Introduction: The years flow like water, and in the wind and dust of the years, our fantasies and our support seem to be as vulnerable as bubbles. But who can deny that the ideals we carry in our hearts, even if they are extremely fragile, still have its beauty in the collision with reality. In Zhang Jie's "Picking Ears of Wheat", we seem to see the flickering light again.
"Picking ears of wheat" is a sad painting. In the distance, the background of the moon and the mist is sparse, and in front of the girl in the field is a girl carrying a basket to pick an ear of wheat, the poetic picture should let people imagine the future in silence, but the author repeatedly asks: "What is she thinking?" Interrupted alive all fantastic anticipation. In a casual "Oops", the heavy ears of wheat, and the equally heavy emotional accumulation, all changed their taste. Everyone understands that after Cinderella puts on the crystal shoes, the story will come to an abrupt end, but the life of a mortal will continue to live smoothly. Perhaps accepting harsh realities requires more primitive courage and ignorant resilience than indulging in fairytale fantasies. I seemed to really hear Zhang Jie's sigh: "Hey!"
"Picking the Ears of Wheat" is another nostalgic poem. Zhang Jie once said: Those memories of childhood are often full of bitterness, and what is nostalgic is the single and innocent state of mind. So she chose a few contrasting shots for us: when "I" went to pick ears of wheat like those rural girls, "I" saw only grasshoppers and butterflies; While the girls fantasize about marrying an ideal man, "I" want to marry the old man who sells stove candy; While the big girls sewed and embroidered to prepare the dowry, "I" only embroidered a crumpled pig's belly-like cigarette bag. Because of innocence, the ugly "I" has gained the love that other girls may not get in their lifetime: a piece of stove candy, a melon, a handful of red dates... It's happiness. Also because of the child's unscrupulous words, "I" made an old man who had experienced the wind and frost of life taste a little warmth in loneliness. "I" will be "anxious" about the old man's life and death, and "I" will be "worried" about where the old man's home is. On one side is an ignorant little girl, on the other side is a wandering old man, but who can say that there is no attachment and no cherishing between these two strange individuals? So in the memories of childhood, I really heard Zhang Jie's desire for love, for the call for sincerity.
Just the wisps of feelings that are maintained between the old and the young, can they really bear the weight of life? When "I", like those rural girls, reach the age of seriously picking ears of wheat, perhaps only the death of the old man can draw a satisfactory end to this simple love, and only death will leave people with a series of serious thoughts: what kind of life can make people love and be loved "without any hope, without any hope". Here, the author twice portrays a small fire persimmon, which is also red and translucent, but because of the difference in feelings before and after, it plays a different symbolic meaning. I don't know that before the old man died, "I" only felt that the small fire persimmon could not be blown by the wind, the rain could not be beaten, and the snow could not be suppressed, and the tenacious life individual made people feel that there might really be someone in the world singing the hymn of joyful love. But the truth is that even if the small fire persimmon is not picked, won't it grow old on its own? When you are old enough to fall to the ground, the result can only be crushed to pieces. So at this time, "Picking the Ear of Wheat" has become a fable again, asking people whether to choose a conventional life, or to be a deviant of life, willing to risk the fall of life. Zhang Jie did not give us a clear answer, but she told the world: the cigarette bag like a pig's belly has long been lost by "I".
It should be said that Zhang Jie gave a deep topic in "Picking The Ear of Wheat", when an adult looks back at the innocence of childhood with cloudy eyes, is it pure sadness, or calm reflection? Is it dismissive mockery, or is it a sincere call? Is it numb obedience, or painful struggle? Zhang Jie is making a choice, and we also need to face it and choose.
Who is not familiar with picking ears of wheat for girls who grew up in the countryside?
I'm talking about the past of picking ears of wheat decades ago.
What was she thinking when she carried an empty basket along the path on the field to pick ears of wheat in the early morning of the moon?
What was she thinking when she walked back to the dilapidated cave in the misty twilight of the night, wading through the dew-stained grass and carrying a basket full of ears of wheat?
Alas, what could she think?!
If you hadn't lived in those days, you would never have imagined what kind of illusions would arise from this grain of wheat thrown in the field.
She was desperately picking, picking, picking, a season of wheat, can she pick a bucket? She saved up the money she had exchanged for this wheat, and when it was time to rush to the market, she pulled on the flower cloth, bought the flower thread, and then she cut it, sewed it and embroidered it... I don't see her wearing it, nor do I see her wearing it. No one had ever summed it up with anyone, no one had consulted it with anyone, but on the day of marriage, they would all put these things in the bride's package.
But when they wrap the fantasies that accompany picking the ears of wheat into the package, they will suddenly feel that all those fantasies have changed their taste, and they think how stupid it has been for them to pick, sew, and embroider for many years! How different is the man they are going to marry from the man they fantasize about when they pick ears of wheat, pull flower cloth, and embroider shoes! However, they still married out obediently, but when they put on those clothes, they could no longer find the same mood when they made it and sewed it.
What does that mean? No one will sigh and sympathize with them. No one cares if they still have fantasies. Even they themselves do not feel excessively sad, at best, like the loss of a beautiful dream. Who has ever seen a man who would die begging for a dream?
When I was just able to pull up a basket and run away, I followed my eldest sister to pick up the ears of wheat.
The basket seemed too big, always bumping against my legs and the ground, making me fall all the time. I rarely pick a basket full, I can't see the ears of wheat in the field, but I always see butterflies and grasshoppers, and when I chase them, the ears of wheat I pick up fall from my basket to the ground.
One day, my second aunt looked at my basket with a few ears of wheat and said, "Look, my geese will pick ears of wheat too." Then she said playfully, "Big goose, tell your aunt, what do you do when you pick ears of wheat?"
I said shamelessly, "I'm going to prepare a dowry!"
The second aunt smiled and winked at the girls and mothers-in-law who were around us: "Who are you going to marry?"
Yes, who am I going to marry? I suddenly remembered the old man who sold stove candy. I said, "I'm going to marry the old man who sells stove candy!"
They all laughed loudly and rattled like a flock of ducks. What a laugh! I was angry. Is there anything unseemly about being my man?
How old is the old man who sells stove candy? I do not know. The wrinkles on his face were one after the other, bending along his eyebrows to both temples, and bending down his cheeks to the corners of his mouth. Those wrinkles added a lot of kind smiles to his face. As he carried the burden on his way, the long white hair on the back of his half-gourd-like head flashed along with the trembling flat burden.
My words soon reached his ears.
That day, he came to our village with a burden, and when he saw me, he was happy and said, "Doll, are you going to make me a daughter-in-law?"
"Yes!"
He smiled with his mouth wide open, revealing a mouth full of yellow teeth. His white hair, which grew on his half-gourd-like head, also trembled with laughter.
"Why are you marrying me?"
"I want to eat stove candy every day!"
He slammed the dry cigarette pot against the sole of his shoe: "Baby, you are too small." ”
"You wait for me to grow up."
He touched the top of my head and said, "I should go into the soil before you grow up." ”
Listening to his words, I was anxious. If he dies, what can he do? I was so anxious to cry.
He quickly took a piece of stove candy and stuffed it into my hand. Looking at the stove candy, I smiled with tears in my eyes: "You don't die, wait for me to grow up." ”
He was happy again. He promised me, "I'll wait for you to grow up." ”
"Where do you live?"
"This burden is my home, and wherever I go, I will rest on it!"
I was worried: "When I grow up, where will I go to find you?"
"Don't worry, when you grow up, I'll pick you up!"
After that, whenever he passed through our village, he always brought me small gifts. A piece of stove sugar, a melon, a handful of dates... He said to me happily, "Look at my little daughter-in-law!"
As for me, I also learned the appearance of the eldest girl—I had secretly seen it—and asked my mother to find a rag, cut me a cigarette pack, and let my mother draw flowers on the cloth. I embroider, embroidery... The cigarette pack was sewn up, and my mother smiled and leaned forward and back, saying that it was not a cigarette pack, wrinkled, like a pig's belly. I asked my mother to put it away, and I said that when I got married, I would give it to my man.
Gradually, I grew older, reached the age of knowing how to pick ears of wheat seriously, and understood that all I said was shameful. The old man who sold stove candy stopped joking—calling me his little daughter-in-law. But he often brought me small gifts. I know, he really hurt me.
I don't understand why, I really become more and more attached to him, and whenever he passes through our village, I will send him a long way. I stood on the ridge and watched his back fade into the col.
Year after year, I could tell that his back was bent more and his steps were more faltering. At this point, I was really worried, worried that sooner or later he would die.
One year, the day before Lapa Ba, I was about to pass by our village on the day when the old man who sold stove candy was supposed to pass by. I stood at the entrance of the village under a persimmon tree that had run out of leaves, looking at the main road under the ditch, waiting.
On the road came a man who picked up the burden. Take a closer look, the burden is also picked on the stove sugar, people are not the old man who sells stove sugar. I asked him about the old man who sold stove candy, and he told me that the old man who sold stove candy was old.
I cried, very sadly, weeping at the strange old man who loved me as a stove candy seller.
I often wonder, why does he love me? It's just because I'm a gluttonous little girl who is extremely ugly and unloved, right? I miss him a lot, and I often want to find my crumpled pig's belly-like cigarette bag. But I don't know where I left it.