It was late autumn, and our family had been living in a shed with neither wind nor rain for months.
One day, a voice that made us excited came from outside the shed.
"What? Is there a beggar living here?”The person who spoke was not from the mine, but a senior official.
" It's not a beggar. It's a worker's family who built a temporary shed here," the mine manager replied.
"It's a shabby shed on the side of the road. It doesn't look good. Can't we let them stay away from the roadside?”The officer continued to ask,
" Yes, we'll get them to move out soon," the director who followed the mine manager rushed to answer.
The senior cadre asked suspiciously," Are they really family members of the mine? Why are you so poor?"
The director continued to answer on behalf of the mine manager." Yes, there are many children in this family. The mine can't save the poor if it's an emergency."
The man who looked like a senior cadre looked at us brothers." Oh, it's a few boys. That's good. There will be labor in the mine in the future." He pointed at the shed and said," Sigh, this shed is too simple. It's getting cold now. It's not good for them to live here."
The director continued to answer," We'll try our best to think of a way for them. Before the beginning of winter, we'll find a place for them to move out. We guarantee that it won't affect the image of the mine anymore."
This was a higher-up who came to the mine to inspect the work. When he saw our dilapidated shed, he felt that it had a negative impact on the image of the mine and asked the mine manager to find a way to move our family elsewhere.
The leaders of the mine also knew about our family's difficult situation, but they did not have the means to help us solve it. During that difficult period, there were too many families in trouble. The mine helped this but could not help that. They only pretended not to see it and dragged it out like this, letting nature take its course.
" When it comes to providing housing for the family members, the mine is barely able to do so. They really don't have the ability to provide food for the family members. The grain station is even more out of the mine's control. However, the prerequisite for our family to survive is to provide food and shelter. We can make do here. The winter in the south is not as snowy as Dafutun.
When it comes to relief, the mine will give a monthly living allowance of ten yuan to the families of workers who are in special difficulties. My father has received it. The leaders sometimes ask the director to give my father twelve yuan. I don't know where the two yuan came from. At that time, his father's monthly salary was 30 yuan. It was difficult for him to support his family. It was something that young people nowadays could not imagine.
Although our family came from our village, our parents were not real farmers. They were not as smart as the southern farmers recruited by the mine. The blacksmith Old Xia's family in the mining workshop came from the rural area of Hunan. When they arrived, they took their sons to build a few thatched huts on the hillside not far from the copper mine so that the family could settle down. They also opened up wasteland and planted their own land to solve their own food problem. Later, they even raised pigs.
Dad didn't have the ability to do that. He didn't dare to let us live too far away from the mine, afraid that the local farmers would cause trouble. He knew that carrying oranges, sharpening scissors, and snatching kitchen knives was the most legitimate way to eat.
After the mine manager accompanied the higher-ups for an inspection, a few days later, the secretary of the mine manager's office came to the shed where we lived. She was a very beautiful woman in her thirties. My mother was more than 1.7 meters tall. There were not many women who were as tall as my mother, but this female secretary looked a little taller than my mother. Her appearance was very European and American. Perhaps she was of mixed blood. Looking at her face, it would be fascinating.
She was very polite as she spoke to Mother. Us brothers squatted on the ground and picked up wild vegetables.
" Mrs. Niu, these kids look good. They're all as tall as you, but Mr. Niu isn't," the secretary said as she looked at us. I was embarrassed by her beautiful eyes. My face turned red and I quickly lowered my head." Oh, this is the second brother, right?" The secretary saw my blush and pointed at me, smiling." Look at you. Are you afraid of me or don't like me?"”
" Our Second Brother is shy when he sees strangers. He's useless," Mother said.
"Do you only eat these wild vegetables? The child doesn't look well."
"Sigh, there's no other way. How can I survive without eating wild vegetables with only Old Bull's food?”
"When the child grows up, you'll be blessed. Oh, didn't Chief Xu (referring to my aunt) come to see you?”
"She didn't come. How could she have the time to come?"
"Chief Xu wrote a letter to the mine manager, asking the mine to take care of you. The mine is also in trouble, so we've helped out as much as we can. Don't blame the mine."
Mother smiled and said," No, no, that's not the fault of the mine. It's because we have too many children and are poor."
"I heard from the mine manager that Director Xu participated in the revolution against the Japanese, a few years earlier than him. Is Director Xu your sister?”
"Yes, from a big family."
" Chief Xu is quite concerned about you guys. Oh, the mine manager asked me to tell you that the workers 'dormitory at the vegetable field west of the canteen has been vacated for your family. You can move in."
"Thank you, mine, for your trouble."
" It's getting cold. You guys should move over quickly. I'm leaving. These kids are really interesting." The secretary smiled at us brothers again and turned to leave.
Before winter, we moved into the workers 'dormitory. The door of the dormitory we lived in faced south. It was the westernmost room in this row of dormitories. The sunlight was very good. The room was three meters wide and five meters deep. Dad used bamboo slices at the innermost end and tied them into two rows of big beds on the left and right walls. He put thick dry straw on the bed, making it very comfortable to sit on.
In the empty space near the door, his father used broken bricks to build a stove. There were pots and pans piled beside it, and the room was full.
Finally, we had a house to live in. Although it was a simple straw hut, we were very happy. The first night, we were so excited that we almost couldn't sleep. Looking up at the electric light above, I couldn't help but have infinite fantasies in my mind. I felt that I would be like the children of the mine's cadre family. I could eat white rice, eat meat, have a student uniform, and have white sneakers. After wearing the student uniform and white sneakers, I would no longer be afraid. When I saw the female secretary of the mine manager, I would blush.
Perhaps we don't look as rustic as when we first arrived. Otherwise, why would the female secretary praise us for our good looks? It seems that the female secretary even gave me a special look. I'm so afraid of those western-style people looking down on us! However, there was no sign of disdain in her beautiful eyes.
Cough, in front of the female secretary, why did I suddenly feel shy? Why did I lower my head? Could it be that I'm really as useless as Mother said?
I can't make it up to her this time. If the secretary comes to look for her mother again, I'll definitely greet her openly and act like a child from a cadre's family…However, the secretary never came to our house again. Not long after, she was transferred back to the provincial capital.
No matter where I am, no matter how difficult the world is, as long as I am by my mother's side, I will not feel lonely. The pain will always be gone by half. My mother will always be the person closest to me.
That night, Father was working overtime in the workshop, Mother was sitting on the bed sewing clothes, and Brother and the others went to sleep first. I lay under the blanket and quietly recited the text of "The Rooster Crows in the Midnight" to Mother. When I recited the part where Landlord Zhou flayed the rooster in the middle of the night and asked the long-term workers to do more work, Mother said to herself,"Are the landowners as bad as they are written?"”These words didn't seem to be meant for me to hear, but no one else was listening. Was Mother asking herself?
At that time, I still didn't know Mother's true background, so I said," Landlords must be very bad. Otherwise, why would the books say that landowners are all bad people?”
His mother whispered," When we were young, when we saw poor people coming to the door to beg for food, we would put food in bags for the poor people to take away. If they didn't have bags, we would let them take off their pants and tie up their pants legs as bags. We would put food in bags for them to carry away!”
I asked,"Mother, aren't you a middle farmer?" Of course, the middle peasants are not as bad as the landlords." Mother listened and didn't say anything else.
When she was in Dafutun, her mother would be afraid when she heard about the division of family composition. Since coming to the copper mine, she had never seen her mother's frightened expression. The mines were busy with production and did not have as much exercise as the doctors.
Not long after we moved into the workers 'dormitory, the commercial grain for our family was approved. The grain station finally provided food for our family members, although the children only had seven catties a month, the older children had nine catties a month, and the mother had eleven catties. However, there were still more than 40 catties in total, which exceeded his father's monthly rations.
Upon hearing this news, his father, who was rarely smiling, walked around the house and kept muttering," We can eat the national grain, we can eat the national grain." He was different from his usual behavior of being humble in society. This time, he wanted to show off in a big way. He asked his whole family to line up and go to the grain station four miles south of Zhoutian Pass to buy rice. Along the way, he saw people of all sizes lining up on the main road. People didn't know what was going on, so many people stopped. They looked back at us, pointing and discussing something.
Father longed to meet more acquaintances on the road. Whenever he met someone who knew him and asked him what he was going to do, he would loudly say," The whole family has eaten the national grain. Go to the grain station to get grain." Father's voice was so bold and proud. This might be the first time in the history of our Niu family that our ancestors had such an honor.
We brothers felt ashamed of our father's posture. We lowered our heads and lowered our eyes, but our eyes secretly looked around, afraid to meet our classmates. We didn't want our classmates to know that our family was poor. We needed to hide our family's humbleness in school, just like how mother hid her landlord family background. Otherwise, our family's poverty and humbleness would make us unable to raise our heads.
Even though I was unwilling to follow father and make a fool of myself on the road, I also knew how difficult it was for father. Mother led us here like a group of beggars. For a few months, we relied on father's rations to feed six people. The whole family struggled in hunger. How much physical and mental pressure and hard work did father and mother bear? Letting father release the heavy pressure and exhaustion in his heart in his own way was unquestionable.
At the thought of this, all sorts of emotions welled up in my heart, and tears welled up in my eyes. Only we knew the hardships we had suffered. From carrying the burden of fleeing from famine to being able to carry rice home from the country's grain station, it could not be said that the fate of our family had undergone a qualitative change.
This book comes from：m.funovel.com。