When the Chinese New Year was approaching, Xu Ning received a package from Jing City. The sender was Wen Qing, who should be Lu Xiaotang’s friend who worked in Jing City. The package contained several of Jing City’s more famous cakes and two kilograms of milk candy.
Xu Ning took out the things, and there was a letter underneath. The letter thanked her for asking Lu Xiaotang to bring over the specialties last time. Everyone in the family liked them very much. These pastries were from Beijing City, and several brothers bought them for her to try.
Xu Ning first wrote a letter to Lu Xiaotang, telling him about his brother sending the package, and then wrote a letter back to Wen Qing, expressing his gratitude to several people and his love for the pastries.
She took out some of the pastries and asked Xu An to send the rest to the cowshed.
The 26th day of the twelfth lunar month was the wedding day for Jianmin's second brother. Aunt Dashuan invited Xu Ning and his brother to the banquet several days in advance. Xu Ning didn't know how much gift to give.
She went to the village to ask Aunt Xiangyun, and heard that it was only 50 or 60 cents. So she wrapped 60 cents in red paper and took Xu An with her.
As soon as she arrived at Jianmin's house, the village chief's wife and fourth aunt invited her to sit with them. Xu Ning went to their table, and Xu An and Dalin sat together.
When the dishes were almost served, Grandpa Qi came with Xu Mo. A few old men sitting inside saw him and greeted him, "Seventh Brother, come and sit over here." Uncle Dashuan also immediately came over and brought Grandpa Qi and Xiao Mo to the table with the old men.
Sandan from Uncle Hongjun's family saw Xiao Mo and pulled him to the table full of children. Xu Ning took a look and saw about eight or nine children, aged four or five to seven or eight. Some of them had runny noses. Xu Ning immediately turned his head away and didn't look over there anymore.
When Xu Mo saw her, he called her "Sister Xu" and stopped talking to her.
Fourth Aunt said, "This kid in the cowshed is really well-behaved. In autumn, he picked mountain products with me. He was reluctant to rest for a moment and would go everywhere with a small basket on his back to pick products."
Aunt Xiangyun at the table next to her also said, "He is well behaved and polite. Our Sandan has become much more sensible after being with him. He always asks to go to the cowshed to play with him."
The village head's wife asked Xu Ning, "Xu Zhiqing, does he still visit you often?"
Xu Ning said, "I don't go out much in winter, and I can't sit still at home, so I came to our place to play with Xiao An for a while."
The village chief's wife sighed, "Your place is too far from the village, otherwise you could sit with us and talk in the winter."
The village head's wife had just finished sighing when an aunt next to her asked, "Xu Zhiqing, you really ran away to the countryside without telling your parents and took your brother. We want to go to the city, but we can't go yet. Why do you want to come to the countryside?" She almost asked Xu Ning directly, "Are you sick in the brain?"
Everyone at the table fell silent, remembering what Brother Xu Ning said when he went to the village chief's house.
Xu Ning stood up and said passionately, "Aunt, the leaders said that we should send educated youth to the countryside to receive re-education from poor and lower-middle peasants and integrate with the villagers, so I responded to the call and brought my brother here. How can you say that I ran away secretly? This is such an honorable thing!"
Everyone at the table stared at her in amazement. The village chief at the next table stood up and applauded, saying, "Xu Zhiqing, you are a girl with a very high level of ideological awareness. Xiao An is also great."
The village head's wife and the fourth aunt also said quickly, "Yes, Xu Zhiqing, please sit down and eat, or the food will get cold."
After Xu Ning's speech, no one talked to her about this topic for a long time.
Just after the New Year of 1972, news came from the county that there would be conscription for the soldiers this year. There were only two vacancies in their brigade, and the competition was very fierce.
After receiving Lu Xiaotang's letter a few days ago, Xu Ning grabbed two handfuls of beans and went to the village to exchange them for tofu. When he passed by the village chief's house, he went in and had a conversation with the village chief's wife. He told her the news and told her that as long as there was no problem with the physical examination, she would not be replaced by anyone else.
Xu An also passed the school exam and went directly to the second semester of junior high school after school started.
Chen Sen from the village chief's family also joined the army successfully. I heard from the village chief's wife that he went to southern Shandong. Last night, the village chief's wife brought a chicken and twenty eggs over. Xu Ning kept the eggs and asked her to take the chicken back.
When spring planting began, five-year-old Xu Mo also went to work with several other children in the village, and could earn one work point every day.
After Li Fengjiao's incident, the village chief and several team leaders discussed and decided to assign all the educated youth to work together. However, they were afraid that they would have conflicts among themselves, so they let them do their own work and calculated work points according to the amount of work they did.
Xu Ning thought to himself, the village chief is really worried about them!
Wei Lanlan and Chen Xiangdong are dating, and now they work and eat together. Sun Hao and Yang Xiaomei are also a couple, and Chunhua has to take care of her younger sister Jiaohua.
Xu Ning was not familiar with the remaining few people and did not want to have any dealings with them. He only worked ten work points every day, and when that was enough, he went home to dig in his private plot, making those people in the Youth League Institute very envious.
Chen Xiangdong and his friends looked at Xu Ning's private plot, where vegetables had already been planted, while their own plots had not yet been dug, and they felt that three grown men were no match for a female comrade.
This year, Xu Ning ordered vegetable seedlings from Aunt Dashuan again, including peppers, beans, tomatoes, and cucumbers. Yesterday, when she got off work, she ran into Uncle Dashuan and asked her when she wanted them.
She planned to plant them tomorrow so that she could eat the vegetables two days earlier. These past few days, when Xu Mo went to cut grass, he dug up some wild vegetables and brought them back every day, so at least there would be one more dish on the table.
When Xu An came back from school, he brought some leek roots, saying that the village head's wife asked him to bring them back. Xu Ning happily planted them on the edge of his private plot and watered them. The leeks grew quickly and would be ready to eat soon. But he remembered that there were still a lot of leeks in the space, but he had no chance to take them out to eat. He only dared to take some out when leeks were on the market.
Xu Ning only planted half of it, and asked Xu An to give the rest to Grandpa Qi to plant.
The next day, after work, they planted the vegetable seedlings. Before it got dark, Xu Ning asked Xu An to cook first while she went to fetch water to water the vegetable field.
Xia Qing and Liu Fang were washing clothes by the well. Lin Miao was standing there with a basin, talking to Xu Mo who was playing at the door of the cowshed.
Xu Ning walked by with the bucket and heard Lin Miao asking, "Do you like white bread? I'll bring some for you when I go to the city in a few days!"
Xu Mo lowered his head and played with the ants on the ground. He said, "We don't have money to buy white bread. I like to eat black bread and pickles. My mother makes black bread every day. It's delicious. The pickles are also delicious."
Lin Miao smiled and said, "Black flour cakes and pickles are not as delicious as steamed buns. Can I buy them for you next time?"
Xu Mo looked at her warily and said, "I don't know you, why did you buy me white bread? Are you planning to sell me?"
After saying that, he ran into the cowshed crying, "Grandpa Qi, someone wants to sell me."
Leaving behind a confused Lin Miao...
Xu Ning was trying so hard to hold back his laughter that he almost failed to lift up the bucket.
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