In 1972, I was seconded to the Xianyang Grain Comprehensive Warehouse for a year to work as a farmer.
It is said that the work is done by farmers, but the salary is not paid to individuals, but all are handed over to the production team, who works according to the diary and distributes the dividends according to the work at the end of the year. Although the comprehensive library does not pay wages, it has a living allowance. This subsidy is not cash, but subsidies to the collective stove of the comprehensive library, which can only be eaten, and it will not be returned to me when it is not finished. But because of this subsidy, living conditions are much better than at home. Not only can you see the oil every day, but you can eat meat dishes or meat dishes every few days, which was unimaginable in the countryside at that time.
On a Tuesday after the autumn of that year, according to the arrangement of the Xianyang Municipal Government, the city's government cadres and enterprise schools had to support the agricultural village, and the comprehensive library was assigned to support the second team of the Shiqiao Brigade of the Shiqiao Commune, specifically to the ghost gate of the team to level the land. Although I am not a regular worker, I come from the countryside and naturally do better work than those urban workers, so I was also arranged to go with the staff to repair the land.
My family is in the Po Liu Brigade of Shiqiao Commune, and this ghost gate pass is just west of our brigade, south of Weihui Canal, and three miles away from our village. So everyone joked about me: "When I get to your door, I won't go back to meet my wife Huating." "To be honest, I came from home on a Sunday and had no intention of going back. But there was a special circumstance that made me feel that I had to go back. It's pathetic to say, just for two meat sandwich buns.
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Because of the hard work of supporting the agricultural science of Dazhai, the leaders of the comprehensive library considered specially improving the food for the comrades who participated in the land repair, and the lunch was two meat sandwich buns for each person, of which the meat slices were fat and thick, and the lard seeped into the thick layer of the steamed bun, which made the population flow. Such meat sandwich buns cannot be eaten even by the workers in the city. It was precisely because of these two meat sandwich buns that reminded me of the fact that it was difficult to see my parents and wives and children all year round, so I said hello to the leader of the team and put the two meat sandwich buns sent to me in the bicycle frame and immediately rushed home.
At that time, the roads in the countryside were all dirt roads, which were difficult to walk in the rain and muddy, and the weather was sunny and potholed. It didn't rain for a long time in the autumn of that year, because of the long time the car smashed people, the road surface was thick with a fine layer of flour-like soil, and a slip of yellow dust was raised behind the bicycle pedaling. From ghost gate to our village all the way downhill. After descending, the main road runs from a large feather (reed) trench with a pedestrian path in the middle of the feather trench. Because I was in a hurry, I rode my car up the path of the feather trench, and I did not expect that the path of the feather trench was particularly pothole, and one did not pay attention, and even bumped a meat sandwich bun out of the basket, and all the meat sandwiched in the bun was also thrown out. I picked up the bun and went to pick up the meat, but I saw that the meat slices were covered with dust, and although I felt sorry in my heart, I didn't pick it up after hesitating.
After I got home, I handed the meat sandwich to my parents, and I quickly took the cornmeal at home and ate it when the pot of green vegetables collapsed. Father saw a bun with meat between it, and a bun with only a layer of seeping meat oil left, and asked me what was going on. I told you about the downfall to the feather trench. The father then told his mother to leave the intact meat sandwich for his daughter-in-law and granddaughter, and he was going to mow the grass in the field. Saying that, I took an egg cage and went out.
I didn't pay any attention to my father's actions, but hurriedly ate two pots and immediately rushed back to the construction site. When I came home a week later, my mother told me that my father went out with the egg cage on his back that day to go straight to the feather trench to pick up the pieces of meat, and after picking them up, wash them in the water, cut them into small pieces, and make a "meat noodle" for the whole family the next day. I turned my head and cried.
Nearly fifty years have passed since this incident, but I can't stop crying every time I think about it. My father was carrying an egg cage, leaning over to pick up meat in the dust, as if shaking in front of my eyes. Now, my children and grandchildren have grown up, but they don't think about the life of their grandparents and their parents. Every time they come home, they have to dump the leftovers we have saved, check whether the food we bought back is expired, and always criticize us for not being willing to throw it away, and they are reluctant to pick it up. I know they're right, but every time I watch them throw away what seems to be fine, I can't help but feel pain.
Children who have grown up after the reform and opening up, where can they understand our feelings?
Author | Liu Yanqiang | Xianyang people