The Story of Jingtou Village (10)
Liu Liangcai was dumbfounded
In the early years, the marriage of men and women mainly depended on the orders of their parents and the words of matchmakers.
Parents examine the daughter-in-law and son-in-law value the character, and the main content of the character is naturally: obedience, honesty, duty, filial piety, know how to work, not slippery, not lazy and not sharp.
Under the ancient locust tree on Shiban Avenue, there lives a family, the head of the household is called Liu Dajiang. Speaking of Liu Dajiang, who is a well-known carpenter in Jingtou, it can be said that he can do everything by installing beams, closing boxes to make cabinets, and making coffins. Working in the east and west for many years, although it is hard, it has earned half of the family business.
Liu Dajiang has a woman and a man at his knees, and his daughter is smart and smart, willing to say that he loves to laugh and has a table of talent. In the early days of liberation, the task force came to the village to carry out revolutionary work, organize production, and was trained by the district chief to become a cadre of the Women's Rescue Association, and two years later, it went south with the working group to work.
The boy Liu Liangcai and his sister have the opposite temperament, thick and honest, do not talk much, and light knows to work with his head down. Liu Dajiang was also full of hope at first, wanting to pass on the carpentry skills to his son Liangcai, but he had been with him for three months, and he would not do anything except pull a big saw to death, let him draw a line and fall asleep, and told him to chisel his eyes and smash his hands. Old Liu helplessly hated that iron was not made of steel, and shook his head angrily with his waving hand and said angrily: "What a dou who can't be supported!"
Liu Liangcai learned carpenter work without a shelf, and his father naturally did not cultivate him. And him? I stopped learning carpentry, but felt relaxed. Working in the team, the captain did not stop, he kept working like a robot. When the captain saw that he was honest, he sent him to the field to carry the dung, dig the edge of the ground, and do some worry-free farm work.
Liu Liang was only nineteen years old, and when it was time to say that his daughter-in-law was old, the guys in the team who were similar to his age had objects and pulled up the matchmaker, but he had not yet skimmed the eight characters.
Daddy and mother are dying of sorrow, he is like a person who has nothing to do, he should eat and drink, and he still sells his death. Someone asked him: "Liangcai, everyone else has an object, aren't you in a hurry?"
"No hurry, no hurry, just like we carry the dung slowly, one day the stone at the bottom of the hair will show its head." As long as it is your daughter-in-law, others can't occupy it, she will come sooner or later. ”
His father and mother called him a daughter-in-law in this village, and the girls in this village were reluctant to give him. So the adults asked the matchmaker to go to the outer village to say.
Maybe Liu Liangcai had an affair in his life, and when he was twenty-two years old, the matchmaker told him about Hu Sanyou in Qiushugou and married him in the winter of that year.
Hu Sanyu can marry Liangcai, mainly because she believes in the good words of the matchmaker, she exaggerates Liangcai too well, saying that the young people in the team are good at liangcai and have good hearts and eyes. And took the father of the three girls to secretly observe Liang Cai, that day the young people in the team all carried a lot of dung into the ground, Liang Cai took the biggest step and ran the fastest. The old man saw that he was in love, and he said to the matchmaker: "As long as you can work, you can earn more work points, and if you earn more work, your daughter can live a good life." Therefore, he let his daughter marry Liangcai, and of course, he also drew the rich financial gifts of the Dajiang family.
In the Spring Festival, Hu Sanniu took Liangcai to pay homage to her father. The custom in the village is that when the new son-in-law comes, he must kowtow to the old man and give a big gift, and only then does this Liang understand that as soon as he steps into the door, Liang Cai shouts: "Daddy is on the top, and the son-in-law has kowtowed to you." One bows, two kneels, three prostrates. Then he nodded at the old mother-in-law and shouted, "Mother, the son-in-law has kowtowed to you." Bow your hands, kneel, prostrate your head, and people do it seriously, without any hesitation.
The second elder looked in his eyes and was happy in his heart, and he praised the third son-in-law's good character and honesty.
Next, Liang Cai followed the eldest son-in-law to pay homage to the elders of the old man's own family, and what the eldest son-in-law shouted, he also shouted something, and the same prayer was extremely serious.
After turning around and performing the rituals for the elders who had brought their relatives with them, they returned to the old man's house.
At this time, the father-in-law and mother-in-law had not yet made the meal, and the sisters and brothers-in-law played poker around the table.
Liang Cai couldn't play poker, and after sitting for a while, he didn't think it was interesting, so he left the chair, walked to the front of the hall again, smiled at the old man and his mother-in-law who were busy cooking, and shouted loudly: "Father, mother and child have kowtowed to you."
The mother-in-law was shocked: "Liang Cai, didn't you stumble when you first came?" How about stumbling again? ”
Liu Liangcai was so shocked that his sisters and brothers-in-law also stopped playing cards, and they all stared at each other and asked, "Yes!" Didn't you just stumble through the door? ”
"Bump is bump, but wouldn't that be idle?" It doesn't make sense to sit still, so I'll do it again. After Liang Cai answered this sentence, he rushed to the big sister, second sister, second brother-in-law, and second brother-in-law who played poker, and gave them another kowtow...
After the teacher of Qiushugou heard about it, he condensed this story into a post-break language, called: Liang Cai prostrated his head and was idle- continue to prostrate.
Later, Liang Cai's laughing work of prostrating his head in Qiushugou was passed back to the well, and soon spread throughout the three townships and five miles, and for a time it became an interesting thing that people talked about after tea and dinner.
(This article is provided dictated by Liu Tiancai and compiled by Cheng Yinchang)
October 13, 2021 - Yu Chaoyang
【About the Author】:Cheng Yinchang, a native of Jingtou Village, Rencun Town, Linzhou City, Henan Province, has loved literature since childhood, is diligent in writing, and has published many articles in newspapers and online platforms. He is currently a member of the China Rural Writers Association, the Anyang Writers Association, the Linzhou Writers Association, and the special editorial board member of Capital Literature.