sbdcsierra Chapter 595 Going up the mountain to dig wild vegetables
Chapter 595 Going up the mountain to dig wild vegetables
As for other families in the village, they were saving money to build houses. Those who had just built houses were now out of money, let alone money to send their children to school.
Now that Qian had money and a new house, she became a popular woman. At the beginning of the new year, matchmakers came to her door several times. Qian was puzzled at first because her child was still so young, so why would a matchmaker come to her door?
It turned out that it was a marriage proposal for her.
Qian was so angry that her face turned pale, but she still politely asked the person to leave.
At this moment, a few people were walking on the street and talking about this as a joke.
Li looked around and saw no outsiders. The old man had already walked up to her, so she said, "Look at you. You're not that old. Are you really going to stay with him forever and never get married?"
Qian sighed, "Why get married? The children are already so grown up and sensible. If I marry someone else, my life will probably be worse than mine now. I have it so good now. I can eat whatever I want and do whatever I want. No one controls me and I don't have to serve anyone. I can take good care of the children and raise them well. My life will be perfect!"
Chen said, "Don't you want to find a man to love you? Help you?"
Qian said, "There aren't that many good men in the world who can still love others. I'm not afraid of you laughing at me, but my child's father was considered a good man in the village. At least he didn't hit people, and he could help carry water and chop firewood, so he was considered to have a good life. But now I think about it, life back then was far from comfortable as it is now. He would get angry if I didn't do what he wanted, and it was common for him to smash pots and chopsticks. Sometimes he wouldn't talk to you for a few days when he was angry, and he would scold me if I did something wrong."
She sighed and said, "I have finally figured it out over the years. There is nothing wrong with being a widow. It was indeed difficult in the first few years, but now life is getting better. We have built a new house and dug a well. The children are growing up day by day. They are sensible and filial. They help with everything. I was surprised that I can still live such a life! For me, now is the best life. I don't want to get married anymore. I will just live with my two children and live a comfortable life. That is my blessing."
These words left both Li and Chen silent, especially Chen, who didn't understand at all: how could one person be better than two?
No matter what, two people are better than one. No matter what you do, you have someone to rely on and someone to discuss with. No one dares to bully you. The difference between having a man and not having a man in the family is huge.
Li felt a sense of empathy in her heart. She had been the head of the household for too long without her parents-in-law or husband to supervise her, and she thought that this was not a bad thing.
Every child in the family is capable and no one dares to bully them.
Although she is busy all day long, she never feels like a widow. Instead, she seems to be more energetic as time goes by. Many people say that she looks much younger than in previous years. The older she gets, the younger she looks.
She couldn't imagine for a moment what would happen to her life if the child's father was not dead and came back, whether it would be good or bad.
Zhou Guo looked at Qian with admiration. Did she wake up after having had a good life for too long?
Chen couldn't help but said, "This is because our village has a good atmosphere and there are no bad people. If it were Taohua Village next door, it would be terrible, especially for widows. Those old bachelors would make eyes at the door every now and then. You can't beat them, and you can't scold them away. After a long time, your reputation will be ruined. That's what it means to cry out to the sky and the earth, and no one will say a fair word for you. So, there must be a man in the family."
Qian smiled and said, "I'm lucky. I wasn't assigned to those villages, and I'm neighbors with Guoguo's mother. Even if those people wanted to come up, I'm afraid they don't have the courage."
Li nodded and said, "That's right. Fortunately, there are a few ruthless people in our family. Otherwise, it's hard to say how our life would be."
In the final analysis, you have to have that ability. Otherwise, a woman living alone with a child in such a world without a clan behind her is unlikely to have a good ending.
Zhou Guo thought about it and felt that it was right.
As they were talking, it felt like they had reached the foot of the mountain soon and were walking up the mountain along a small path.
It was called a small path, but it has been trampled into a big road over the years. The sides of the road have been cut smooth, making it very easy to walk on.
There were a few people behind the crowd, so they couldn't pick up much.
Zhou Guo just came up to see how many mushrooms there were in the mountains and how they were growing.
She picked up flowers as she walked. Each flower was not big, but it seemed that there were quite a lot of them this year. She followed others and picked up quite a few as well. She didn't know if they didn't see them or if no one had walked this road before.
Pick up as you go.
She successfully grew her sheep mushrooms, so she didn't need to dig mushroom seeds this year. But for the sake of comparison, she thought about it and dug some more. She carried half of the basket with mushrooms and half with seeds. She followed the crowd slowly, and when the basket was full, she took out a small sack.
Sheep mushrooms are very delicious, fresh and tender, and can be dried and eaten as a dish in winter.
It’s a pity that there isn’t much of this stuff to begin with, and there isn’t enough left to dry in the winter.
By the time she had picked up half a bag of sheep mushrooms, she had almost picked all the mushrooms on the mountain.
She started picking Chinese toon. The Chinese toon on the mountain was at its freshest and tenderest, but it seemed that few people liked it because they thought it had a strong smell. So this was a perfect bargain for her.
You don't need to bring them into the city to sell this year. You can keep them and dry them, then fry them in the winter as pickles. They are great to eat with porridge or wrap them in steamed buns.
There are plenty of Chinese toon plants on the mountain, and this thing takes up a lot of space. After more than half an hour, a sack was full.
She couldn't just pick Chinese toon trees, she also picked every ferns she came across on the way.
Ferns are very popular nowadays, especially when they are just harvested. A handful can be sold for three or four cents. If you can pick fifty handfuls a day, you can make one or two hundred cents!
Working for the landlord only paid about thirty cents a day, and it took six or seven days of work to earn that much money.
The patches of fish halfway up the mountain and at the foot of the mountain had long disappeared, so she could only pick up some that had slipped through the net in these woods.
After picking for half a day, I got three or four handfuls, which looked like about a pound. This is enough for eating cold dishes at home, and I can't even tell the difference if I stir-fry them.
I picked some fresh shepherd's purse from the ground and planned to take it back to make dumplings. It would also be delicious if eaten cold.
It had been a while since she had been up the mountain, so she started digging wild vegetables enthusiastically, even wild onions. She dug them up handfuls at a time and stuffed them into a sack.
By mid-afternoon, in addition to the full backpack, there was a sack of Chinese toon and a sack of wild onions, shepherd's purse and fern.
She moved all her things to her usual resting place, sat down on the ground, plucked an unknown wild flower from the ground, put it under her nose and smelled it, and a faint fragrance wafted out.
At this time, all kinds of wild flowers all over the mountains and fields have bloomed, mostly white, dotted in the mountains that have just revived, and birds are chirping among them.