecracker to enjoy the scenery in front of the villagers? Compared to the father's hard work, selflessness and dedication, a wrong? What's the point of being beaten up?.
More than fifty years later, the childhood anecdotes in my memory are still so clearly flashed in my mind, and the feelings for the year and the contentment in the poverty are still vividly remembered...........
The years passed and the time flew by. Nowadays, whenever you hear the sound of firecrackers, you will touch the scenery, you will remember the fun and happiness of picking up firecrackers as a child, and your heart will be filled with a wisp of warmth and memories of the New Year...
(Image from the Internet)
【About the author】Zhu Yufu, born in May 1962. He is a member of the China Essayists Association, a member of the Shandong Young Writers Association, a contracted writer of Shenzhou Literature and Art, a certified writer of "China Countryside", and a special writer of "Wangyue Literature" "China Ceramics News" and "Shandong Hospital News". He worked as an editor/reporter for Capital Public Security Daily and Zibo Evening News. The essay "That Mountain, That Village, That Dog" won the National Essay Gold Award; the paper "Discussion on Third-Party Liability Insurance for Motor Vehicles" won the Shandong Provincial Government Award; and the short novel "Sour Grapes" won the Third Prize of Shandong Province's Five One Culture. Since joining the work, he has published more than 10,000 news, literature and photographic press releases in more than 60 central provincial and municipal media such as People's Daily, Guangming Daily, China Youth Daily, and Farmers Daily.
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