Chapter 49 At the meeting of commune members, “I recommend Zhong Ying, an activist among women, to work as…”
In the following weeks, Zhong Ying was "assigned" a few more times, but they were all trivial matters, such as Lai Hunzi stealing vegetables from Hu's private plot, Nie Ying arguing with her husband again, etc. Zhong Ying didn't think much of it. She went whenever Li Ming asked her to. She realized that this world was just a place where "girls help girls".
Can a woman in her forties or fifties still be called a "girl"? Men can remain teenagers until death, so why not?
Li Ming intended to observe and train Zhong Ying. These family matters that had always given him headaches were handled beautifully by his youngest daughter-in-law, making her the perfect candidate for women's team leader.
There was one thing that bothered him a little.
Li Ming asked Zhong Ying to handle it, and she didn't refuse. She went whenever he asked her to. But if he hadn't said anything, Zhong Ying wouldn't have volunteered so eagerly. It was like a millstone pushing tofu; it only moved when pushed.
Having lived for fifty-four years, Li Ming has accumulated a considerable amount of experience and has developed a knack for judging character.
For example, his children: the eldest is ambitious and wants too much, but his abilities are only average.
The second son has no skills or ambition, but he can still find joy in his simple life with his wife, children, and a warm bed.
Rou Nier, born in the same womb, was a bit smarter than her second brother, but she had the same gentle temperament as her mother.
The younger son was capable and ambitious; he persevered through his studies to learn skills to help build the production team. Unfortunately…
Thinking of this, Li Ming couldn't help but sigh deeply.
He had developed some affection for Zhong Ying, which is why he was angry at her for not standing up for herself.
Li Ming was exasperated. How could this girl be so capable yet so lacking in ambition? Didn't she ever think about becoming a village official and serving the people?
Zhong Ying, the "salted fish," never imagined that she was washing dishes, or to be more precise, that she was performing the act of washing dishes.
Judging from Zhong Ying's back, her arms never stopped moving, making her look diligent and hardworking. But if someone turned to her face, they would find that she was just putting on an act.
In ancient times, there were those who pretended to be skilled musicians; today, there are those like Zhong Ying who slack off.
The water flowed and washed between the bowls and chopsticks, entirely controlled by Li Linshi, while Zhong Ying simply took the washed bowls and chopsticks out and put them into a basin on the other side, just like in a modern dishwasher.
Zhong Ying was happy to have some free time. Behind everyone's back, she and Li Lin worked together seamlessly, one washing and the other taking the shower.
"What else could a man be thinking when he's helping a woman? If I didn't want you to be my wife, I wouldn't be putting in all that effort!"
Liu Fengshou's words echoed in Zhong Ying's mind, causing her to pause involuntarily, her eyelashes fluttering slightly as she looked at the dead man in front of her.
The initial bet was just about washing the dishes once, but now Li Linshi is basically doing that job for Zhong Ying.
Zhong Ying looked at Li Linshi's focused face; could it be that he also...?
However, Zhong Ying quickly dismissed the idea. No, it's different. Liu Fengshou wanted to marry Chen Zhiqing, but between her and Li Linshi, she was the one who "forced her way in."
It turns out that Li Linshi is just a ghost after all.
Zhong Ying silently sent him another "good ghost card" in her mind.
Just like the food ration coupon Chen Lina paid, relying on others to be lazy is not a long-term solution. And the ghost can't be her dishwasher for life. Zhong Ying sighed and put her hand into the water. "I'll do it myself."
The gushing water in the basin stopped abruptly, interrupting Li Linshi, who looked up at Zhong Ying in surprise.
Zhong Ying didn't look at him anymore and just buried herself in her work.
Li Linshi couldn't help but glance at her again and again.
What happened? Why are we suddenly not using him anymore?
In Li Linshi's memory, when his father angered his mother, she would do the same thing, taking all the work upon herself and letting his father go wherever he wanted to cool off.
But what did he do wrong?
Li Linshi couldn't help but silently reflect on his behavior over the past few days...
“Zhong Ying—I have a letter for you!” A man in a dark green uniform with a crossbody bag stood outside the Li family’s door and shouted.
Zhong Ying quickly scooped up a spoonful of water to rinse her hands, stood up and wiped the water off her clothes, walked to the door and took the envelope from the postman. She glanced at the words on it and saw that it was from her brother Zhong Cheng.
The middle-aged man in front of us is surnamed Zhao. More than ten years ago, he was selected as a postman in this mountainous area, and he delivered mail for several production teams around here.
“I knew you were looking for a husband, so I came directly here,” said Zhao, the postman, who was quite well-informed. “It saves me the trouble of walking a long way into the village.”
Zhong Ying thanked her and replied, "That's true, it's more convenient to live at the village entrance."
The postman left after delivering the mail.
Zhong Ying rubbed the envelope between her fingers, estimating its thickness. She figured there were probably several sheets of paper inside, so she didn't rush to look at them and simply put them in her pocket.
After starting work that day, Li Ming did not immediately organize the production team to work. Instead, he gathered all the poor and lower-middle peasant adults in the team on the open ground of the threshing floor.
"Before we get to work today, let's have a meeting first," Li Ming said, standing at the front of the group. "As you all know, every year around April, our production team holds a new election. Those who didn't do well in the past year and weren't popular with the people are removed from office, while those who did well are re-elected. Anyone who wants to contribute to the team can also run for election..."
Zhong Ying mingled in the crowd, sneaking off like she would when attending a university meeting, taking out a letter she hadn't read yet from her pocket, tearing open the envelope and taking out the letter inside.
The letter, spanning four full pages, was written with such force that the words seemed to penetrate the paper, revealing the writer's indignant emotions.
Zhong Ying had no doubt that if this were a magical world, she would probably have received a roaring letter from her brother.
She quickly read the words on the paper. Although there were many words, they all boiled down to one meaning: her brother's questions. In the army, men with two legs were like weeds that grow back after being blown by the spring breeze, one crop after another, and they were worthless. Why did Zhong Ying insist on marrying Li Linshi and suffering the fate of a widow? Zhong Cheng was so angry that he was about to be driven crazy by his troublesome sister.
After reading the letter, Zhong Ying felt only relief. Fortunately, in this era, travel was slow and news was transmitted by letters at a snail's pace. Fortunately, her brother's leave to visit his family had already ended when she started her troubles; otherwise, she really wouldn't have been able to achieve her goal so smoothly.
A ghost is preventing her from getting married? Zhong Cheng will probably just pack up his sister and take her away, find a reliable comrade to marry her off, and forget about ghosts. The glory of socialism will defeat all demons and monsters.
"...We've all lived together for years, and everyone's words and actions are under the watchful eyes of the commune members. I'm sure everyone knows what's going on. So let's start the election now. After the candidates are nominated, everyone will raise their hands to vote, and the person with the most votes will be elected. If only one person participates in the election, then more than half of the votes are required for the election to pass," Li Ming said. "Let's start with the position of production team leader."
Immediately, someone raised their voice, "You'll have to continue doing this!"
Many voices seconded the motion, but it was meaningless to anyone else, and no one else stepped forward to volunteer.
Zhong Ying had no objections and followed the crowd, raising her hand in agreement along with the people around her.
With a unanimous vote of 36, Li Ming was allowed to continue serving as the team leader of the Tonggan production team.
"Thank you all for your trust in me." Li Ming bowed to the crowd.
The custodians and feeders remained the same, still Li Gangshi and Nie Jinfeng, since they had performed well at work and hadn't made any mistakes.
When it came time to select the scorekeeper, Fan Wu, who used to do that job, waved his hands repeatedly, saying, "Please spare me, I'm getting old, I really can't do this kind of mental calculation work anymore."
Last year, Fan Wu finally stepped down, handing over the hot potato of scorekeeper to Li Lin, who had returned to his hometown. But after less than half a month of this relief, an unexpected event occurred, and the job fell back on him. This year, he absolutely doesn't want to do it anymore; it's too mentally taxing and ages him quickly. He already has half a head of gray hair.
"If you don't take the position, who will?" Hu asked loudly.
Someone chimed in, "That's right, that's right..."
"Work points, work points, the lifeblood of commune members." The scorekeeper is a crucial position in the production team, requiring a high level of education, including literacy and accounting skills.
Moreover, the work of the scorekeepers is quite heavy. Every day, they record the work points of the attending members; every month, they summarize the daily records into a "Work Point Statistics Table" and record them in the individual work point books, ensuring there are no errors or omissions; at the end of the year, they provide the total data for the whole year, cooperate with the production team leader to calculate the grain and cash that each person should receive, and participate in the grain distribution work...
Fan Wu has been doing this job for over twenty years, and he really doesn't want to continue.
Li Ming frowned. He knew that Fan Wu wanted to retire. Fan Wu had talked to him last year. Seeing that everyone was trying to push Fan Wu back into the workforce, he stood up and said, "Old Wu has worked hard for so many years. Now that he is getting old, it is understandable that he wants to retire."
People then calmed down.
Li Ming continued, "Does anyone here feel they are qualified for this scorer job?"
This job requires educated people. Tonggan Production Team only started to pay attention to education after Li Ming became the team leader. Apart from this generation of young people who attended the village primary school, the previous generation was lucky if they could even recognize their own names, let alone record work points for the entire production team.
Among the younger generation, Li Linshi was the most outstanding, but now that he's gone... the remaining kids are truly a case of "choosing the best among the worst."
At this point, the parents couldn't help but feel a little regretful, wishing they had supervised their child's studies as well as Captain Li had.
Li Ming, who had never relaxed his children's studies, looked at his eldest son, Li Gangshi. If Li Gangshi could be a scorekeeper, he would have done it long ago, instead of settling for a storekeeper. His second son, Li Rongshi... Li Ming silently looked away. "When a tiger has three sons, one of them will surely be fierce."
Zhong Ying silently put the letter away without saying a word. Although the original "Zhong Ying" wanted to marry Li Linshi and take his scorekeeper job, the current Zhong Ying had no interest in the job and just wanted to be a couch potato.
People looked left and right, and finally could only look helplessly at those few educated youths.
Cheng Bin stepped forward and said, "If the villagers are willing to trust me, I am willing to do my part."
With no one else to choose from, Cheng Zhiqing became the new scorekeeper.
Some people thought that was the end of it and were about to walk to the farmland to work when they heard Li Ming continue, "And there's the women's team leader position. I think we can elect someone for it this year, since it's been vacant for so long."
The members of the Tonggan production team looked surprised, because they had almost forgotten that such a position existed because they had not found a suitable candidate.
Li Ming decided to give it another push, "I recommend women activist Zhong Ying as a candidate."
Startled by everyone's gaze, Zhong Ying looked up abruptly, a look of surprise on her face. Wait, what's going on?
"I'll vote!" Zhong Ni, whose marriage had been resolved with Zhong Ying's help, immediately raised her hand. Cao Fang, the female ghost floating in mid-air beside her, also raised her hand, even though people couldn't see her.
Wu Ling, the eldest daughter-in-law of the Liu family who was no longer subjected to domestic violence, quickly raised her hand.
When the Zhou family broke off the engagement, Zhong Ying stood up and retorted. Fan Erni immediately pulled her father, Fan Wu, and her mother, Nie Ying, to raise their hands. She then glanced at her younger sister, Fan Zhaodi. At her second sister's prompting, Fan Zhaodi had no choice but to raise her hand.
Fan Dani remembered that Ying came to help when she was giving birth, so she raised her hand as well.
The events that happened at the educated youth settlement not long ago were still fresh in everyone's mind. Chen Lina was the first to raise her hand, followed by Yang Meijuan, Qiu Yucai, and Cheng Bin. All four educated youths raised their hands to cast their votes.
Deng Xia, Zhong Chunsheng, and Miao Suyun naturally voted for their own people.
Nie Jinfeng thought of a casual remark Zhong Ying had made earlier, and after a moment's thought, she raised her hand. Li Rongshi, without thinking, followed his wife and raised his hand immediately afterward.
Tian Mei felt somewhat ashamed for taking on the cooking duties, but thinking that if her younger sister-in-law really became the women's team leader, she would at least have something to do, so she also raised her hand.
Li Gangshi simply thought he was doing Zhong Ying a favor, and raised his hand along with his parents.
Hu raised his hand, Third Aunt raised her hand, Lin Shuhong raised her hand...
Zhong Ying was even more surprised. Why would everyone be willing to vote for her?
Although puzzled, Zhong Ying was inevitably moved as she looked at the raised hands, as if she saw sparks of hope gradually igniting.
So when Li Ming finished counting, 26 out of the 36 commune members who participated in the election voted in favor, more than half, and Zhong Ying was elected as the new women's team leader of Tonggan Production Team, even though she had hated her father in the past because he was obsessed with power, Zhong Ying did not say anything to refuse.
It's unclear which woman started clapping first, but soon the applause joined in.
Li Linshi watched from afar as Zhong Ying became the focus of the crowd, and raised his hand to applaud her.
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Author's note: Everything we do leaves a mark on people's hearts~ Go for it, Zhong Xiaoying!
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