Big City Trivia: Dear Neighbors

　　China Xiaokang Network Exclusive Article

　　Wen | Lin Xiaomiao

　　The neighborhood relationship in small places is completely different from that in big cities, and when I first came to Liuyang to live, the neighbors came to the house with slippers, put the children down and disappeared. In particular, they don't regard themselves as outsiders, and they don't regard you as outsiders.

　　I also have a home in Liuyang Mountain, and I always have to live for a while a year.

　　The first long stay was in the summer of a certain year, the staircase suddenly heard the sound of "clicking" and "Hada Hada", looking for a sound, bumping into a huge Dogo dog, we both looked at each other, very confused with each other, and at the same time had the same question: Who are you?!

　　What's even more infuriating is that this big dog has obviously seen the world better than I have. My expression was still frozen in Harry Potter's consternation at the sight of the Philosopher's Stone Three-Headed Dog, which had already passed me and continued upstairs with its tail wagging and heading for my bedroom.

　　I sped downstairs, ran to the middle of the yard, and shouted with all my might: "Whose big dog has come to the house?" I only saw a strange man playing basketball in my small courtyard, nodding to me lightly while shooting. I snorted and ran to my husband and asked, "Do you know the big dog that just came in?"

　　"Well, I know." The husband replied.

　　"Do you know anyone who plays in the yard?" Did he just run in politely without saying hello?" I kept asking. The husband said calmly, "It's the neighbor." "That's the way it is in the village, if you stop your neighbors from running into your house, you won't be polite..." After that, the husband went downstairs with ice water and watermelon to entertain uninvited guests.

　　Another day, I was crackling in my notebook and writing a book, when I suddenly felt a slight gasp and a whining sound behind me, and turned my head to see that it was the white-haired neighbor's grandmother squinting at my screen. Seeing me looking back, she asked, "Typing?" I replied, "Well, yes. Do you drink tea?" She said, "If you don't drink, I'll go all at once." ”

　　After that, the neighbor's grandmother stood behind me again and looked at me, and I didn't have the courage to type another word. The two of us stared at the open Word document silently for a minute or two.

　　Later, I came across the Japanese writer Randi Taguchi writing that she had moved to the mountains, saying that her neighbors would run to her house when they had nothing to do, and let her modernity self collapse. The writer herself is a neurotic who observes meticulously and overly sensitively, and she cannot follow the local customs, which makes her very mad. Originally, I had to find a quiet place to write before moving to live in the mountains, but now I feel worse than living in the city. When Chekhov lived at the Mellihovo estate, he often complained that his writing was frequently interrupted, and he had to constantly "cook samovar" for the guests who came to visit. After all, I have been in Liuyang for so many years, and I already know a lot of neighborhood rules. The neighborhood relationship in small places is completely different from that in big cities, and when I first came to Liuyang to live, the neighbors came to the house with slippers, put the children down and disappeared. After waiting for a day and delaying to pick up the child, when she helped her deliver the child, she found that they were playing mahjong. Just because I don't take myself as an outsider, I don't take you as an outsider. After I moved to Liuyang, I was sent by the neighbors with ham, fennel tea, dried tofu, pumpkin cake, potato flour eggs, mugwort, and various home-grown vegetables brought from the countryside, and if I said I had never seen any kind of dish, they would intimately write a recipe for me.

　　When I lived in my home in Beijing, it was difficult to say a few words to the neighbors across the wall, but nodded when encountered in the elevator, and said "hello" when the garbage was thrown. In the small town of Liuyang, especially in the village of Liuyang, I was tacitly accepted as a part of their lives, not only the interpersonal relationships were frozen, but also surrounded by a nearly transparent cover. My neighbors should be the same.

　　Liuyang's home may be soundproof, but I think it is more because everyone is familiar with it, and the ears are no longer picky and sensitive. It can be said that the longer you live in Liuyang, the higher the tolerance of your ears. In the first few years, my upstairs children often jumped metal bouncers at home, but I didn't think it was a big deal, and once when I met a child, I asked, "You like to play jumpers at home, right?" The child said, "Yes, how do you know?" ”

　　Liuyang Riverside can raise cats and babies,

　　Wu Chu Xiaocheng can write and paint.

　　("Xiaokang", China Xiaokang Network Exclusive Special Article)

　　This article was published in the early October 2021 issue of Xiaokang