That year the flowers bloomed 1981

Chapter 707 I am their relative

Someone in later generations said that no one should look down on farmers, because if you count back three generations in your family tree, they are all farmers.

Fu Guiru's father was also born into a peasant family, so even though he died in the city, his grave is in the countryside.

However, Fu Guiru and her son and daughter walked back and forth in the cornfield for half an hour, but they couldn't find the grave they remembered.

The cornfield in July is like an airtight steamer. If people stay in the cornfield for too long, they will be covered in sweat.

The edges of corn leaves have serrated fiber protrusions, and when you pull them on sweat-soaked skin, you can deeply experience what "sour and refreshing" means.

[Can the fabrics of this era be used to make sun-protective clothing? If so, I will arrange for the factory to produce it when I return.]

Li Ye felt very sore at the moment. His arms were covered with marks from the corn leaves, which were itchy and uncomfortable.

But he didn't dare to complain, because his mother Fu Guiru and her sister Fu Yiru were also anxiously searching ahead!
The two women had more sweat and marks on their bodies than Li Ye. What right did Li Ye, a grown man, have to complain?
Ten minutes later, Fu Yiruo, who had suffered the least since childhood, finally couldn't help it anymore and pouted and said to her mother, "Mom, there's not a single grave here. Did you remember the wrong place?"

Fu Guiru stopped walking, and after a long silence, she smiled bitterly and said helplessly: "Maybe! I'm old now, and my memory is not good. Let's go to the main road to pay tribute!"

Li Ye watched his mother walk out of the cornfield, and could sense her loneliness and melancholy.

I have a very good memory. I can remember every turn, every embankment, and even a few old trees on the way here.
Even if they couldn't pinpoint a specific location, the mother and her two daughters had already searched the cornfield within a radius of several hundred meters, so they should be able to find it eventually.

So there is only one possibility, that the Fu family hasn't visited the ancestral grave for twenty years, and the ancestral grave has been leveled.

Li Ye asked Fu Guiru. Although he had no uncle and his grandfather had only one daughter, Fu Guiru, he did have two distant cousins.

In other words, although we are of the same clan, no one has cared about us for so many years.

That's right! Clans were originally mutual aid organizations formed by people in the past to deal with various difficulties and crises. They emphasize mutual giving and helping each other.

When others are building walls or houses for weddings or funerals, no one in your family helps out. How can you expect others to add a few shovels of soil to your ancestral grave during the Qingming Festival?
Li Ye followed closely and said to Fu Guiru: "Mom, why don't I go to the village to ask! After so many years, the ridges of the fields have changed so many times. Maybe we really have found the wrong one?"

"No need," Fu Guiru said calmly, "Since they are afraid of being implicated by us, wouldn't it make them uncomfortable if we go? Anyway, the old Fu family has no male heirs in this generation, so there is no need to come in the future."

"."

In the place of Zhonghuajia, why has the custom of favoring boys over girls prevailed for thousands of years? One important point is that if there is no male in the family, then at most one or two generations, there will be no one to visit the grave.

Fu Guiru's father had three brothers, two of whom were conscripted and sent to Southeast Asia, leaving Li Ye's grandfather in his hometown to look after the ancestral grave. As a result, he only had one daughter, Fu Guiru.
It’s okay for Li Ye and Li Yue’s generation, but when it comes to Li Ye’s next generation, there is a high probability that they will no longer come to visit the graves.

The mother and her two daughters left the cornfield and joined Wen Leyu and Li Yue who were guarding the car outside.

Wen Leyu was also going to follow them down to find a grave, but Fu Guiru wouldn't let him, and asked her sister Li Yue to accompany him, because no one could tell at this moment whether Wen Leyu had given birth or not, and she had to be carefully served.

Fu Guiru gave a few words of greeting, and everyone took out the offerings they had brought from the trunk and prepared to light incense to summon the soul.

This is also a method often used by many wandering scholars in later generations. The sound of a fragrant scent can be heard thousands of miles away, and one does not know whether their ancestors can hear it, but they just want peace of mind.

But just as Li Ye spread the things on the ground, and before my mother started to light incense and chant, a dark-faced old man ran out from a shack in the distance.

"Hey, who's there? Whose family are you from?"

"."

Li Ye looked at the old man running over panting, took out a cigarette and said, "Uncle, we are here to visit the grave, not to steal sticks."

The old man was stunned for a moment, then smiled and said, "I know you are not thieves. Who can drive a car to steal sticks? I want to ask if you are relatives of the old Fu family."

"Uncle, how did you know?"

Li Ye quickly handed the cigarette in his hand to the old man and lit it for him. "Well, this cigarette is good, with a mouthpiece."

The dark-faced old man first lit up a cigarette, then pointed to the cornfield below and said, "There is only the Fu family's ancestral grave in this field. No one else would come here to visit the grave!"

Li Yexin thought there was a way, and continued to ask: "Uncle, we have been looking for more than half an hour, but we can't find the grave!"

The old man's eyes sparkled, and he asked with a smile, "You have been talking for a long time, but you still haven't said whether you are a relative of the old Fu family!"

Li Ye nodded and replied: "Yes, Fu Yingcheng is my grandfather, this is my sister, and this is my wife. We just got married and came here to visit the grave according to the rules."

"Oh~"

The old man looked at Li Ye and Li Yue, then glanced at Fu Guiru, and said, "The grave is right down there, but you didn't find it right."

The old man walked down the embankment with a cigarette in his mouth and went into the cornfield.

Li Ye and others followed closely behind, and this time even his young wife Wen Leyu hurriedly picked up the tribute and followed.

The old man was very familiar with the place. Even though he couldn't tell east, west, or north in the cornfield, he quickly stopped on a ridge.

"Look, these two bricks are the ancestral tombs of the old Fu family. One is Fu Zhongxian, and the other is Fu Yingcheng."

Li Ye looked at the two bricks on the ridge in surprise.

The two bricks were not far apart and were covered with mud and moss, almost blending in with the yellow soil underfoot. You couldn't see them unless you paid attention.

But Fu Guiru suddenly realized something, walked up, grabbed the brick and turned it over, revealing the back of the brick.

On the back of the brick, there are several layers of gray straw paper, which are obviously formed by the decay of yellow paper used for tombs.

When visiting graves at Dongshan, there is a custom of putting paper on the grave. The paper under the bricks can be kept for several years.

The reason for this custom is to prove to people around that this family's grave has descendants, and that no one should touch it or dig it. If you urinate anywhere or accidentally dig up the ancestral grave, we will fight you to the death.

Li Ye now looked at the layers of straw paper stuck under the bricks. It was obvious that someone had been visiting the grave in the past two years.

Fu Guiru asked in a deep voice: "Uncle, have the people from the Fu family in Donggou Village come here to visit the graves in recent years?"

The dark-faced old man smiled and said, "Why would they come to visit the grave? It's too late to hide! These are the old couple from Xigou who came to put down the grave paper."

"Old Nanggua?" Fu Guiru was stunned for a moment, and couldn't help asking, "Why are they here to visit the graves of the Fu family?"

The old man took a long puff of his cigarette and said calmly, "No one can explain this clearly, but for the past twenty years, the old Nanggua couple have always come to visit the graves, and they didn't offer much, at most a steamed bun and two pieces of paper."

"Originally, Lao Nanggua was thinking about shoveling some dirt to build a grave, but no one dared to dig on the grave without the permission of the Donggou Fu family, right? So after all these years of wind and rain, only these two bricks are left."

"."

Fu Guiru nodded and said softly, "It's good to have two bricks. At least there's a place to visit the grave."

The old man looked at Fu Guiru and suddenly asked, "Miss, who are you to the old Fu family?"

Fu Guiru was silent for a few seconds, then smiled and said, "Of course they are relatives."

"relative."

The old man smiled and lowered his head without saying anything.

(End of this chapter)