Introduction: Fish leaping over the dragon gate, sending blessings in the new year: big blessings, small blessings, family portraits, blessings are everywhere. Knowing blessings brings blessings, and pure blessings and great blessings add happiness. Receive blessings and receive blessings every year, keep blessings and pray for blessings every year!
The New Year is getting closer. Although the weather has not been very good these past few days, with falling rain and snow, and the outside world shrouded in a cold and gloomy fog, I am still extremely excited and excited in the atmosphere of joyful New Year.
The whole family took action: buying new clothes, cleaning, buying new year's goods... they were very busy.
On the evening of the 22nd day of the twelfth lunar month, I was in front of a stall selling firecrackers and Spring Festival couplets at the south entrance of the urban farmer’s market. "Firecracker, about to take money out of his pocket. Suddenly I felt someone tapping me from behind. I was startled and turned around subconsciously. A man of medium build, bald and with big eyes, wrapped in a half-new military coat, about fifty years old, stood behind me with a smile.
"You——" I felt that the person in front of me was very familiar, but I couldn't remember it all of a sudden.
"Yue Ming, I am your brother Cheng..."
"Ah, brother Yongcheng..." I suddenly remembered who he was and screamed in surprise. .
He is Brother Yongcheng, from my hometown. According to Murakami's seniority theory, I should call him brother. He is kind and warm-hearted. More importantly, he is a "rural know-it-all", he has also been a civil teacher, and he is good at calligraphy. He is always indispensable in taking charge of weddings and funerals in the village.
Since I was transferred to work in the county town, I haven’t seen him for more than ten years.
"Haha, brother, you are still wearing glasses, and you are still so thin. Your appearance has not changed, I recognized you from afar..."
I was a little confused: "Brother Cheng, why are you here? Are you going to the city to buy New Year's goods? Why are you empty-handed?"
"This stall belongs to your nephew. I have nothing to do at home, so I'm here to help..." Brother Cheng shouted to a busy young man in the stall, "Boy, come and meet Uncle Yueming who is teaching in the city..."
The man who just handed me Spring Festival couplets and firecrackers The young man who looked smart and capable turned his head and shouted: "Uncle Yueming, hello..." While taking things from others, I stood in the mist of rain, snow and mist. Brother Cheng seemed to have forgotten the cold and started chatting...
When I got home, my mother and I talked about meeting Brother Yongcheng.
"Yongcheng stopped writing couplets and sold them instead. What a pity..." Mother stopped what she was doing and looked very disappointed. She sighed and said, "Twenty years ago, when I was in my hometown, He wrote all the Spring Festival couplets in the whole village..."
Listening to my mother's words, the traces of the village in my memory and the New Year's Eve stories in my memory seemed to emerge clearly before my eyes:
< p> The downstairs of the old archway gate was crowded with people, men, women, old and young, crowding around and making a loud noise. Several Eight Immortals tables lined up in a row were covered with cut red paper. Brother Yongcheng first rubbed his left and right hands, then put them to his mouth and breathed; then he held the edge of the large porcelain bowl filled with ink with his left hand, He grabbed a thick brush with his right hand, hung his wrist in mid-air, dipped it in ink, and swung the brush vigorously. The brush moved like a dragon and a snake, "As time goes by, people live longer, spring fills the universe and brings happiness..." A series of red couplets exuding the fragrance of ink, In the expectant eyes of the onlookers, in the admiration of "Not bad, not bad, really good, really good", it was passed from Brother Yongcheng's hand like a red ribbon, and fell like snowflakes all over the sky towards the courtyard entrance of the village..."You bastard, why did you write my 'recruiting wealth' like this?" Suddenly, Lao Scar, a five-guarantee household in the village, ran over panting, carrying a square piece of red paper. , he yelled, with drops of water hanging on his goatee - I don't know whether it was water from the nose or sweat. "Humph, you're bullying me for not knowing how to read? There are obviously four characters, why is there only one?"
Everyone saw the red paper in Old Scar's hand. Some people booed, some laughed, and some didn't untie.
"Uncle Scar, this is a combination of traditional Chinese characters. I changed the four characters of 'beckon wealth and treasure' into one character 'beckon wealth and treasure'. This is the word on the old almanac. This year The most popular one..." Brother Yongcheng put down his pen, rubbed his hands, and explained with a smile.
"Hey, that's what happened. Even you kid wouldn't dare..." Lao Scar wiped the hot sweat from his forehead and grinned.
"Go home quickly, otherwise the glue on the door will freeze and won't stick on..." Someone shouted from the side. After hearing this, Lao Scar stopped talking and walked away amidst the laughter of everyone.
The Chinese New Year in my memory always seems to start with Brother Yongcheng writing couplets to the whole village during the twelfth lunar month. When I was in elementary school, during the winter vacation, my friends and I went in groups to the place where Brother Yongcheng wrote couplets - downstairs of the old archway in the village. Either stand on tiptoes and stretch your neck to watch him write, or everyone finds a branch and gestures randomly on the ground, trying to compare one person to another. At that time, everyone shouted loudly: "Apprentice, apprentice, slave for three years; practice calligraphy this year, and start teaching next year..." Invisibly, everyone regarded themselves as Brother Yongcheng's little apprentice, hoping to get his true inheritance, even if It's a pointer.
It's a pity that Brother Yongcheng was so busy that he didn't even notice that someone was learning from him.
The New Year in my memory, when the smoke rises from the kitchen, when the sound of firecrackers resounds deafeningly through the whole village, when the whole village is immersed in the happiness and joy of the New Year... the front and backyard of the village In the streets and alleys, the most eye-catching Spring Festival couplets with red background and black characters from Brother Yongcheng seemed to fall from the sky, shining red on the lintels of every house and everyone's smiling face...
"Damae When I went back to my hometown last spring, I heard from people in the village that your brother Yongcheng had already started a business since he was not a civil servant. Now, we have set up a small printing shop..." My mother kept her treasures in mind and began to tell me the story of Brother Yongcheng again.
When I listened, I couldn’t help but feel very emotional. Brother Yongcheng, an ordinary rural man, a man who loved writing calligraphy when he was young (it is said that he has to use up at least ten porcelain bowls of water every day to practice calligraphy), is constantly being washed away by the torrent of time and life. And grind. Time is not forgiving. Running for family life and working hard for a better life, Brother Yongcheng has undoubtedly undergone tremendous changes. So, did life slowly change him, or did he gradually adapt to real life?
I remembered what he said when I broke up with Brother Yongcheng when he handed me a pair of Spring Festival couplets that looked handwritten rather than printed from the box, "Brother, this couplet, It’s not as beautiful as the gold-plated ones, but it’s handwritten by me. It’s very attractive and practical. You can take it. Now, although few people want to buy handwritten Spring Festival couplets, I still like to write two..."
At that time, my heart was full of warmth, and my memory seemed to have traveled through the rusty time and space, returning to the old archway gate in the village during the Chinese New Year that had long since disappeared. But more importantly, I felt inexplicably moved inside, because from that moment on, at that moment, I seemed to understand a lot and understand a lot.