Emmett's Epoch of Endeavor Chapter 20

The superstitious people in my hometown say: "In the middle of July, ghosts are scurrying around."

The little ghost Yu Kun came to the world on the morning of the first half of the seventh lunar month in 1967. Not the time!

He Jie lay back on the mattress, her face covered with pain and sweat, she stopped moaning, relaxed her cold little hands, and stopped holding my hand tightly. Aunt Xu, the private midwife, congratulated me and said that I would be born a "worker" rather than a "cooker." I looked at my watch, and it was 8:40. At this time, I heard the loudspeaker on the electric pole at the entrance of the alley wail, and a stern female voice from the town's cable radio station read "Quotations of Chairman Mao" loudly. There is such a coincidence, it is this paragraph: "All wrong ideas, all poisonous weeds, all ghosts and ghosts, must be criticized, and they must not be allowed to spread freely." That night, this "worker" actually snored loudly, making him He Jie and I looked at each other in shock and couldn't help laughing. "I'm afraid this kid will become a dreamer again when he grows up." I said.
 
In her thirties, He Jie only ate one chicken and forty eggs. Over the years, I heard other women say that they ate dozens of chickens and hundreds of eggs during confinement, which made me feel ashamed. He Jie didn't say this. But later when she was quarreling with me, she wanted to talk, and said it in tears, so that I no longer dared to be arrogant, so I had no choice but to play the no-fight card.

Kun Kun ate rice soup and He Jie's milk as a baby. He Jie's nutrition was poor, and the milk fountain was only a trickle. She couldn't afford milk or milk powder, so she followed the teachings of a poor woman and peeled two cents worth of raw peanuts every night and chewed them slowly. Sure enough, the spring gushed out the next day, just like a poet's inspiration pouring out, making the little devil slurp to his fill. At that time, prices in my hometown were very low, and it was the season for digging peanuts. Two cents could buy a big bag. Suddenly autumn turned to winter, and the rebels took He Jie to the residential area to criticize her. He Jie, carrying a baby on her back, stood among the revolutionary masses and was scolded and humiliated. In a fit of anger, the milk fountain stopped flowing, and it was difficult to continue dripping. So Kunkun was weaned at four months, sat in a bamboo chair and sedan, and ate steamed sweet potatoes three times a day. Half a year old, in addition to sweet potatoes, rice is added to eat. It is also lucky that there is no infarction or choking to death. He was severely malnourished. He was still unable to stand firmly even after he was over one year old, and he fell down every step of the way. As he got older, He Jie would no longer care about Kun Kun and would take care of Zeng Xurong's baby Dongdong at home every day. Zeng Xurong works as a waiter at Jincheng Canteen on Dadong Street and is He Jie's best girlfriend. We all call her by her nickname Manman. She called He Jie her elder sister and me her ninth brother. She often brought a large porcelain pot of meat and vegetables to my house, and she never forgot to stuff Kunkun with a steamed bun. We sometimes jokingly call her "Master" and Dongdong "Little Buyer". She never regarded He Jie as a nanny, even though she paid her wages on time every month. The manager of Jincheng Canteen reminded her many times not to be friendly with He Jie, but she didn't care. The manager couldn't do anything to her. She came from a good family and was uneducated. What could he do to her? Seven years later, He Jie was unjustly imprisoned, but Manman still came to my house often to see if he had any difficulties and offer help; he touched Kun Kun's head and gave him something to eat; he asked about He Jie's current situation in prison, with tears in his eyes. go. Manman was dragging Dongdong, her husband passed away unfortunately, her salary was low and her life was not comfortable. Later, it became even more difficult to start a family with a large group of children. That's it, every time Kun Kun ran to find her, he would get some good luck.

I often eat kimchi at home, so Kunkun has a serious case of roundworms. In the summer when I was eight years old, roundworms became tangled and blocked my intestines, causing severe intestinal obstruction. We had no money to send him to the hospital, so he had to delay at home. I suffered severe pain for four days and four nights. I ran around the table in pain, holding my stomach and crying loudly: "I have cancer! I'm going to die!" I couldn't eat every day and drank only vinegar water, salt water, and sugar water. I was in critical condition. elephant. If he couldn't sleep at night, I would lie down all night, arching my back and pushing up against his stomach, which could alleviate the pain a little. It took four days for the disease to subside, and seventy-eight roundworms appeared, filling a tile bowl. When he was young, he ate poorly and often fell ill. Whenever he felt bad about himself, he would come up and say, "Dad, touch your head." He pressed his forehead against mine. If I said, "Don't take any chances," he would run out to play again. If I said, "I have a fever," he would go to my cousin's husband and ask Di Qi for medicine. Xiang Diqi works in a hospital and always has medicines at home.