"My wife has rushed to do all the housework, so you should knit me a sweater first. I don't have this one to wear, and you have done so much for Zhou Rong. What do you want my wife to think?
"
While speaking, Zhou Bingkun also pointed at Zheng Juan who was busy cooking in the outer room.
"When your sister finishes knitting, mom will knit it for you." Li Suhua said with a little embarrassment.
"You may not be able to finish knitting this piece by the time of the Chinese New Year."
"In this way, Bingkun, wait until next year, and my mother will definitely knit one for you next year." Li Suhua promised sincerely.
Li Suhua had already said this, and Zhou Bingkun couldn't say anything else.
But trying to get Li Suhua to realize the importance of Zheng Juan and talk to Zheng Juan better was a failure.
The relationship between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law is not that easy to handle, and Li Suhua cannot be said to be harsh on Zheng Juan.
But for Li Suhua, no matter how filial her daughter-in-law is, there is no unfilial daughter, and she has status in her heart.
For Zheng Juan, marrying Zhou Bingkun is considered a high achievement, but not much.
I don't think I owe too much to the old Zhou family.
Even if it was because Zhou Bingkun was helping out in Taiping Hutong, Zheng Juan would be equally filial to Li Suhua out of gratitude.
But when Li Suhua has been so biased for a long time, it is perfectly normal for Zheng Juan to be an ordinary person and feel dissatisfied with her mother-in-law.
However, this problem will not break out in a short period of time. There will be plenty of time in the future and we will act accordingly depending on the situation.
If we can leave the responsibility of taking care of our parents to Zhou Bingyi or Zhou Rong in the future, we won't have to live together under the same roof.
The problem of mother-in-law being partial to her children will become completely non-existent for Zheng Juan.
…
At the end of November in the lunar calendar, which was just around the corner from New Year's Day in the solar calendar, Zhou Bingkun came home from get off work and saw Li Suhua sitting on the kang listlessly and sighing, so he asked Zheng Juan:
"Juan'er, mom, what's wrong?"
Zheng Juan pulled Zhou Bingkun into the outer room again and whispered: "Sister wrote a letter, saying that she will stay in Guizhou during the New Year and cannot go home to celebrate the New Year."
"It's not a big deal. You don't have to be so cautious. Mom is a person who can handle things. It was Zhou Rong who sneaked away to Guizhou to find a man to elope with, and it didn't take long for Mom to recover."
When talking to Zheng Juan, Zhou Bingkun always seeks truth from facts.
She was just afraid that if she didn't explain things thoroughly, Zheng Juan would misunderstand the old Zhou family as people, and she wouldn't understand Zhou Bingkun's true attitude towards these people.
Zheng Juan cannot be allowed to take the image of Zhou Rong as beautiful, sensible and well-educated in the mouth of her neighbors as true.
The image spread among the neighbors is that Zhou Rong chose to go to the countryside to endure hardships so that her younger brother could stay in the city.
This is completely the news that Li Suhua deliberately released for the sake of the face of the old Zhou family.
Their daughter ran off with a wild man, and no parent would be able to tell her.
"Kun'er, Bingkun, do you think your sister is still worried that your father will be angry, so she doesn't dare to come back?"
After returning to the back room, Li Suhua looked up at Zhou Bingkun and said.
"That's not possible. How could my sister be worried about my dad being angry? Everyone in Guangzi Film knows that my dad favors my sister the most. My dad cuts me off every once in a while. Has he ever touched her finger? She is
Simply not wanting to come back has nothing to do with whether my dad is angry or not."
Although it hurts the most when telling the truth, it is better than having Li Suhua have unrealistic expectations for Zhou Rong.
"Then you say, your sister has been gone for four years and why is she unwilling to come back? Doesn't she miss home and her mother?"
"Isn't this simple? Her husband, a poet in the fifth category, was sent to the countryside and will definitely be supervised. Lao Hei cannot leave. My sister will spend the New Year with her husband there."
This is a logic that is easy to figure out, but as parents, when thinking about their children, they are always willing to think the best.
Li Suhua, who was in a bad mood because her fantasy was exposed, immediately got angry and said, "Get lost."
"Good medicine is bitter in the mouth and good for the disease, and good advice is hard on the ears but good for deeds. If you recognize who your daughter is earlier and don't have such high hopes for her to go home for the New Year, you won't be so disappointed now."
Li Suhua's mental endurance needs to be tempered.
Otherwise, Zhou Bingkun would be worried that when he was dealing with Zhou Rong, Zhou Rong would do something evil and make Li Suhua angry to death.
"Bingkun, mom is in a bad mood, please stop talking," Zheng Juan said.
"It's okay. I know Mom is in a bad mood. I made her angry on purpose. It's better to vent the anger than to keep it inside." Zhou Bingkun fooled Zheng Juan and said.
As the daughter-in-law of the old Zhou family, Zheng Juan should have to adapt to this kind of contentious life.
Now only Li Suhua and Zhou Bingkun are at home, and the dispute is already very small.
It would be really lively if we could really gather all the people from the old Zhou family.
…
After Zhou Rong also replied to the letter, Li Suhua's hope that her children would go home for the New Year was over.
Some time ago, I was so hopeful and happy, but now I am so disappointed and depressed.
My mood fluctuates so fast, faster than a child's.
Originally it was the New Year's Eve, and it was time to prepare various New Year's goods.
Every year, the government will provide more rations of meat, oil, flour, vermicelli, fish, peanuts, melon seeds, candies, etc. based on reserves.
This is the time when women at home are needed to go to various supply and marketing cooperatives, non-staple food, and grain and oil stores to queue up to buy various supplies.
Li Suhua also lost the motivation to rush to buy, and most of her energy was gone.
Seeing that Li Suhua was like this, Zhou Bingkun naturally wanted to write a letter to tell Zhou Bingyi and Zhou Zhigang what kind of condition Li Suhua was in.
Li Suhua felt happy and sad for a while. It wasn't because I, Zhou Bingkun, didn't take good care of her at home, it was all because of you people outside.
I wrote letters to two people to confirm Li Suhua's status in their hearts.
Whether the two of them should go home to celebrate the New Year or not, Zhou Bingkun's words were of no use, so he left it to the two of them to decide.
If Li Suhua is in this state, neither of them will come back.
One refused to go home to accompany his wife, and the other refused to go home to look for his daughter.
Calculating it this way, these two people don't seem to be any better than Zhou Rong.
Li Suhua's status in Zhou Rong's heart is not high, but in the hearts of Zhou Bingyi and Zhou Zhigang, her status doesn't seem to be that high either.
…
Li Suhua was sad and sad alone, not caring about family affairs, but having Zheng Juan at home could not affect the old Zhou family's preparations for the New Year.
In the 1960s and 1970s, supplies were not so abundant, so in order to have a more abundant Spring Festival, we had to start making various preparations as soon as we entered the twelfth lunar month.
The main things are to prepare New Year's goods, paint and clean the house, unpack and wash bedding, and rush to make new clothes for the New Year.
What Zhou Bingkun did was to take advantage of his weekend break to buy rice, large yellow rice, small yellow rice, white flour, corn flour, these heavier rice flour grains and oils and take them home.
For the painting work of the adobe house of Lao Zhou's family, if any piece of soil on the inner and outer walls has fallen off, some mud should be used to repair it, and then the entire house should be painted with lime.
The linoleum on the roof is getting worn out and rotting. Buy a new one and replace it.
Some special items for the Spring Festival, such as sesame oil, tofu, vermicelli, meat, fish, etc. These items are not many and not heavy, and you still need to queue up to buy them.
It was Zheng Juan who took the time to buy it every morning.
In the afternoon, Zheng Juan needs to unpack and wash the bedding at home, and make new clothes for everyone.
Taking apart and washing bedding is also a very troublesome task. It takes Zheng Juan at least two days for three sets of bedding.
Making clothes is also not an easy task. In addition to the three members of the old Zhou family, Zheng Juan also has to make clothes for Aunt Zheng and Guangming.
That is to say, Lao Zhou's family has a sewing machine, and Zheng Juan learned it quickly, so she was able to make these five sets of clothes in this month.
Here in the Northeast, there is another big task during the twelfth lunar month, which is steaming bean buns and steamed buns.
You need to steam enough for the twelfth lunar month at one time, as well as almost the entire first lunar month’s staple food.
Even now there are only three people in Lao Zhou's family at home. The steamed bean buns, steamed buns, flower rolls, and sugar buns require at least thirty kilograms of ingredients in total.
The good thing is that Li Suhua doesn't care about these things at all.
Just because my favorite children are not coming back, I don't have the energy to take the initiative to do this.
When she sees Zheng Juan busy, Li Suhua will still help her more or less.
After I was almost busy with all this, it was already the twenty-fifth day of the twelfth lunar month.
It was also Zhou Bingkun's day off on the weekend, and he was busy cooking meat and freezing it at home.
Northeastern cooked meat is equivalent to the boiled meat in other regions years ago. This year, Lao Zhou's family actually has a lot of meat.
The total amount was about twenty kilograms. Li Suhua saw Zhou Bingkun taking the meat home and refused to let him eat it. After serving the meat jelly, he stored it in an empty water tank outside.
Put the pork, ribs, elbows, pig's trotters, and other non-flavored things into a pot.
No salt is added, but some onions, ginger, garlic, pepper, aniseed, chili peppers, etc. are added to cook the meat.
Traditionally in the Northeast, these kinds of seasonings are basically added to the fried pork. There may be some differences in the spiciness of each fried pork restaurant.
The reason why other seasonings are not included may also be the reason why other seasonings are not so easily available.
After all these meats are cooked, it will be easy to prepare them when you want to eat them during the Chinese New Year.
When it comes to freezing, it means making skin jelly. The process of making skin jelly is not much different, it is just more trivial and time-consuming.
"Aunt Zhou, please send your telegram."
While I was eating my jelly, I heard the postman shouting outside.
"Comrade Xiao Zhang, thank you for your hard work. Please send me a telegram."
Zhou Bingkun came out and said to the postman. Being a postman during this period is still very hard. You need to ride a bicycle to deliver letters to every house.
This is still in the city. If you are in a rural area, there may be only one postman per town.
I need to ride a bicycle every day and visit every village in the township.
"Bingkun, the postman just came, didn't he?"
After Zhou Bingkun returned to the house, Li Suhua also put on her shoes and got off the kang and walked out of the back room.
Li Suhua was not very energetic about other matters, but she still paid close attention to the letters sent to her home.
"Here he came, with a telegram."
"Who sent it?" Li Suhua asked anxiously. This time the anxiety was justified. The reason for sending a telegram was expensive. If he was willing to send a telegram for communication, it was basically because he encountered an urgent matter.
Zhou Bingkun opened the telegram: "Guizhou, Zhou Rong."
"What did your sister say?"
"Dad is here with me. With these four words, my dad went to Guizhou to find Zhou Rong."
Seeing this, Zhou Bingkun still felt that Li Suhua was not worth it.
The couple had been together for nearly thirty years. As soon as they got married, Li Suhua risked her life and followed Zhou Zhigang through Guandong to the Northeast.
They haven't seen each other for four years. Li Suhua misses her husband so much that Zhou Zhigang still doesn't go home to find Zhou Rong.
Of course, when Zhou Rong sent a telegram, he sent these four words, which made Zhou Bingkun happy.
A telegram costs 3.5 cents for one word, and 14 cents for four words.
The stingy way she sent the telegram showed that Zhou Rong's life was difficult enough.
"Okay, let's go find Zhou Rong. Your dad, this stubborn old man, has finally figured it out and is willing to forgive your sister."
Li Suhua took the telegram and was so excited that she burst into tears again.
"Yes, my dad, an old father, lives a humble life in front of his daughter. It was the daughter's fault that she eloped with someone. She made the mistake and didn't contact her father for four years, and the old father had to find her personally.
Come to the door and bow your head."
"This is a big happy event. Let's celebrate by eating meat tonight." After feeling better, Li Suhua pointed to the cooked meat in the pot and said, everyone became excited. "Bingkun, can you tell your dad, can you
Bring it back to Zhou Rong for the New Year?"
"Mom, you shouldn't think about whether Zhou Rong can go home for the New Year at this time. You should think about whether my dad can come back for the New Year." Zhou Bingkun continued to pour cold water on Li Suhua's blind optimism: "Think about why Zhou Rong doesn't
We'll know when we get back. My dad might not be able to bring Zhou Rong back, and will have to stay in Guizhou to celebrate the New Year with Zhou Rong."
Li Suhua's face suddenly turned cloudy. Li Suhua was just uneducated, but that didn't mean he wasn't smart. He was able to give birth to two good students, Zhou Bingyi and Zhou Rong. Li Suhua's mother was also very smart, and it was easy to understand this logic: "Are you?
If you can’t make me happy for a while, I’d better not eat meat tonight.”
"If you don't eat it after it's ready, I'm a big fool."
Zhou Bingkun shrugged his shoulders, looked at Li Suhua who returned to the back room and said.
"Bingkun, stop being like this. Why do you have to go against mom?" Zheng Juan pulled Zhou Bingkun's arm and said.
"I'm not going against my mother. I'm doing this for our family and for my mother. I want to prevent her from having too much expectations and being happy for nothing. After the person she's looking forward to doesn't come back, she'll be depressed for another ten days and a half.
Our family has never had a good year."
After the food was prepared, there wasn’t much to prepare for the New Year.
The last thing left is to pay attention to personal hygiene and go to the bathhouse to take a shower.
The most suitable times are of course the 27th, 8th and 9th days.
If you wash it too early, it will be too long before the Chinese New Year, and it can be said that it has been buried again.
If you wait until you are thirty, it will be too late. Even the public baths are closed for the New Year holiday.
