Cousin Li Daniu brought his tractor, which was originally a production material for the brigade. After the reform and opening up, and the household responsibility system, the tractor became idle.
When Li Daniu was a child, he followed a master who drove a tractor every day. The master liked him and taught him how to drive.
Later, when the government wanted to buy this tractor, Li Dalong came to borrow money from his brother Li Dawei and bought this tractor for his son.
Now when Li Daniu is not busy farming, he drives a tractor to do odd jobs of pulling goods.
Li Manjun had never thought about getting involved with her uncle's family, but she had memories of her cousin helping her beat people up when she was a child.
After thinking about it, I decided that the money would not go to outsiders, so I asked Li Dawei to make a call to find out how this cousin was doing.
Li Manjun led people to Aunt Wu's canteen to load the goods. Li Daniu looked at Li Manjun's thin arms and asked her to rest, "Let me do it. These things will be finished in a while."
Li Manjun was really dizzy after staying up all night, but he felt relaxed and happy. He stood in the tractor bucket and stuffed a few more straws into the bottle to compact it to prevent it from breaking due to bumps along the way.
Li Daniu quickly finished moving several large baskets of bottles, Li Manjun locked the door of the canteen, and the two set off.
Li Dalong was driving in the front, and Li Manjun was sitting on the edge of the truck in the back, holding on to the guardrail, and drove away from Heather Town and onto the yellow mud road.
The tractor is not fast and the road is not easy to travel, but because of Li Daniu's good driving skills, the entire truck body is very stable.
The gentle breeze accompanied by the light fragrance of the pine forest blew across his face. Li Manjun took a deep breath of fresh air and felt as if his whole lungs had been washed. He was clean and refreshed, and his sleepiness was awakened.
The cousins talked incessantly.
Li Daniu asked curiously: "Where did you get so many bottles?"
"I collected it from the soy sauce factory."
"Then are you planning to take it to the next town and sell it?"
Li Manjun hummed and asked about his sister-in-law and niece. Li Daniu suddenly sighed. He didn't really want to say anything, so he responded perfunctorily and fell into silence.
Li Manjun didn't dare to ask further, and the two stopped talking.
Just when Li Manjun thought he was going to remain silent, Li Daniu suddenly said: "My mother wants me to give my daughter away."
"Ah?" Li Manjun was shocked. His granddaughter actually wanted to give it away?
Mr. and Mrs. Li Daniu currently have only one daughter, and there is no way they should give their daughter away just because they cannot afford to raise her.
Li Daniu also found it difficult to say this, let alone to a girl who was not yet married.
But it was really uncomfortable to be bored in his heart. Li Manjun happened to ask again, and he couldn't help but want to say it out.
Li Manjun asked tentatively: "Are you going to send it away?"
Li Daniu roared angrily, but not at Li Manjun, "How is that possible! Nannan is my daughter, who dares to send her away and give it a try!"
Li Manjun breathed a sigh of relief. Fortunately, his cousin was not confused.
Li Daniu said that his mother had something even more outrageous. She heard people said that mutes would give birth to sons, and wanted to find a mute to give birth to a son for him. His wife was so angry that she almost divorced him.
Li Manjun originally thought that it was outrageous for her grandma to give her granddaughter away, but she didn't expect that this woman could be even more outrageous.
"Brother." Li Manjun sincerely suggested, "I think it's time for you to separate your family."
Li Daniu was stunned, split up?
"Yes, the family is separated. You, your sister-in-law, and your daughter have separated by yourself."
Li Daniu quickly turned around and glanced at Li Manjun. The girl was obviously a gentle and quiet person, how could she say such 'rebellious and unethical' words.
He found that the girl he met this time was much more courageous and had the right idea.
"You make your own money and spend it yourself, no one can care about it, and you can keep your waist straight." Li Manjun said matter-of-factly.
This is the truth, but when Li Daniu is suddenly separated from his family, he only feels hesitant and fearful.
Can he really support his own small family?
"Brother, why don't you come out specifically to pull goods? Just say that if you make this trip for me today, I will have to give you twenty yuan. If you do two trips a day, isn't thirty or forty easy?"
Li Manjun calculated an account for him, "Even if there are special circumstances, there will always be a few days a month that I can't work, but on average I can earn 20 yuan a day, so that's 600 yuan a month."
"How much is the salary for an iron rice bowl now? It's a little over two hundred. My father can support our whole family, but you can't support the three of you at six hundred?"
Li Manjun continued: "Everyone's life is gradually getting better now. Those who build new houses need to pull bricks and tiles, those who do business need to purchase goods, and there are still people in the village who need to buy fertilizers. These are all businesses."
Li Daniu was enlightened. Why didn't he think of going out to sell goods?
It's not because the elders in the family disagree, saying that crops are the lifeblood of farmers. Keeping the land means safeguarding the home. If you have food to eat, you won't have to worry about anything.
How much money can you make by going out to work?
Even if he could earn it, would it be something he could earn as a person with an elementary school education?
Li Daniu knew very well that because he was the eldest son in the family, his parents always wanted to tie him to them.
He also said that he had no ability and was not as smart as his younger brother, and that farming the land honestly was his destiny.
And he believed it naively.
"Can people come to me?" Li Daniu asked Li Manjun anxiously, some of the restrictions in his heart seemed to be loosened.
Li Manjun affirmed: "Of course I will look for you. Brother, haven't you noticed that few people in our Heather Town have tractors? This is a scarce resource of yours. It is too wasteful to only use it to help fellow villagers bring some fertilizer back to the village."
Not to mention others, she alone will definitely need Li Daniu's tractor in the future.
This country road is different from the asphalt road in the city. Between villages and towns, large trucks are not as good as small tractors.
"Brother, you can go squat in the brick kiln." Li Manjun suggested.
Li Daniu's heart moved, and he really stopped talking now. He became nervous, always feeling that Fenjia was a ferocious beast, and it would swallow him as long as he moved.
But the next thing happened that completely changed Li Daniu's mind.
The two sent the bottle to the soy sauce factory. Li Manjun said she wanted to find Director Wang from the workshop, and the guard called him out for her.
Director Wang checked the bottles, counted them, and asked the finance manager to pay the money to Li Manjun.
Including the agreed 30 yuan shipping fee, the total is 256.44 yuan, and the profit after deducting the cost is 155.8 yuan. After counting the 20 yuan shipping fee paid to Li Daniu, the total amount is 135.8 yuan.
Li Daniu's eyes lit up when he took the 20 yuan for shipping. He wanted to be polite and said that there is no need for this between brothers and sisters, but after two rounds of pushing, he still accepted it.
When the two were about to leave, Director Wang suddenly stopped Li Daniu, "Hey, is your tractor still alive? If not, I have dozens of boxes of soy sauce. Can you help me deliver it to Rongcheng Lotte Supermarket?"
Li Manjun hurriedly patted the stunned Li Daniu and responded on his behalf: "Okay, my brother happens to be free in the afternoon."
Only then did Li Daniu react and hurriedly said that he could do it, "Okay."