1983Fishing and Farming between Mountains and Seas

Chapter 15 My Heart Flies to My Wife

Liang Ziqiang put the money in his pocket and was about to go out when he caught a glimpse of the pile of tools for catching seafood beside him, such as buckets, pliers, etc. He suddenly realized that he was going to disappoint his little sister again today.

This was the second time he had stood up Liang Lizhi.

The day before yesterday, it was not suitable to go fishing because the low tide happened to be at noon and the sun was very strong, so the shrimps and crabs all hid in the cooler places. But this time, everyone was already on the road, and unexpected things changed the plan.

He looked at his younger sister apologetically:

"Lizhi, I'm so sorry. Today again..."

"You don't have to tell me, I know everything!"

Liang Lizhi was surprisingly not angry. Instead, she looked expectant. She interrupted him and asked with her big eyes blinking:

"You're not going to the beach today. You're going to your sister-in-law's house to pick her up for the bridal chamber, right? Go quickly. I've wanted to see your bridal chamber for a long time!"

Liang Ziqiang: "..."

She seemed quite considerate. The problem was, she squatted beside Aunt Yu and listened to her chat for a long time, how could she condense the matter into "I'm going to pick her up to the bridal chamber today"?

Also, when Chen Xiangbei and I were having our wedding night, how could a little girl like you stand by and watch?

Do you know the meaning of the word "bridal chamber"? How dare you use it indiscriminately?

There was no point in arguing over the details with Lizhi, but it was certain that she would not pester him to go fishing for the time being.

The distance from Pomwang Village to the commune is quite long, and the only means of transportation is walking. Fortunately, Liang Ziqiang walked very fast.

When he set out, he specially brought a pair of empty baskets from home. He did not want to follow his father's instructions completely, but had some plans of his own.

When they arrived at the supply and marketing cooperative in the commune, the wooden door was open. After walking in and taking a look around, they saw quite a few commodities, but the display style and packaging style made Liang Ziqiang, who was accustomed to the supermarket shelves of later generations, feel a sense of nostalgia.

Not only is the product packaging extremely plain, but the entire lighting is dim.

There were two sales clerks sitting behind the glass counter. Since there were no other customers at the moment, the two of them were chatting casually.

Seeing Liang Ziqiang coming in, the two did not stand up immediately, but glanced at him and asked:

"what to buy?"

Liang Ziqiang went straight to the point and asked:

"How much is sugar?"

"Ninety cents a pound." The other party answered sparingly.

"Help me weigh two kilograms." Liang Ziqiang ordered.

In fact, the villagers in this area have the habit of growing sugarcane, so they should have no shortage of sugar. However, there are no sugar factories in each village, so they still have to buy sugar from the supply and marketing cooperatives.

In this era, sugar was still a quick way for villagers to supplement their nutrition, and it also became a good gift for relatives and friends. This was very different from the later generations where excess sugar caused diseases such as obesity.

The salesperson stood up upon hearing this, and moved quite skillfully. He quickly weighed two kilograms of sugar, poured it onto a piece of kraft paper, folded it a few times, and made it into a square package, which he then tied with a thin linen string.

Liang Ziqiang's eyes swept across the can of oranges, but did not stay there for too long. Instead, they continued to move forward and landed on the bag of flour.

"Where are the Fuqiang fans?" he asked.

From the beginning, he had no intention of buying canned fruit as his father suggested. That stuff was expensive and not necessarily nutritious. If you were visiting a sick person, it was okay to bring canned fruit, but it was not necessary at other times.

On the contrary, flour, in this era when food is not very abundant, is more practical and much more valuable than canned food.

There were three kinds of flour on display: Shengchan, Jianshe, and Fuqiang. The price difference was not that big, so he just chose the slightly better Fuqiang brand.

"Fuqiang flour is 2.5 cents per pound, and a bag of 10 pounds is 2.5 yuan. Do you want a bag?" the other party asked.

"Two bags. And how much is a bag of Daqianmen?"

"35 cents for a pack, huh?"

"Help me get four packs." Liang Ziqiang remembered that his father-in-law, Chen Dagang, was different from his father. He did not smoke hookah, but cut the tobacco leaves himself and rolled them with waste paper. Sometimes, he would buy cigarettes that cost only a few cents a pack.

In addition, Chen Xiangbei's two brothers also smoke cigarettes like their father-in-law.

I bought four packs of Daqianmen, planning to give one pack each to my father-in-law and two brothers-in-law, and keep the remaining pack on my body to give out to others.

Several things were quickly bought, spending a total of eight yuan and twenty cents.

Sure enough, there was change left from the ten dollars, and there was one dollar and eighty cents left.

After putting all the things into two baskets, he carried them and went straight home without staying in the commune for even a moment.

The reason I brought the basket was to use it to carry flour.

Although more than 20 kilograms of things are not heavy, but considering that we have a long way to go, it is much easier to carry them than to carry them.

"Here's the remaining 1.80 yuan. Keep it, Mom."

Liang Ziqiang went home, put his things away, and gave the remaining money to his mother.

Liang's mother didn't say what she was taking, she just took the money, then looked into the basket and said with some surprise:
“Why did you buy so much flour?”

Liang Ziqiang took out one of the bags and handed it to his mother:

"We'll take one bag to Huagu Village tomorrow, and this bag is specially kept at home for us to eat. Even if we're just drinking porridge, adding a few dough balls in it will make it more filling!"

Liang's mother thought about it and agreed. Fuqiang flour is indeed a very good food for the family, and it can be made in many different ways. The one Liang Ziqiang described is already the most wasteful way of cooking it.

She believed that something so practical would also be welcomed by the Chen family.

As dusk approached, Liang Ziqiang started going out again to set up the traps.

Considering that he has to go to his future father-in-law's house tomorrow, he doesn't want to meet Chen Xiangbei with dark circles under his eyes, and he can't delay his sleep too much at night, so he only put up two rows of ground cage nets this time.

The catch that night was neither good nor bad. There were only two small yellow fish, and the rest were stone crabs, green shrimps, red shrimps, and mantis shrimps.

Each row of nets holds about six or seven pounds, and the total catch is about thirteen or fourteen pounds.

Liang Ziqiang discovered that his mother seemed to be a little partial to him.

Usually, she would nag for a long time if she kept a sea bass at home to steam and eat. This time, she took the initiative to bring two small yellow croakers to Lao Chen's house, and also picked out some of the best green shrimps and red shrimps from the shrimps and asked Liang Ziqiang to take them as well.

She took the rest to Zheng Liu at the big pier to sell for money.

Of course, his future father-in-law, Chen Dagang, was indeed a straightforward person. They hadn't officially become in-laws yet, but whenever there were any fruits or vegetables at home, he would ask the Liang family to bring baskets to carry them.

As the saying goes, sincerity is rewarded with sincerity. Liang's mother seemed embarrassed to be too stingy with such in-laws.

After breakfast, Liang Ziqiang carried a basket and set off for Huagu Village.

At one end of the basket was ten kilograms of flour, sugar, and dried dragon head fish, and at the other end was a bucket filled with fresh green shrimps, red shrimps, and two small yellow croakers, which were specially raised with sea water.

While he was still on the road, Chen Xiangbei's voice, appearance and smile played in his mind frame by frame like a movie, including her youth and her later appearance as she grew older beside him.

Her appearance when she was young was somewhat vague and fuzzy, but her appearance when she was old was so clear. Especially the way she died of illness at the end, it was like it was engraved in my mind and could not be shaken off.

In fact, he had wanted to go to Huagu Village to see her since the night he returned to the fishing village, but his father and brother were about to go out to sea, and he couldn't afford to be distracted at all.

At this moment, he couldn't tell whether he was feeling encouraged or bitter.

He only knew that since his own imprisonment and his father and brother's misfortunes at sea could all be successfully rewritten, he hoped that his life story with Chen Xiangbei could also start over.

I hope that she can follow him in this life, and no longer have to live such a hard life, with less wandering in the wind and rain, and fewer ups and downs.

The author has a well-received work with two million words on other sites. As long as there are many readers, Qidian's new book will be of stable quality and quantity. Currently, there are very few people who know and pay attention to this book. Please collect it, recommend it, read it to the latest chapter, and give me motivation! Thank you all first.

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(End of this chapter)