"Ideals and Youth" - It turns out I also had a youth (Thirteen...)

Although the car window wasn't very transparent, Zhou Wenyan could still see Ye Xiqing's face clearly.

When Zhou Wenyan realized that the person sitting in the car was his ex-wife, his entire worldview collapsed. What?

A huge wave of emotions surged within me, but I dared not show it. I hurried home, only to find that even home was different now.

Seven years have passed, and the youngest child in Zhou Lao Er's family has grown up. Having never seen Zhou Wenyan before, seeing him leading so many people to enter her house, she immediately ran over and asked, "Who are you looking for?"

Zhou Wenyan looked at the unfamiliar child with suspicion, while her mother was busy in her garden.

After recognizing the person, he knew something was wrong and quickly came over.

He tugged at the child's clothes: "Don't be so rude, this is your third uncle, call him uncle!"

The child had never heard of this third uncle before, and hid behind his mother without making a sound.

Li Danfeng complained for a moment about the child's lack of manners, then smiled broadly and said, "The third son is back. Oh my, he even brought a wife with him. Not bad, really not bad."

"You've been doing well all these years, haven't you? How long will you be staying this time?"

Li Danfeng smiled radiantly, gentle and approachable. Before Zhou Wenyan could even speak, she had already shut him up.

Standing there in a daze, something felt off.

There's nothing wrong with that; after seven years away, things are bound to change.

The Zhou family's battle over dividing the family property lasted for a long time, but in the end, the second son's family, who had the better brains, emerged victorious.

The eldest brother of the Zhou family is a coward, and his sister-in-law has a straightforward temper and only knows how to act impulsively. When she said she wanted to divide the family property, she just said it directly, and went on to explain how much she deserved to be divided after all the injustices she had suffered over the years.

The second son's family was clever; their son and daughter-in-law served Old Man Zhou soup and water every day, showing their respect. Even though they were the ones who started it, they acted obediently in front of Old Man Zhou.

They don't want to split up; it's all the eldest sister-in-law's fault for making trouble. They just want to stay home and take good care of their father.

Old Zhou had a rare experience of what it was like to be an emperor in his small territory. Once you're in the emperor's position, you're easily offended by honest advice and can't stand harsh words.

When I get angry, I kick the eldest son's family out. If you want to divide the property, then divide it. Don't expect to get anything from me!

Like Ye Xiqing, the eldest son's family eventually left to start their own household. Apart from farmland, they only had six-tenths of an acre of land allocated by the village according to regulations, just like Ye Xiqing in this respect.

But the second son's family was different. They directly inherited the entire old courtyard of the Zhou family and also took over the cultivation of Zhou Wenyan's land.

There's this problem with dividing up family property in rural areas: crops are planted once a year, and when crops aren't grown, the land is just sitting empty. The village can still redistribute the land if it wants to.

Houses have been built on the homesteads, and people live there every day. Law enforcement also needs to be humane. You can't change the homestead every few years and tear down people's walls and demolish their houses every time. There's no such thing as doing that.

Therefore, farmland may change, but the area of ​​homesteads will accumulate from generation to generation, and whoever wants the old house will benefit.

Old houses are often the result of the accumulation of several generations. The Zhou family was dominated by males and dominated by females, which was reflected in their three brothers, three wives, and countless children.

Other families also include married daughters. When a woman marries and moves to another place, she does not take her family's house or land with her, so it is naturally incorporated into the old house.

And because women marry all over the world, cross-regional management is difficult to achieve even in modern times, and it is even more so at this time.

It can't be like a computer program that, as soon as a woman gets married, immediately takes back her land, and as soon as she gets divorced, immediately returns it to her.

Unless the land changes, they basically don't interfere and just let the original family farm it.

If the land were to be reclaimed, neither the woman's husband's family nor her own family would conduct cross-regional investigations; the land would often be divided directly, and the woman's family could use the number of women to claim a few more acres of land.

So, in a sense, women are not without land; in fact, they have even more.

But women's benefits are like two pieces of land that exist simultaneously; in name, they occupy more than men, but in reality, they have none.

Now Zhou Wenyan can finally experience the benefits of marrying out of the country. Men are not usually treated this way, but unfortunately, he is now competing with men.

Zhou Lao Er first coaxed Zhou Lao Tou to drive the eldest son's family out at the lowest possible cost. Then he served Zhou Lao Tou diligently, often stewing meat and serving sweet soup. He always gave the old man the best things, which made the old man lower his guard and gradually took over the family property.

When Ye Xiqing built the greenhouse, they rushed to build their own greenhouse and used that as an excuse to squeeze all the old man's money out of him.

Now that the second son's family has built a shed and made money, will they treat Old Man Zhou better and better?

Won't.

The money is all in their hands, so why bother serving this old man properly? Their attitude has completely changed. They even make sarcastic remarks if the old man takes an extra bite of food at home.

Old Zhou couldn't stand the constant bullying from his second son's family, so he went to stay at his eldest son's house. The eldest son wasn't kicked out, but being a dutiful son, he still served them well.

He would even help his second brother with chores when there was something going on at his shed.

The eldest son's wife was furious. From then on, she never spoke a word to the second son's family and went to work in Ye Xiqing's greenhouse.

Of course, Ye Xiqing's salary in the shed was indeed higher than elsewhere. She had married a good-for-nothing man and could no longer rely on him for the rest of her life, so she wanted to earn her own money and control it herself!

Judging from the fact that Zhou Wenyan didn't know Bao Xiangqiao was still at his house even after seven years away from home, he had no contact with his family at all.

After being away from home for seven years, plus another year, the War of Resistance against Japan was already won, so it's normal to have a little surprise when you go home.

The last surprise was Bao Xiangqiao's long and arduous stay in a cold cave; this time, it's the complete renovation of his parents' house into his second brother's house.

Life is full of surprises, and everything has two sides.

Don't be too surprised if the result is different.

...

Zhou Wenyan's return still caused a small stir in the village.

But it had nothing to do with Ye Xiqing; she still built her own house.

When Wu Guiyun was helping her build the greenhouse, she had many worries, but many of them turned out to be unnecessary.

Greenhouses are not a simple technology for people in this era, and the cost of building them is also not a small one.

The spread was even slower than Ye Xiqing had expected, allowing them to monopolize the market for several more years.

The threat of bidding has not yet been addressed, but the consumer base is clearly growing.

After all, seven years have passed, and those born in the 80s are now in their 90s. Leaving aside the progress of our competitors, vegetable prices should have gone up by now.

By the time off-season vegetable prices have completely dropped, basic vegetables will probably have already reached this price.

Ye Xiqing not only earns income from four sheds, but also has a truck to transport materials. People in the area who want to build sheds all have to buy materials from her.

She was one of the first to set up greenhouses, and having a vehicle made it easy to deliver vegetables, giving her many stable sales channels.

Selling vegetables is easy for her, but when others actually try it, they find it's not as simple as just going to three markets. You can't sell that much just by going to the markets, and in the end, they have to rely on her to collect the vegetables.

The key to off-season vegetables is that they are off-season, and the focus is on quick sales and large-scale distribution. The newly built greenhouses did not pose any threat to her, but they did provide her with a stable source of supply.

Ye Xiqing wasn't doing this for free; of course, she would earn a profit from the price difference during the vegetable harvesting process.

Interest compoundes, money makes money, and with capital, the snowball grows bigger and bigger.

Ever since moving into that mud-brick house, Ye Xiqing had always wanted to move. Of course, she would move immediately once the money was available.

This time, not only were the best main beams used, but all the walls were also made of red bricks and cement, and the tiles were the newly popular small red tiles.

Of course, besides these facade projects, there is another major change.

When the main structure was completed, a well drilling team came to drill a well.

After drilling the well, a special set of equipment was installed.

Ye Xiqing stayed at Wu Guiyun's house during the period when the house was being demolished.

The shed had already been dismantled, and the land had been planted. Wu Guiyun, who had nothing else to do and had been keeping track of the progress at the construction site, immediately asked curiously upon seeing this: "What's this?"

Ye Xiqing patted the large iron tank: "Pressure tank, for handling tap water."

Wu Guiyun was shocked. It was no secret that urban buildings all had running water, but could their village have it too?

Ye Xiqing calmly replied, "Yes, it's possible. Don't underestimate modern technology."

Wu Guiyun looked at her, then at the enormous machine: "How much does this equipment cost?"

"Two thousand five hundred, don't tell my mom, just tell her eight hundred."

Wu Guiyun: ...

Then don't tell me! I don't want to know!

Looking at Ye Xiqing's new house with pain, he kept asking her how much the bricks, cement, and workers cost. He never expected that the most expensive thing was this big iron tank outside.

Wu Guiyun was already shocked to hear that she used 50,000 bricks to build her house.

These days, a brick costs five cents, so 50,000 bricks would be 2,500, which is no small amount. As a result, this big iron can contains 50,000 bricks!

If you do the math, the two items alone amount to 5000.

Even if you're a millionaire, you can't just waste money like this!

Ye Xiqing turned around and said, "Why not? I'm a ten-thousand-yuan household, not a ten-thousand-yuan household."

Wu Guiyun: ...

You're not a millionaire either!

Even if you don't have 100,000 yuan, you can still build a house. If you have tens of thousands, you can build one. It's not worth saving money when you finally get to build a house.

These days, when building a house, everyone cares about appearances. Old Mrs. Wang is happy to see red bricks and red tiles. She touches the wall with the red brick roof every day. It makes her feel so proud!

Ye Xiqing, on the other hand, focuses more on substance. This house won't be replaced anytime soon, not because he doesn't have the money, but because building technology doesn't advance that quickly.

If you want to enjoy advanced technology, you might as well buy a house in the county town; the prices were quite cheap at the beginning.

Rural construction techniques will continue to evolve over a long period of time; all we can do this time is ensure that tap water is installed properly.

She could no longer tolerate a life without a flush toilet and washing machine; she absolutely did not believe that a washing machine could clean as well as a hand.

It's not uncommon for people with ten thousand yuan to build big houses, but a pressure tank water tower is extremely rare. Since it was built, everyone has come to see it, and the story has spread by word of mouth, making it seem more and more amazing.

When Ye Xiqing built the foundation, he pre-buried cast iron pipes and specially built a septic tank with bricks in the side garden to treat sewage.

After the drainage ditch was dug and backfilled, tens of thousands of bricks were thrown to build a courtyard wall and a carport.

Everyone passing by was estimating how much it cost her to build this house; it must have cost tens of thousands!

Zhou Wenyan was originally a prominent figure in the village. He returned to his hometown with his wife and children from the city, which should have been a great success. However, Ye Xiqing stole all his glory.

Not only that, he became the laughingstock of the village once again. When he returned, Zhou's eldest sister-in-law immediately came to his door and asked him to take his own father with him. Why should he be the only one who doesn't have to support the father of three people?

The second son's family originally used the excuse of providing for the elderly to take care of them in order to seize the entire old house.

But once you get the stuff, then naturally everyone's father is your father. Everyone was raised by their father, so why should only he be the one to raise it?

The eldest son's wife couldn't handle those two, so she naturally came to the third son. "You seem to be living a good life, you can't not even support your father!"

Hearing this, Ye Xiqing already guessed the ending: "So he raised her?"

Wu Guiyun nodded: "Yes, we'll take him in. Zhou Laosan is a very proud man."

Ye Xiqing couldn't help but laugh out loud, "You've taken care of it? That's great."

She has a dark side; she believes the male protagonist is about to get a second divorce.