02
"Grandma, do you want my mom to find me a stepfather?"
Before Yang Qiujin could say anything, Tianyou went into the kitchen to drink some water and brought her a bowl of water. When he heard this, his eyes widened and the water in his hand almost spilled all over the floor.
Yang Tianyou looks more like Yang Qiujin, with big double-lidded eyes, curly eyelashes, a high nose bridge, a small mouth, and a very handsome appearance.
His height seems to be inherited from his grandmother. He is small and thin. No matter how much good food he eats, he can't gain weight. His skin is very similar to his father Chen Shengqing. It is white and clean. He doesn't get tanned even if he is exposed to the sun every day. If he doesn't talk and his hair is not cut short, he will look like a lively and beautiful little girl when he stands there.
"Why, you don't want your mother to live a good life?" Li Xiu'e quickly took the water from his hand and gave it to Yang Qiujin to drink: "Don't you know how difficult it has been for your mother all these years? Your biological father has been gone for seven years. When your mother gave birth to you, she had a difficult birth and bled all over the bed. She almost died, but your father didn't show up. Over the years, you, a naughty boy, have caused trouble and made your mother cry. You just don't listen to what your grandma and your mother taught you. If your biological father really died, what reason would I have to keep her in our house? A woman should find a good partner while she is young, so that she can have an easier life in the future."
"Then I'll follow my mother to my stepfather's house." Tianyou blinked his round eyes and said stupidly.
"That won't work. You have to stay at home." Li Xiu'e peeled off the hairy shells of the bamboo shoots and said without looking up, "It's not right for a woman to remarry with a boy. It will make the husband's family dislike her. Your grandmother is not dead, so you should stay with her and she will raise you."
"I don't want to! I don't want to follow grandma, I want to follow mommy!" Tianyou said loudly, his eyes turned red unconsciously.
He is naughty and usually looks heartless and a little silly, but he knows very well in his heart who is good to him and who is not.
Although his mother has a worse temper than other mothers and often beats and scolds him, that is because he is disobedient.
When he was obedient, his mother was very nice to him. He would get chickens, ducks, fish, meat, candies, eggs, toys and other things that the children in the village rarely saw in a year, but his mother would get them for him every now and then.
Every year he was given new clothes and shoes to wear, and he never wore clothes that were patched on top of patches like other children.
His mother would carry him around to play, hold him in her arms and sing lullabies, tell him stories, and praise him for being a good boy...
Although his grandmother was nice to him, the food she cooked was not as delicious as his mother's. She also didn't scold him in front of him like his mother did, then turn around and touch his head with heartache and apologize to him.
His grandmother would not teach him to read and write, and would not stand for other children hitting him, regardless of whether it was his fault or not. She would protect herself regardless of anything, and even quarreled and fought with those tyrannical parents...
His grandmother was a well-known good person in the village. She was always patient and would not argue with others when others bullied her. She allowed others to bully her.
His mother had a hot temper and would never tolerate any injustice or grievance. She would often quarrel and fight over a single word.
He didn't understand what the adults meant by "潑妇". He thought that people should be like his mother and have the courage to resist and fight, so that others would not dare to bully them.
He liked his mother and wanted to follow her.
From birth to now, Tianyou has never seen his father once and has no concept of his biological father. When Yang Qiujin wanted to remarry, he had no objection at all and just wanted Yang Qiujin to take him with her.
Yang Qiujin gulped down the cool mountain spring water in the bowl, and seeing the naughty boy crying, she reached out to wipe away the tears from his eyes, not knowing whether to laugh or cry, "Well, who said mom was going to remarry? Your grandma was just teasing you. You are mom's child, and there is no way mom would not want you."
She put the bowl on the ground and continued to peel bamboo shoots. "Mom, don't listen to the gossips of the village. Shengqing is a soldier. Soldiers have to keep their missions secret. It is normal to have no news for three to five years. If he really died, the country would give us a pension, and the leaders of the county and the commune would come to visit us in person with the martyr's certificate. The leaders didn't even come to our house, how could he be dead? Those gossipers are just jealous of the money Shengqing mails to us every month, and they are jealous of the good life we three mothers have, so they spread rumors. These days, life is not easy for every family. Who would save up money to support the family of their comrades after having enough to eat? Tell me, who said such nonsense to you, or I will tear their mouths apart later!"
In fact, Li Xiu'e didn't believe it in her heart. She had never been to school, was illiterate, and was timid and shy. She would always blindly believe what others said.
Hearing what her educated and cultured daughter-in-law said, Li Xiu'e was relieved at once. She said that her third son was smart and capable. He was one of the only two high school students in the village who was admitted to high school. He was well-educated, so how could he die?
She also knew her daughter-in-law's hot temper and was afraid that she would quarrel with those gossipy women in the village again, so she stammered and found an excuse to avoid the issue and urged Yang Qiujin to make breakfast.
In the smoky kitchen, Yang Qiujin cut the freshly peeled bamboo shoots in half and threw them into a pot of boiling water to cook.
One hundred pounds of bamboo shoots with shells will only yield about fifty pounds of bamboo shoot meat after peeling them out. They are boiled in the pot for a few minutes, picked out and dried in the sun. In the end, the dried bamboo shoots weigh less than two pounds.
Chen Shengqing hadn't written home for two years. Yang Qiujin didn't know whether he was at the original mail address, so she didn't plan to mail him dried bamboo shoots this year.
I picked up the bamboo shoots in the pot, cut most of them into thumb-sized strips, put them in a bamboo dustpan, and moved them to the yard to dry. I packed half of the remaining bamboo shoots and planned to give them to my mother's family, and eat the other half myself.
After cooking the bamboo shoots, soak them in cold water for a period of time to remove the bitter taste of the bamboo shoots and turn them light yellow.
Yang Qiujin randomly picked up some bamboo shoots and sliced them for later use, and then cut some garlic sprouts from her own plot and some dried red peppers hanging under the eaves. She put some cooking oil in the pot, heated it up, and poured the bamboo shoots in with a sizzle. After a while, she added garlic sprouts, red peppers, salt and MSG. The unique fragrance of bamboo shoots, mixed with the fragrance of garlic sprouts and the spiciness of peppers, the delicious garlic sprouts and peppers were scooped into the plate with a spatula. The aroma was so good that Tianyou, who was standing by the stove watching Yang Qiujin cooking, drooled.
"Mom, I'm so hungry."
"Don't grab the vegetables with your hands. It's not polite to steal them. Go wash your hands. Mommy will grab some kimchi and chop them, and then we can eat."
Yang Qiujin knew what Tianyou was going to do after he said this without even looking at him. She glared at him and watched him obediently go to the water tank on the right side of the yard to fetch water to wash his hands. She took out a small bowl and went to the window of the kitchen that was sheltered from the sun and ventilated, and picked up some kimchi from a large kimchi pot.
Almost every household in the southwest can make kimchi, but the taste and texture are different in each household.
Yang Qiujin has been able to cook since she was a child, and she is an excellent cook. Once you open the lid of the kimchi jar, a strong sour and spicy flavor comes out, making you salivate.
Yang Qiujin picked out a few pieces of pickled radish peels from the jar that she had pickled the night before, and also picked up some pickled green vegetables, pickled red peppers, and young ginger. She covered the pot with a lid, took the pot to the chopping board, cut it into two-finger-wide pieces, added some sugar and MSG, scooped a spoonful of bright red chili oil, and mixed it with some cold water. A portion of sour, spicy, and slightly sweet kimchi was ready.
Breakfast was the leftover sweet potato porridge from last night. Yang Qiujin heated it up. She and her mother-in-law each had a large bowl of porridge, while Tianyou scooped a small bowl. They ate with the dishes at the wooden table in the yard.
"Eating porridge again." Tianyou washed his hands and frowned when he saw the porridge. "I don't like it."
"Other people don't have anything to eat, and you're still picky. Eat quickly." Yang Qiujin put a piece of red pickled radish skin into his bowl and tapped his head lightly with the tip of her chopsticks: "Other people can't even have a full meal, let alone make porridge with fine rice. You should be content."
In the past few years, there was famine and hunger, and people in the Pioneer Brigade starved to death. Although life has improved a lot in recent years, every household still lives a tight life.
In many families, adults and children could only eat about 60% to 70% full at every meal, and a bowl of porridge was so thin that you could see a few grains of rice. Yang Qiujin's porridge was thick and dense, and she used refined rice because coarse rice would cut the throat, and she was afraid that Tianyou and her mother-in-law would be upset.
In Yang Qiujin's concept, one does not have to dress well, but one must eat enough and well so that one has the strength to work. Therefore, she has been willing to eat since she was a child.
After getting married, Chen Shengqing mailed living expenses on time every month. After deducting the filial piety money given to her mother-in-law, there was a lot left every month. Yang Qiujin was not like other women in the village, who were reluctant to spend money and were reluctant to buy things here and there.
She did what she should buy, what she should eat, and what she should drink, and she raised the three of them very well. However, Tianyou became a picky eater, and he wouldn't eat this or that.
This is also the reason why many women in the brigade envied and hated Yang Qiujin. Many families in the brigade could not even get enough food to eat, but her family was different. Not only did they have good food and drink, but her son was also a picky eater!
Picky eater! Listen, what a luxurious word!
Tianyou doesn't like eating porridge, he just thinks it's too sticky and not tasty.
No one knows a child better than his mother. Yang Qiujin understood him and had many ways to deal with him. No matter how much she was willing to give her child food and drink, she would not tolerate his picky habits.
If he doesn't like porridge, she would add his favorite sweet potato cubes to the porridge. If he can't swallow the porridge, she would add a portion of sour and spicy appetizers, his favorite kimchi, to go with the rice. She just didn't believe that he couldn't eat it.
Tianyou also knew that her mother was a very stickler for what she said. You had to eat whatever her mother cooked and you were not allowed to be picky or say it was not tasty. Otherwise, if she was in a bad mood, she would either not make sweet potato porridge for several months or make it every day, making you vomit.
He silently scooped a mouthful of porridge and ate a piece of sweet and soft sweet potato. This was the yellow-heart sweet potato that his mother had improved and planted in the fields. It was different from the white-heart sweet potatoes planted in the village. The sweet potatoes her mother planted were sweet and fragrant, while the sweet potatoes planted in the village had no sweetness and would choke the throat. Every bite would cause him to hit his chest three times, and he could choke to death. He didn't know what kind of sweet potato his mother planted.
Tianyou, who had just been saying that he didn't want to eat porridge, unknowingly finished a bowl of porridge with the sour, spicy and crispy radish skin and the spicy and crispy fried bamboo shoots.
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