There is a local saying that the roots of farmers' homes are deeply rooted under the eaves. It can be seen that the house is important for rural people.
How many houses has my father built in his life? I'm afraid even he has to count carefully with his fingers broken.
My family was poor when I was a child. My parents worked hard in the production team for a year from morning till night, only enough for our family to barely fill their stomachs.
Every morning, as soon as the morning sun is white and there is enough paper, my mother gets up and goes to the kang. She combed her thick ear-length hair neatly, took out a small basket of sweet potatoes and two green radishes from the cellar, washed them, cut them into pieces, shredded them, put them in a cauldron, scooped up half a pot of water, grabbed a handful of big salt and cooked them on the fire. Maybe it's because clear soup and water are too scarce. Mother thought for a moment, then took out a handful of peanuts from the porcelain jar containing grain, mashed them in the jar and added them to the pot, which was considered as adding a little meat to the pot. Mother calls this kind of rice salty rice.
This is what our family eats all day.
I hate eating sweet potatoes, which are not fresh at all, sticky, sweet or salty, and hard to swallow when stuck in my throat; Even if you eat it, your stomach will protest and you will feel uncomfortable. Many times, looking at a pot full of rotten sweet potatoes, I tightened my face and wanted to cry. But my mother said, besides sweet potatoes, what else can I eat at home? The wheat of the production team is basically given to the public grain, and the poor kind is also divided into several kilograms. We have to save up to build a house for your uncle and marry a wife!
I don't remember my uncle. My mother said that she is a soldier in the army and will be demobilized this year. Parents ask people to match the bridge everywhere, but everyone thinks that orphans and widows can't earn a few jobs and have a hard time. After many twists and turns, I finally got engaged in a neighboring village. This daughter-in-law is very frank and asked the matchmaker to send a message: I am not afraid of not having a father, I just want to be good! But on one condition, you must have a "nest" to live in when you cross the door, and you can't be crowded with your uncle's house!
In the middle of the night, I woke up, and under the dim kerosene lamp, my father was still sitting on the kang, rolling dry cigarettes with my brother's homework paper and smoking constantly. Fireworks flickering, father's face clear and hazy.
"... when I was ten years old, my father left us ... My mother was weak and didn't advocate anything, so she couldn't support her family. My brother has been very dependent on me since he was a child, treating me as both a brother and a father. I can't mistreat him ... "
Mother was silent for a long time and said firmly: Gai, since I follow you, I admit it!
But the family is so poor! There is nothing but two adobe houses, a simple wooden table for eating and a heatable adobe bed for the whole family. Looking at the empty home, parents are very worried.
That day, my father bought a little pig on credit from the market. Its white coat is like a layer of unmelted snow. On this clean background, it happened that a black rose was embroidered on both sides of the belly, which was very delicate and charming. It wags its bare little tail, looks at us with silly eyes, and purrs with a very trusting expression. Cute! Mom said: don't be fun when you come back from school. Digging vegetables to feed. At the end of the year, I will sell it to you to make new clothes and eat delicious pork, Huimian Noodles.
New clothes-what a temptation! I looked down at my patched gray trousers, and a complicated feeling passed through my mind. At the head of the village that day, Xiao Ye laughed at two boys and said that I always pulled my brother's pants and that I looked like a tomboy! Pork stewed vermicelli-my stomach began to growl, and it is only delicious in August and Chinese New Year every year! I licked my tongue and my heart was full of joy!
Attractive hope unfolds before our eyes, and people can give birth to infinite power. Every day, my two brothers and three people compete with each other and dig wild vegetables with baskets around the field. When I got home, I chopped it up and mixed it with a little bran. Watching the pig eat greedily, growing up day by day, the smooth white hair shining with bright luster, the two black roses becoming more and more colorful, more and more ostentatious, and the heart is sweet. Break your fingers day after day.
Spring has come and summer has come. "Indus flower, purple mother-in-law, turned around and opened the green radish, which attracted cicadas, cicadas and cicadas. She was telling me: I am thirsty, I am thirsty."
The cicada flew away and the plane tree leaves withered. The yellow leaves on the trunk were absorbed by the autumn sunshine. When the cool wind blew, they fell feebly and covered the yard. Those flowers, clothes and pork, like life, came alive in front of my eyes and shook my eyes.
During the Spring Festival, firecrackers exploded, and I wore brand-new flower pants and a flower coat, dragging my mother's hand across the street to pay New Year's greetings. Aunties cooed: Young man, today is really like China. How handsome!
Xiao Ye blinked at me and said nothing; I raised an eyebrow at her and said loudly, it's time to go home for dinner-my mother made me pork stewed vermicelli!
Thinking like this, I woke up from my dream again and again, smiling all over my face and drooling for a long time.
The end of the year has finally arrived, and that exciting moment is just around the corner!
On the 26th of the twelfth lunar month, my father is going to kill pigs, and the whole family is like New Year. Early in the morning, even my younger brother, who usually likes to sleep late, got up early, and my mother cleaned the yard clean. The invited butchers and helpful neighbors also came. My father moved the door of the pigsty. Suddenly, the little pig was a little timid when he saw so many strangers coming around. He looked at his mother piteously and refused to come out of the pigsty. Mother is holding a handful of vegetables in her hand and calling "Liu Liu" in her mouth. Flower pig hesitated, but still couldn't resist the temptation of vegetables and hesitated to walk out of the circle door. Several men quickly stepped forward and quickly overturned and tied them.
The pig struggled desperately, the snow-white coat was covered with dust, and two beautiful Chinese roses withered instantly. It screamed in despair, and its voice stung my heart. My stomach suddenly hurt, so I hid in the house, and my tears flowed out quietly. ...
With the pig's piercing howl, the yard gradually quieted down. I rushed out of the house, and when I stood in the yard again, the pig-no, the two complete pork fans were lying neatly on the rabbit's wooden cart. The rabbit wiped his hands, took out a crumpled handful of money from his greasy cotton-padded jacket pocket, counted several pieces and handed it to his father. My father's hands seem to be shaking. He took the money carefully, counted it carefully, smoothed it out slowly and put it in his arms.
"Do you sell those entrails?" The rabbit pushed the car, suddenly remembered and looked back at the pile of blood on the ground.
Father seemed to be startled, hesitated, glanced at us, turned his face and said mercilessly, "sell!" " "
My brother and I stood silently, watching the rabbit take away the whole pig liver and intestines.
When the crowd dispersed, I stood in front of the empty door and stared at the big pool of sewage flowing in the yard, as if all the drops were flowing in my heart. ...
Tears poured out like brakes.
My brothers and I naturally have no pork to eat this year, let alone new clothes.
I was awakened by my mother's sobs in the middle of the night, listening quietly with my eyes open-
Mother choked: it's nothing for adults to suffer, but children are too wronged! Father sighed and smoked a cigarette. "This money is not enough! The ancients said that big brother is like a father. The more we are in this situation, the less people look down on it! The house must be built, and the best in the village must be built! "
Mother hesitated for a long time, and then said slowly, I have figured it out. The four old pagoda trees behind the house are thicker than one person's arms (surrounded by one person), and the three phoenix trees in the yard are sold, and then I can borrow some from his aunt, which is almost enough.
After a long year, I finally survived the crackling firecrackers and laughter of others.
My mother stroked my head and said softly, Ya Ya, we will be rich in two years, and my mother will definitely make you a flowered skirt.
I was speechless, and the tears of injustice flowed down again.
In spring, the snow melts and the sun is warm. The earth seems to be a little girl who just woke up, full of vitality. The grass drilled a sharp little skull, the cherry blossoms took the lead in smiling and opening their pink faces, the swallows flew in, and the whistle built a nest under the eaves of the hut.
Father wants to build a house, and all the villagers come to help. Men help build walls, mix mud, lift wood and tie straw handles. Women help carry water, pick vegetables and cook, and everyone goes into battle together. In a few days, three brand-new white lime-painted new houses will stand proudly!
She is very different from other dusty huts in the village. She is tall, spacious and clean. Even better, she pressed two shiny tiles neatly under the eaves, like a straw hat with a beautiful black border.
It is so outstanding and striking that it stands out from the crowd in the small mountain village. She stood in front of the village like a proud princess, noble and elegant.
Father stood in front of the house and walked over to finish smoking cigarettes for people one by one.
Soon, the second uncle's daughter-in-law came in, and the whole family was smiling. As soon as the old people in the village saw their grandmother, they kept boasting: Aunt, after so many years, you finally came out. Look, how capable the son and daughter-in-law are! Grandma nodded and smiled and said nothing. The sun shook its eyes and kept wiping its sleeves.
My father built a house for the second time in the mid-1980s ten years later. Big brother is also old enough to marry. At that time, the rural land production contract responsibility system had been implemented, and every household was full of enthusiasm. The fertilizer in the field is full. The fertilizer of livestock and plant ash, together with the rain, make the crops grow vigorously when the nutrients are sufficient. White flour can be eaten all year round. I don't have to bite the bullet and eat that choking sweet potato anymore.
My parents saved a little, and my mother raised a litter of old sows and sold breeding pigs twice a year. The sweet potatoes and corn are basically fed to pigs, and the piglets are getting longer and longer day by day. Eldest brother works as a temporary worker in the port, and can take home more than RMB 100 every month. Therefore, it is very easy to build a house this time.
Looking at three tall and bright red brick and blue tile new houses, bathed in sunshine, standing in front of the old houses, my father was happy. He walked leisurely on the red brick floor with his hands behind his back, and the golden sunshine shone on his father's smiling face through the bright glass window, which was warm.
When I go to Qiu Lai in spring, the winds of the four seasons change different colors and walk leisurely through the yard. The days quietly parted in the relaxed symphony of pots and pans, and in a blink of an eye, the second brother reached the age of marriage.
My parents were very angry and built a new house for my second brother. There are five rooms this time, which are much more exquisite than eldest brother's. They adopted the most popular style at that time, and at the same time added a cement eaves more than two meters wide in front. On windy and rainy days, there is no need to worry about having no place to cool clothes. The skilled second brother built a semi-circular garden with red bricks in the yard, and planted rose, rose, corn poppy, chrysanthemum and so on. After work, I moved a chair and sat on the porch, watching the sun shining, the flowers competing and smelling fragrant; Bees and butterflies are jumping around in the yard without feeling anything.
Mother was relieved and said with emotion: "I have lived for most of my life and suffered a lot in the wind and rain;" Tighten your belt, scrimp and save, and keep clutching ... alas! When your second brother marries his daughter-in-law, we can finally rest. "
But my mother's wish came to nothing. Second brother has just married his daughter-in-law for several years, and his family is going to build a house again!
Because of the drinking water problem, the township government and the village Committee jointly decided to relocate all the villagers living in the mountains! Young people cheered and responded positively, tearing down the old house and moving away. The village is full of broken bricks and tiles, broken walls and ruins, and it is a bleak scene. My father, who is almost sixty years old, has obvious hunchback and low back pain because of years of fatigue. Whenever it rains on cloudy days, the pain gets worse. But he still ran before and after, helping his two sons build a house in a new village three or four miles away.
These unified planning and construction of new houses are all red bricks and tiles, with tall and bright doors and windows, elegant gatehouse and neat quadrangles. They are more "up a storey still higher" than the original houses. They are very spectacular!
It rained in Mao Mao on the day of supporting the house. Because of excitement or low back pain, my father accidentally fell off the wet wall. ...
Young people live in a new village. Rows of uniform big tile houses are full of ostentation and extravagance and jubilation. There are spacious and clean streets, and all kinds of colorful seasonal flowers on the roadside are enchanting. The small village has become a new atmosphere!
I advised my father to move away several times. The rest of the old houses are scattered on a dilapidated hillside, all of them are old, weak and sick, in case no one takes care of anything. Father said: I am used to living here and don't want to leave. Look how free it is on the mountain. Going out is a mountain, the air is fresh, and you can raise chickens and sheep. How nice!
We must let him go. And every time my mother sees me coming back, she happily puts the mountain eggs in my handbag and talks about how nutritious the children are!
The year before last, my father was informed that because the homestead in the old village had been contracted to individuals, the remaining families were ordered to move out within one month. I called my father, and if I have no money, I can give him some. Parents are getting older and their physical strength is not as good as before. In recent years, the big brother's children have a heavy burden of going to school, and the second brother is in poor health. Parents' savings may be running out. On the other end of the phone, my father said easily: Dad has money, that's enough! All you have to do is bring up the child wholeheartedly. Your mother and I are in good health, so don't worry!
After the house was built, I went home. I will never forget that day! I walked around the whole village, and the house was tall, eye-catching, solemn and majestic. Which one is it?
An enthusiastic grandmother pointed me out and hid behind the village. What kind of houses are those? ! Low brick walls, narrow courtyards, semi-old doors and windows (my mother said they were found in the flea market) are shabby and shabby, which is incompatible with the layout of the whole village! She stood quietly behind a high-rise village, just like an elderly person, sad and helpless.
The faint light of the sunset shone in front of my eyes through the small window, and I suddenly returned to my childhood. In a blur, my chest suddenly hurts. Looking around, my nose is sour. "How can I live here?"
Father sat at the door, quietly smoking a cigarette, and said with a smile, how nice! Two old people, that's enough.
I looked at my father, and his back bent by suffering expanded even more, and his waist bent deeper, like a wooden bridge honed by years; The weather-beaten face has turned into the color of yellow land, criss-crossing wrinkles, like newly plowed wheat fields. ...
Thoughts are like clouds, and the past comes back to my eyes. ...
Tears filled my eyes quietly. ...
My father and mother!