In order to understand and experience the "three rural" conditions of agriculture, rural areas, and farmers, the ancient emperors set aside "three acres of land" in the palace compound for hereditary farming. Later, one-third of an acre of land was extended to mean "one's own small territory", or "power or scope".
My father-in-law, who is over seventy years old, has been retired at home for more than ten years. In addition to walking every morning and evening, and insisting on taking his grandchildren to school, he also cultivates three-thirds of the thin land in his hometown in the countryside. It is said to be "three points", but it is actually just scattered plots in front of and behind the house. Only seasonal vegetables such as tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplants, peppers, spinach, rapeseed and onions and garlic can be grown.
In the early years, my father-in-law worked in a tobacco company in the county. He took a back seat the year I changed my job and came back. At first, he went to the company specifically to hold annual meetings and so on, but later he stopped caring about it. Just ignore it. Consultants, consultants, in the words of people of their time - without official position, one is light.
I remember that there was a concierge at the gate of the tobacco company's family residence. Every time after dinner, many people would gather in the corridor of the concierge to watch chess games. Before his father-in-law retired, his former manager often guarded one side of the "Chu River and Han Boundary" and started a wheel-and-wheel battle with chess players who came to learn chess skills until midnight, and the chessboard made a "crack" sound. After his father-in-law retired, he was just like his former manager. In addition, he was straightforward and high-profile, which attracted onlookers even more. His chess playing sounds were even more exaggerated.
Later, our little family moved from the county to the urban area where we work, and we spent less time together with my father-in-law. I can only go back and stay for two or three days during holidays and holidays with my children.
My mother-in-law was also laid off after her father-in-law retired. She stayed at home all day doing cooking, mopping the floor, washing clothes, cleaning tables, chairs and coffee tables. She was rarely seen walking around on the street. Move around.
My father-in-law and mother-in-law grew up in the countryside, and they also lived in the countryside when they got married. There is still a courtyard in the village, plus three acres of thin farmland in front of and behind the house.
When my wife and I were first transferred to work in the city, our daughter was still young and was not old enough to go to school, so she was left in the care of her father-in-law and mother-in-law. One summer weekend, my wife and I drove back to the county. When we entered the house, we didn’t see our daughter. We called my father-in-law and told him that they were watering the vegetable fields in their hometown in the countryside. Without saying a word, my wife and I locked the door and drove to my father-in-law’s hometown in the countryside again.
My lover grew up in his hometown before going to elementary school, so he knows the fields well.
Parking the car beside the vegetable field, I saw my father-in-law and mother-in-law each wearing a new straw hat and each holding a shovel in their hands, heading towards the green seedlings of tomatoes, peppers and beans. Put water in it for irrigating. My daughter saw us, her little body jumped up and down in the vegetable field, and ran towards us.
My father-in-law shouted to us, my old daughter and my eldest son-in-law are looking back at your little daughter? My father-in-law is always so humorous. The mother-in-law focused her attention on her swaying and jumping granddaughter, and kept shouting, "Slow down, slow down!" She was afraid that her granddaughter would trip and fall on the vegetable patch.
The daughter’s little face was flushed red by the sun, and her lover was a little unhappy, so he said to her father and mother - my father-in-law and mother-in-law, you still know how to wear a straw hat? Why can't I put a sun hat on my baby girl?
The father-in-law didn’t care about the tone of his eldest daughter’s words, he still asked us with a smile: “Are you all back?”
I also quickly followed behind my lover and said goodbye. I handed the two elders a bottle of mineral water and said, "Dad, Mom, we're back. Are you tired?" But I didn't mention the subject of sunbathing or not.
The second elder said with a smile on his face, "It's good to come back, it's good to come back, I'm not tired, I'm not tired."
Taking the shovel from my father-in-law's hand, I walked on the vegetable patch. The cool well water flowed into the vegetable patch along the channel beside the field. The land instantly became wet, and the vegetable seedlings bloomed. After drinking enough water, everyone was full of energy and raised their heads. The green leaves all over their bodies were vivid and bright under the sunlight.
In the second half of 2010, when our daughter reached the age of going to preschool, we took her back from her father-in-law and mother-in-law. In this way, my father-in-law was more focused on the soft fields in front and back of his three-quarter house.
At the turn of summer and autumn this year, my lover said it was time for the red onions planted by her father to be planted in the border. My father-in-law was getting older and had so much to make a living, so he was worried that he would be overwhelmed, so my wife mobilized me to go back with her to help out for a day or two.
Early in the morning, we drove from Yulin to Fugu, and then to my father-in-law’s hometown in the countryside. It was nearly 200 kilometers away. It was already noon when we returned to the small courtyard of my father-in-law’s house. My mother-in-law gave us a meal of home-produced farm rice, including boiled corn, boiled peanuts, steamed potatoes, steamed pumpkins, scrambled eggs with tomatoes, radish pickles, steamed steamed buns and millet porridge. What a fragrance! It’s been a long time since I’ve had such a hearty farm meal, and in fact I haven’t had such an opportunity.
After taking a short rest and changing into working clothes, since my mother-in-law was not well and could not rest at home, my wife, my father-in-law, and I carried farm tools to a rented mountain land behind the house. The red onions are gathering on the edge of the border, and by the way, I pick a few rows of ripe mung pods interspersed in the red onion field and take them home.
My father-in-law dug a fertilizer pit for the red onion seedlings in the long and narrow field, and I spread farmyard manure into it. Then he took soil from the side, buried the fertilizer and filled the waist of the shallot with soil. This will help the red onion seedlings grow taller and thicker, because the rhizome of the red onion is the most nutritious part of the food.
Red onions are planted in a row-by-row layout. There is no requirement for row spacing. You can plant only one row of red onions in a field, and you can also plant other crops; the spacing is very particular. They must be planted close to each other, and the spacing should not be greater than fifteen centimeters. Otherwise, it will be a waste of land, and the yield of red onions will not be too large.
Since people in northern Shaanxi like to eat red onions, as long as they use oil, whether it is meat oil or vegetarian oil, and add a little chopped red onion, the fried aroma can be used to season various ingredients and open up the taste. Help with meals. Braised pork, stir-fried pork, and stewed mutton in northern Shaanxi are all inseparable from a large amount of red onions for seasoning. Even the famous northern Shaanxi snack - haggis, is inseparable from a handful of chopped green onions for seasoning. It is said that red onions are excellent ingredients for nourishing yin, strengthening yang, tonifying kidneys and activating blood circulation. No wonder people in northern Shaanxi like this.
To be honest, the two rows of red onions on the border made me sweat several times. I even ran home and took a shower in the middle of the trip. It was too hot in Qiuhu. My father-in-law worked so leisurely and sweating profusely. A pot of cold boiled water was finished by us husband and wife in less than an hour. My wife had to go home several times to boil water, bring it to the fields, and let it cool down for us to quench our thirst and replenish water.
There is not much profit from cultivating these small plots of land in front of and behind the houses. I don’t know what my father-in-law’s purpose is for planting all this land.
At a family dinner, I overheard my father-in-law say that he has been suffering from diabetes for more than 30 years and does not need to take any other medicine except an injection of insulin half an hour before eating. I have no dietary restrictions and have not had any complications.
People of our age range are old and young. It would be great happiness for the elderly to be disease-free and for their children to study hard.
Fortunately, my father-in-law and mother-in-law insisted on returning to the countryside and farming for so many years, which made them healthy and gave us as children less worries.
It seems that I have to go back to the countryside every year to accompany my father-in-law and mother-in-law to farm and work, not for anything else but for their health and longevity. I thought to myself privately that after I retire, I will follow my father-in-law's example and return to my hometown in the countryside to farm. My wife said, we no longer have houses in our hometown in the countryside, so how can we go back to farm so far away? Want to farm and exercise? Nowadays, there are many open spaces in the suburbs of cities, and renting half an acre is enough.
(Written in Yulin on December 24, 2918)
About the author:
Wu Junxiang, who once used the pen name Hu Yang Fengyuan, male, Han nationality, one Born in December 1970 in a small mountain village in the southeast of Shenmu County, northern Shaanxi. A member of the Shaanxi Provincial Writers Association and a student of the advanced training class for writers at Northwest University. Started writing in 2016, and has published in "China Land and Resources News", "Writer's News", "Yan'an Literature", "Selected Prose", "Yulin Literature Garden", "Haihe Literature", "Xi'an Daily", "Yulin Daily", "Yulin New Youth", He has published dozens of essays and novels on newspapers and magazines such as Yulin Culture, Hongshixia, Shenmu Literature, and Wuding River, as well as public accounts such as Shaanxi Provincial Writers Association's Literary Shaanxi Army and Hebei Provincial Writers Association's Hundreds of Prose Schools. . His works have been selected into various anthologies.
The long prose "Fishing Notes" won the first prize of the 4th Chinese Writers New Creation Forum and the 12th Writers' Report Cup National Outstanding Literary and Art Works Evaluation Competition, ranking first in the prose category.