The white balloon of that year

I was born in the sixties, when we were young, the country was not as rich as it is now, and the people's lives were tight, although the sky was very blue, the water was very clear, and people loved each other, but everyone could not compare with today, whether they ate and drank, or what they wore. The toys of that time were all homemade, and the toys played with by children today are incomparable, if anyone has a fun toy, then he must have a clever father or a clever brother. Of course, sometimes, because of his luck, he is particularly favored by "God", and inexplicably gets a toy that no one has ever seen.

When I was a child, there was a neighbor, the neighbor's adult worked in a chemical company, and the chemical company had many small factories, including an explosives factory, and the explosives factory produced black powder, and also produced yellow TNT. But this neighbor does not work in an explosives factory, but in a chemical company, and he and his colleagues run the explosives factory. At that time, they were called cadres, which is now the management staff.

This neighbor had a bunch of kids who were about the same age as our siblings, boys and girls, and were mischievous at the time, so we were able to play together.

One day, the second son of the family was holding a white balloon. The balloon blows quite large, and the other hand is still holding a balloon that has not been blown up, the balloon is long in the shape of a balloon, but it is also round after blowing. Balloons were a luxury for us at the time, and we rarely even had a chance to see them, but this kid had a big handful in his hand that day.

He shook with the inflated balloon in one hand, and handed us the unpicked balloon he was holding with the other, saying, "One for each person, blow it up." ”

So I and a bunch of children from our neighbor rushed up, one by one, and blew it happily.

My neighbor's second son is named Xiaoming. By the way, it's the famous Xiaoming, Chinese knows. Xiaoming has had a leadership temperament since he was a child. The so-called leadership temperament, in my opinion, is to think of the masses in everything, to consider others at all times and everywhere, to have benefits, to think of giving to others; to have difficulties, to think of helping others. And be able to take the lead all the time. Specifically, at that time, it was fun, I thought of playing with everyone, having good food, being able to take it out for everyone to share in, encountering neighbor children fighting with other children, and being able to rush up without hesitation to help neighbor children get bricks, and so on. Bob, who distributed the balloons this time, also falls into this category.

Each of our children was holding a blown-up white balloon in his hand, and some of them were holding one or two balloons that had not been blown up in addition to the blown-up balloons in their hands, so that they ran triumphantly in the street, scurried around in residential areas, and went crazy in the corridors.

We found that this time, no matter how crazy we were, the adults just looked at us in surprise, stared at us dumbfounded, and then quietly stopped their children and pulled them home.

We were not reprimanded for going crazy in the corridors, sneaking around in residential areas, running on the streets, but only being quietly called home by adults with a slight mystery, which was unprecedented.

After returning home, the adults of each family quietly asked their children, "Where did that thing come from?" ”

"That thing" – when the adults say "that thing," they point to the balloons in our hands.

When the adults learned the source of "that thing," they didn't say anything, and they didn't have to ask the truth as they usually did when they saw something from an unknown source in their hands. This surprised us.

Until one night, when the whole building was chilling downstairs, Xiaoming's father seemed to have no intention, but in fact, he had planned it for a long time, saying that those "white balloons" were used for firing cannons in the mine. He asked the comrades of the explosives factory when he went to inspect the work. As a result, the parents of each family all made a look of sudden realization, and invariably turned the topic to the quality of explosives in the explosives factory.

Is it? Is Xiaoming's father really the "white balloon" he wanted from the explosives factory for firing cannons?