Ronan's Moonlit Journey Chapter 14

Maybe it was possible for the former prostitute to study farming, but it was because of Grenfell's connivance that everyone refused to allow it. In the beginning, it was all a mistake on her part, but in the end, everyone in the village sabotaged it. For example, she let pigs into her vegetable plot, cut off the water source of the wealthy family, smashed their dog's legs, and barely dug up their ancestral graves. The reason for not digging is that their family's ancestral grave is also the ancestral grave of everyone in Chuzhuang. In a chronically hostile environment, the Grenfell family had little hope, except for their big-headed son.

They raised their sons as scholars and did not allow them to do farm work, but only allowed them to study. Later, my eyes were wrong and I couldn't see the road at night. The Chuzhuang area was commonly known as "sparrow eyes", which was actually night blindness. Mainly caused by malnutrition and lack of vitamin E. The former prostitute insisted that their son's special eyes were the result of studying and studying hard, and he would just go to the city to get glasses in the future. Since he doesn't do farm work, the shape of the sparrow's eyes is different from that of local children, and is relatively slender (this is like his mother). He walks with thin steps, his hands are tucked into his sleeves (like Grenfell in this), he wears a three-tile blue cotton hat, his neck is slender, his skin is white, and his face has youthful pimples that only people in the city have. . The mouth is big, so in addition to sparrow eyes, it is also called Shuizui, which means it loves to talk, spits a lot, and drools whenever it talks. Shuizui wore a unique cotton-padded jacket or cotton-padded jacket blouse, made of dark green silk, with dark lights flashing from time to time on his shoulders and chest. Clothes of such color and texture are rare in Chuzhuang. It is said that Jianfu's wife used the clothes she used to receive guests to modify them. From this, we speculate that the former prostitute must have brought a lot of good things with her when she married Gianfu. What exactly was contained in the iron-wrapped wooden box in the hall where the confession was made? This provided an excuse to continue persecuting this family of three. Anyway, they have savings, so they won’t starve to death even if the land becomes barren. It was worth causing all the trouble for his family just to know what was in that box. Otherwise, they will never open that box until they are at the end of their rope, and won’t everyone’s curiosity never be satisfied?

Before Lao Guo's family was decentralized, they hired people to handle the laundry. Later, when the Cultural Revolution began, it was impossible to hire other people's labor, so the small items of clothing were washed individually, and the large items (bedding, sheets, etc.) were gathered together and put into a large wooden basin. First, Lao Guo stepped on it with his bare feet, and then Hong Ying crossed the water. The two of them twisted together. Twisting the sheets left and right like a marijuana flower. After being transferred to the village, laundry was still a headache, especially in winter when the water from the nearby river was bone-chillingly cold. Once the clothes are washed, the skin becomes rough and cracked. I had to go back to the old way of hiring people. The employees are naturally the women in the village, and they are very happy because the pay is generous (compared to earning work points in the team). Finally, one person was fixed: Grenfell’s wife. I can’t explain the special reason, maybe it’s because she has lived in the county town and it’s relatively easy to get along with her. Maybe it was because she couldn't do any farm work well, so Lao Guo felt sorry for her and let her do the laundry.

Every time she did laundry and stayed for lunch (guaranteed to have meat), Hong Ying would give her a dollar or two before leaving. Later, Gianfu also came to Lao Guo's house to help --- of course he was introduced by his wife. He built a chicken coop, put up a fence, and stayed to eat as usual. Grenfell is not as experienced as his wife, and he makes a lot of jokes just by eating. For example, a bowl of steamed bacon usually takes Lao Guo and his family two or three days to eat. Fatty but thin, large slices of snow-white meat with a two centimeter-thick layer of transparent lard on top. Gianfu's meal was completely reimbursed, and the meat and oil were all turned upside down. Immediately after returning home, I had diarrhea. Without a diagnosis, I knew it was because the oil and water suddenly increased and my intestines were too slippery to hang on. I went to Lao Guo's house to look for pills before being woken up by Lao Guo, who hurriedly said: "It's for nothing!" The second time I returned home, I mixed half a gourd and gourd of bran and ate a whole bowl of bran to stop the diarrhea. Grenfell is not a cure for diarrhea, but a pity for the oil and water. Now that the rice bran has absorbed the oil, the disease is cured, and the meat and vegetables we eat are also taken away. It’s really the best of both worlds!

One day, Lao Guo's family held a banquet for guests to express his gratitude to the villagers and the local government for their care during the past year. All the cadres of the large and small teams came, as well as the heads of each household in Chuzhuang. Grenfell is certainly among them. I heard that Lao Guo's family was entertaining guests in the evening, but he didn't eat either breakfast or lunch. I have also squatted in the latrine, and my belly has been cleared. Unexpectedly, I was too drunk on an empty stomach, so after drinking a small glass of Yanghe, Jianfu vomited. Since there was nothing in his stomach, he vomited out the yellow bile, so he had to be carried away from the banquet and went back to recuperate. Soon Gianfu's wife arrived and said she was here to replace Gianfu, but was scolded out by the brigade secretary. Then there was Sparrow Eyes, wearing a green silk blouse and a cotton-padded jacket, being pushed across the threshold by his mother. Hong Ying enthusiastically gave up his seat, but Secretary Zhao refused: "You're a sparrow who's walking at night and found the wrong place. If you want to eat, ask your father to come over, he hasn't toasted me with wine yet!"