In the spring of 1953, the third year after the land reform, a vibrant scene was presented in Houhe Village in the beiqi Mountains of Heluo Ancient City. The trees sprouted tender buds, the grass grew green leaves, the small river in front of the village rushed to flow, and a few naughty children, regardless of the cold water, impatiently held their arms and played with the water, and the clear river was crystal clear like broken glass flowers.
In the early morning, the rooster crowing woke up the croppers, and a stream of green smoke rose from the farm yard, the men stretched out their waists, rubbed their eyes and got out of bed, kicked their shoes to wash their faces, and the women had already cooked the soup and brought it to the dining table, waiting for the treasurers to eat.
The sun rose, and the sky to the east was fiery red, as if burning. His father, Who lives in the south of the village, is licking the cattle, with a half-used towel around his neck and a dry cigarette bag pinned to his waist, and he is going to plow the dry land in North ridge today. This scalper was bought by him last year, his father bought it with the money he had saved from selling vegetables, three years old, when he first bought it, he was as thin as wood, and the neighbors were not optimistic, they all said that they had lost money, but his father did not think so. Father looked at the cow, his eyes shining, and he had to mix grass for the cow several times a night. Afraid of the cows freezing in the winter, specially built a grass shed for the cattle, when the summer was too hot, he gave the cattle a fan, after a year of careful breeding by his father, now the waist is round, can pull the single plough and rake, which makes the villagers very red, they did not expect that the father is still a master of cattle raising. Wanting to own an animal was my father's dream for many years, and the days without animals were really hard! It is really difficult and tiring to build the ground with one hammer and one hammer, slow and bitter, full of calluses! Pick up the feces in the ground, press the shoulders red and swollen, the pain makes people shed tears, and now it's good, the plough rake has this cow to use, a cow top a few strong laborers!
His eldest son, Shin, is thirteen years old this year, and he can do him some favors, and he can plant a piece of land with him to harvest crops, and he is much more relaxed. It's just that there is no way to earn money at home, and life is tight. He heard that his cousin was playing iron in Pinglu, Shanxi, and had become a treasurer, so he entrusted someone to carry a letter, hoping that the eldest son Shen would follow his cousin as an apprentice and learn the craft without pressure. The cousin is short of manpower, and when he hears it, he promises that Shen, who is only thirteen years old, will leave his hometown and follow his cousin to learn to play iron. The mother is very distressed, the child is still young, the twelve or thirteen are incomplete, she is really reluctant to do it, but there is really no good way!
After entering the summer, the heavens went crazy, getting hotter and hotter every day, the leaves on the old locust trees were hanging listlessly, the chickens and ducks were thirsty and opened their mouths, and the black dogs that were uneasy in the past also crawled on the shady ground and whirred and gasped. Even if people wear shorts and shorts, even bare shoulders, they can't stop the baking of the heat wave, there is no wind, and the heat is irritable. At this time, a rather surprising news reached Houhe Village, and Wang Yaozu, the chairman of Yingdong Township, was arrested, and it was said that he had committed two crimes, one was to open the road and accept money privately; the other was to mess with the relationship between men and women, and the style was corrupt, this time it was enough for him to drink a pot. The people in the village talked about it a lot, and some of them were secretly happy, saying that when Yaozu was the chairman of the township, he looked down on the fellow villagers and mixed with women, and he deserved it! Some people say that it is not easy to become an official in the village, I wanted to follow the light, who wanted to have an accident again, it is really a shame to die! Soon, Wang Yaozu was sentenced to ten years in prison by the Heluo People's Court and sent to Xining Prison in Qinghai to serve his sentence, which is exactly the old saying that good is rewarded with good, and evil is rewarded with evil, not by not being reported, and the time has not yet come. After a period of discussion, the village gradually calmed down.
Her mother had a long relationship with Yaozu's mother, who was older than her mother, and her mother called her a Taoist sister-in-law. When this happened to her family, she felt disgraceful, could not lift her head in the village, and sighed all day long. The mother comforted her and said, "Sister-in-law, Yaozu's accident is not good for anyone, you have to want to open up, you can't be sad all day long, you will be sick, and the days to come will be thicker than leaves!" Listening to her mother's words, Yao's grandmother slowly eased up, what to do, she was grateful to her mother.
Most of the small-footed women in the village, who are about the same age as their mothers, are already mothers of several children, and some of them call their mothers sister-in-law, and some mothers call them sisters-in-law. Mother and they are very compatible. Every day, they are responsible for the work of supporting the elderly at home, cooking and washing, raising children, sneaking around, and sometimes gathering together to talk about the short gossip of the east and the west, and the mother never turns over the gossip, nor does she pick things up. The family had a temporary emergency, asked the mother to help take care of the children, the mother did not say a word, full of promises, which fell into a good reputation among the neighbors.
At this time, the mother was nine months pregnant, holding her stomach, still insisting on doing housework, until mid-June, successfully giving birth to her fifth child, which was only a few days off. However, God did not have long eyes, and sent a baby, it was really not in line with the mother's wishes, the mother was a little sullen, only the uncle and uncle were so happy that they could not close their mouths, and the father named the baby five sons.
Soon after the autumn, it rained heavily, the sky was like a decisive mouth, rushing and rushing, the muddy water on the ground flowed like a small river, in the courtyard, on the road, in the crop fields, there was muddy rain everywhere, and the once calm River seemed to be crazy, suddenly rising more than a dozen inches wide, roaring and rushing. People did not dare to go out, the dilapidated houses began to leak, and the villagers complained about the heavens, hoping that the rain would stop quickly!
Time flies by, and in the blink of an eye it is the end of the year. Since he followed his uncle, although his father said that he would return to his hometown to visit his mother every New Year's Festival, his father rarely took the whole family back to his hometown. Every festive season, I think of my family. This year bought cattle, the heart is comfortable, plain busy, the father plans to take advantage of the New Year, go back to visit the grandmother, the old man is more than seventy years old, although the health is still good, life can also take care of themselves, but a day less than a day. Grandma was always worried about the eldest son, the Mai Duo family, and they all thought of each other.
Early in the morning of the first day of the Chinese New Year, the father and mother together gave the uncle and uncle a New Year's greeting, and then let the children give the old man a New Year's greeting, and the mother served the cooked dumplings to the uncle and uncle, and then settled the stew for lunch. The father was busy setting up an ox cart, loading the Hesheng stack snacks that he had bought a few years ago, putting a stool on the car for the mother to sit on, and took a quilt to warm up the mother, and the eldest son, Shin, led the cow in front, and the family got on the road.
Rural customs, on the first day of the first year, all the families are basically reunited, there are very few people who go out to visit relatives, the father is an exception, the neighbors see the father going out, they have greeted and asked: "Brother Mai Duo, where are you going to go today?" Father Happily replied, "Go back to your hometown to see your mother!" "Out of the village, there are almost no pedestrians on the road, it seems very deserted, and the father rushes to the car and gossips with the mother. Near eleven o'clock, I came to the village of Yinggou. The acquaintances of the old family greeted their father and mother warmly, the grandmother greeted him outside the courtyard despite the cold weather, and the third uncle Shi and the dolls also panicked to pick up his beloved big brother and sister-in-law, booing and asking for warmth, and there seemed to be endless confidants.
As soon as my father and mother arrived at their hometown, they first prostrated to their grandmother to pray for the New Year, and said, "Mom, you are old and happy for the New Year!" Excitedly, the tone of her voice was a little choked, and Grandma was moved to wipe her tears and said busily: "Child, hurry up, the ground is strangely cold!" He said and sent a pressed money to each doll. In the afternoon, the third uncle's family made dumplings, stewed vegetables, and also prepared four cold dishes of silver strips, lotus vegetables, pork head meat, and skin jelly, and the family chatted while eating, talking and laughing, which was very lively.
(ii)
My uncle's body is not as good as a year, and she coughs and gasps badly in winter, and she always feels that she can't breathe. At the turn of the spring and summer of five or six years, when her condition worsened and she was bedridden, she called her mother to her side and said weakly, "Child, I am satisfied and blessed." People are always going to die, if it weren't for you and Mai Duo's careful care in recent years, I would have buried the loess soil a long time ago, you two are stronger than my daughter-in-law, and I remember the good mile of your two mouths. The mother said with tears in her eyes: "Concubine, don't say this, take care of you and your uncle." After these days, you will get better, the old saying is not that illness comes like a mountain, and illness is as good as a silk! "Alas, I know my illness, I'm afraid I won't be able to survive these few days, but with you two taking care of your uncle, I'm blind when I die!"
A week later, when the concubine returned to heaven, the father mourned the uncle's two daughters-in-law and relatives and friends, and when the relatives arrived, they entered the funeral to set up a spiritual hall for relatives and friends to mourn, and after seven days of guarding the spirit, they went into the ground, and the father held the remains of the uncle and wept all the way, which was heartbreaking.
In 1958, the people's communization movement swept through the rural areas of the country, the peasants changed from cooperative members to commune members, the land was returned to the collective, the large livestock and large agricultural tools were also handed over to the production team, and his father's eye-catching cattle were also handed over to the production team. In addition to the cave dwellings, houses, and daily necessities, the members all belong to the collective, and I heard that even meals should be eaten intensively, and gradually reached the goal of "ploughing the land without cattle, and lighting lamps without oil." Upstairs and downstairs, electric lights and telephones "the good life, to quickly enter communism." This makes the society that the villagers did not dare to think of in the past seem to be about to be realized, and people are full of hopes for a better future.
The collectivization movement is also influencing the change of Houhe Village, and they are not far behind. Beginning in the autumn of 1958, the production team established a collective canteen, each household did not need to make a fire, arranged special people to cook, and the members sat at the table to eat canteen meals. The production team also set up a kindergarten, where the children gathered together and lived a collective life.
Wang Jun, the captain of the production team, is thirty-seven or eight years old, with a figure of one meter and seven six. Before liberation, he worked in the white iron business in Heluo City, and returned to Houhe Village during the land reform. He is mobilizing the members: "Fathers, brothers and sisters, after this, we will eat in a unified way, work in a unified way, and finish work in a unified way, and everyone will not have to worry about eating and drinking." The commune announced the day before yesterday that it would transfer young and middle-aged people to participate in the construction of the Great Canal in The Mountain, that food would be provided by the team, that the bedding for living should be brought by itself, and that it would strive to repair the Canal in one year. This is a big thing, a good thing. In our place, there are nine droughts in ten years, and after the canal is opened, the watering land can realize artesian irrigation, which is really convenient! No more fear of drought. At that time, many people signed up and asked to join the canal repair army.
The construction of the Great Canal of Yaoshan Mountain is a grand water conservancy project. The project starts from Xin'an County Cijian in the west to Yanshi Ridge in the east, with a length of about fifty kilometers, along the way to cross the mountains and mountains, the amount of engineering is very large, and there is no modern construction equipment, all rely on manual labor, its difficulties and obstacles can be imagined.
My father also became one of them, but he was not on the front line, working as a cook, a logistical support, boiling water for more than twenty people, and the work was not easy. These people, all young and middle-aged, are able to eat and drink, coupled with the intensity of labor, eat two or three steamed buns, two bowls of rice, ordinary things, steamed buns, stir-fried vegetables, rolling noodles, are all hard work, my father has to survive, become the unsung hero of repairing canals.
For a while, my uncle's body was obviously weak, he always wanted to sit and lie down when there was nothing to do, the amount of food was also small, and he had no appetite for anything. Entering three or nine days, it is the coldest time of the year, dripping water into ice. A heavy snow is brewing, the northeast wind is blowing, the cold is straight to the bone, the sky is overcast, and gradually it begins to fall some snow particles, and after a while, it will drift snowflakes, and soon it will fly all over the sky, and a layer of snow will accumulate on the ground, and the roof and branches will also be wrapped in silver. By noon, the snow was no deeper than a foot, but there was still no intention of stopping. The mother said to the uncle, "Uncle, what do you want to eat at noon?" I'll go to the cafeteria and ask the boss to make you something." "I don't want to eat anything, so you can eat it first." "Don't eat in the middle? Man is iron, rice is steel. On a cold day, you have to eat a little! "I'm not hungry, I want to sleep." The mother said to her father, "Shen His father, you go and ask Yin Han to come and show our uncle, but you don't dare to delay our uncle's illness." "Medium!" The father promised to put on a piece of linen and push the door to the village doctor.
After a meal, the father took the village doctor Yinhan into the house one after the other, a layer of snow fell on his body, the mother picked up the broom to sweep the snow on their bodies, the silver man hurried to give the uncle a pulse, look at the tongue moss, inquire about the condition, he comforted: "Uncle, nothing, I will prescribe medicine for you, drink for a few days just fine!" "Thank you old nephew," said the uncle, thanking him, "the cold weather has disturbed you." "Uncle, did you say that?" Folks in our township, you have something, whenever I say something, I have to come immediately! After saying that, she got up and went out, and her mother said, "You sit down first, I'll go and pour you a mouthful of hot water to drink, and then go after a warm time!" Yin Han said, "They are all their own people, don't be polite!" Father went out after Yinhan. Yin Han whispered to his father, "Brother, it seems that the old uncle's illness is not light, he is old, so let's prepare for the aftermath!" "Brother, do you need to go to the city hospital?" "Brother, don't you believe my words?" If you want to spend the money you have wronged, you can go. "Believe it, how can you not believe it?"
Ten days later, my uncle drove the crane west at the age of sixty-nine. The parents were distraught, and the father quickly found a blank piece of paper, cut a square a foot long, pasted it on the gate, first went to find the village monk, let him come to the house to preside over the funeral, and then went to find a carpenter to make shou materials, and then complained to relatives and friends, asked the neighbors to help, and broke the filial piety to make paper. Uncle's old relative Hou Dong Cai family heard about it and led the team to mourn and play. This Cai family is a famous Zhenhe Luocheng township team, the average person can not move, can take the initiative to play to the uncle, it can be seen that the friendship between the two families is deep.
Seven days after the funeral, the uncle came out of the funeral, that afternoon, the chief monk arranged eight young and strong villagers to carry the coffin for the uncle, in front of the uncle's spiritual seat, with the sad "Sacrifice spirit" screaming, the father wore a ma dai filial piety, prostrated for the uncle three times, burned incense to make offerings, and then the brothers made sacrifices in turn, and finally burned paper one by one from the close relatives to the distant relatives and friends. Firecrackers sounded, the coffin was raised, the Cai family nodded their heads, Cai Liu whimpered and played hard, the father followed with the portrait of his uncle, the male filial pieties followed with weeping mourning handles, the female filial pieties guarded the black coffin and wept, crying and mourning along the way, the neighbors who came to help took the iron or went forward or followed behind, and with the help of the villagers, the uncle's coffin was buried, and the uncle was buried in peace. At noon on this day, the production team canteen made a meal of millet porridge, fried a few pots of cabbage and tofu to entertain guests, and the funeral was simple and decent.
In the summer of 1959, the Great Canal of Qiushan Was opened. On the day of the opening of the water, the members of the nearby brigade waved bunting flags, held up banners, beat gongs and drums and gathered on both sides of the Great Canal of Yaoshan Mountain, and came to watch the exciting moment when the water was opened happily. wow! Crowds of people, colorful flags, gongs and drums are noisy, just like the grand situation of the Lantern Festival on the fifteenth day of the first month. The water of the canal rushed along the channel like a giant dragon, and the crowd boiled, "The water is coming, the water is coming!" Some people shouted loudly, some couldn't help but dance with their hands, and many people picked up some muddy water and washed their hands and washed their faces!
The excited members did not wait until noon, when they heard the train in the railway depot of Heluo City pulling up the whistle at twelve o'clock, that they left the canal step by step and went home.
His father also came, how could he not be happy, he was walking while smoking a dry cigarette, his cheeks were drumming, and Wang Zhoudao, who came from the same village, asked his father: "Brother, everyone is so happy, why do you look sullen and unhappy?" "Alas, Zhou Dao, you said that this canal water can water our team's land?" "Look at it like this, Xuan! So we've been busy for half a day, didn't we shave the dog's head? "Just know it in your heart, see through it and say it through!" "Brother, let's talk about each other!" The two men walked home as they talked.
The food in the canteen of the production team is not as good as before, the adult month can not eat a meal of meat, the white noodle steamed bun is also less, and the soup is getting thinner and thinner. Chang Kaifu chattered: "It's been almost two months, and I haven't seen any fishy meat, it's time to improve the food!" Lao Chang, who was cooking, said: "It is difficult for a woman to cook without rice, you ask the captain to buy meat, who will not do it?" "Yes, I see that there is less and less wheat in the warehouse of the team, there is not much coarse grain, the days have to go down, and it is always impossible to sit on the empty mountain to eat, people have no far-reaching worries, there will be near-term worries."
This year's weather is strange, after entering the summer, the moon will not end up with decent rain, the crops are dry and cracked, like turtle covers, the leaves begin to fall in large quantities early, the autumn crops can not be planted, the big guys are anxious to stomp their feet, and the clusters are turning. If you want to use the village's well to carry water seedlings, you can only twist half a bucket of yellow soup water from the well each time, so as to ensure that the water used by people and livestock is the first. When the farm time is not waiting, looking at the sky, there is no trace of cloud in the clear, the sun is like a fireball, burning the earth, and the crops are angry and cursed the mother. Although the corn planted on the river beach land is long and tall, the dry leaves are also rolled, and if the drought continues like this, the yield reduction is certain. The autumn crops on the slopes are big heads, and they can't be planted for ten and a half days, and they will be blind during the autumn harvest. The production captain Wang Jun was anxious to catch fire, his cheeks were swollen and hot, his teeth hurt so much that he couldn't even eat, he was sad to die, if there was a shortage of grain after autumn, what could the members of the winter and spring clubs do?
(iii)
Fear of what to do, the drought intensified, and the drought in summer and autumn caused a serious reduction in autumn grain production. In previous years, sweet potatoes, one piece is larger than two fists, a nest is less than two pieces, more than three pieces, this autumn's sweet potatoes are only one fist large, a litter of one piece, sweet potatoes half a year of grain, sweet potato production reduction will definitely affect the annual rations of members. Corn is almost out of harvest, the ears of millet are small and small, the size of a finger belly, looking at the poor crops, the hearts of the members are like knives, they have experienced the taste of hunger, and the days of lack of grain are really sad!
Houhe Village has more than a dozen acres of river beach land, and has also harvested some autumn grain and vegetables, although it is not more than in previous years, it can also stand for a while, but to spend the winter and spring, you have to tighten the belt of your pants.
Everything is doomed, and destiny is difficult to violate. Less than a month after his uncle's death, the cave in which he lived suddenly collapsed one night, smashing almost all of his belongings, leaving his parents in a cold sweat. A family of eight people crowded in a cave, not even a place to cook, had no choice but to go to the captain of the production team Wang Jun, his kiln house is spacious, Wang Jun cheerfully promised to let my family temporarily move to his house, and promised to give my family a new homestead as soon as possible. I was born in the mill of Wang Jun's family, and the house where the eldest brother Shen got married was also borrowed from Wang Jun's family.
My mother was not easy, before giving birth to me, I had already given birth to six children, all of them boys, four sons, Gaowa, unfortunately died at the age of eight or nine, and my mother's grief was endless.
In January 1960, the eighteenth month of the lunar year of the pig, it was the middle of winter, I was born, hunger and cold coexisted, born at the wrong time, worse, ah, my birth and brought her more pain and trouble, how she hopes to have a girlfriend, so as to help herself, but the opposite is true, destiny.
In all fairness. The five families of Wang Zhen in the north of the village have already given birth to four girls, eager to have a baby to continue the incense, the month I was born, Zhentong's wife gave birth to him a girlfriend, named Xiaoni, which made Zhentong very unhappy. I don't know who first proposed it, if you exchange two children, it will be the best of both worlds! Without hesitation, I said that I would change it, saving the night long and dreamy, so that I would come to the strange Wang Zhenwu family. So pitiful, I was with my biological mother for less than twenty days, I came to a strange home silently, although the Wang family regarded me as a treasure, but I did not appreciate it at all, crying all day long, not eating milk and not sleeping, for several days in a row, so that the Wang family was overwhelmed, worried about making me three long and two short, unable to explain, had to tell my mother, discussed each of them to take their children back. Maybe I was destined to be a member of the Chen family, and when I returned to my mother, I was very stable and well-behaved, so my father gave me the name of "Fighting for a Baby".
Ninety-nine hours have passed, the frozen river has begun to melt, singing the song of ding-dong, and the willow branches on the river bank have become soft and grow green buds. In order to solve the plight of the members of the spring hunger, the production team disbanded the canteen and gave each family their own land, so as to mobilize the enthusiasm of the members to carry out production and self-help. Due to the increase in the family population, the three-hole kiln can no longer live, and my father plans to go east to the next kiln yard to completely solve the difficulties of living, and he still desperately digs the kiln every day.
Ah, the cold winter is about to pass, will the warm spring be far away?