Old things in the south

Chapter 9 Let's Go to the Sea (1)
一
My mother said that Xinlianzi Hutong is like a spoon, and our family lives near the bottom of the spoon, which is the place where the soup touches the lips when drinking.So my father taught me a lesson. With a sullen face and staring eyes, he said:

"Don't listen to me! Drink the soup without making any noise, rustling, it's not like a girl. When scooping up the soup, don't knock the bowl with the spoon..."

I carefully held the spoon and slowly poked it into the soup bowl. Dad lost his temper again:

"Little people have to wait for the adults to scoop it up before scooping it up. If you can't serve a dish, you start it first." He turned to his mother again: "You don't teach the children at all, it's not okay..."

I was very impatient, I just wanted to eat quickly and go to the door to watch Fang Decheng and Liu Ping play football, so I drank the soup and made a noise, touched the bowl with the soup, and started the food first.I was full, so I had to sit at the dining table, waiting to serve my dad a second bowl of rice.Dad said, you can't let the servants do everything. For a man of his age, when he was in his hometown, he still stood aside after eating, listening to his grandfather's lessons.

While serving my father a good meal, I slipped away from the dining table and walked to the desk by the window, only to hear my mother whisper to my father:
"Don't control her so strictly, how old is the child? Last year, the lunatics in the Hui'an Pavilion scared her into a serious illness, and she is still timid. When she heard you scolding her loudly, she kept silent. Well, she is not such a child! Now that she has moved here, changed a place, forgotten the past, and went to school again, it is easy to gain weight on her face..."

Mom!Why do you bring up that strange incident again?You often say, which one is a lunatic, which one is a fool, which one is a liar, and which one is a thief, I can't tell the difference.Just like I am now, when I look up and see white clouds floating in the blue sky outside the window, I think of the article "Let's go to the sea" in No. 20 class [-] of the Chinese textbook:
Let's go to the sea!
Let's go to the sea!
on the blue sea,

Hoisting white sails.

golden sun,
rose from the sea,

It shines on the sea and shines on the bow of the ship.

Let's go to the sea!
Let's go to the sea!
I can't tell the sky from the sea.Does the golden red sun rise from the blue sea?Or did it rise from the blue sky?But I like reading this lesson very much. I read it over and over again, as if lying on a boat or sleeping on a cloud.I can already memorize it now, and my mother often praises my father and Song Ma that I work hard and read well.What I like to read, of course I read it well, like last semester's "Human hands, feet, knives, dogs, cattle and sheep, second-hand..." lessons, I hope to forget them as soon as possible!

Dad went to take a nap, and the whole family was not allowed to disturb him. There was no sound at home, but I heard the sound of "Boom! Boom!" from the street wall. It must be that Fang Decheng and his team kicked the ball against the wall.I was thinking, how to talk to them and play with them when I go out?In school, we girls don't talk to boys, just ignore them, just stare at them, but now I really want to play football.

Good mother, here she comes:

"Go out and tell those two wild children, don't play football in front of our house, your father is sleeping!"

With this sentence, I ran out quickly, and the braid was hooked on the nail of the door frame again, pulling out the root of my hair, it hurt to death!Why isn't this nail removed?By the way, it was nailed by Dad, and a shoe duster was hung on it. Dad dusted his shoes before going out and coming home.He taught me to do the same, but I think the dirt on my shoes should be cleaned better by stomping my feet.

Mama Song was feeding her younger sister porridge in the doorway. There were mint leaves stuck in the hairpin on her hair, and little carrot skins stuck to her temples, because she was having a headache.When opening the street door, Mama Song asked me:

"Where did you go crazy?"

"Mom told me to go out." I answered her with good reason.

A circular field outside the door, fully illuminated by the sun, looked like a full spoonful of soup.I stood in front of Fang Decheng in awe and said:
"You are not allowed to kick the ball on the wall of our house, my father is sleeping!"

Fang Decheng picked up the ball from the ground and looked at me stupidly.

Diagonally opposite our house, there was an empty house with no one living in it, only an old deaf man who was watching the house, and he often locked the street door and went to live with his daughter.Song's mother didn't know where she heard it, saying that the house could never be rented out because it was haunted.After hearing this, my mother said to my father: "Why are there so many haunted houses in Beijing?"

In the middle of the haunted house and another house, there is a clearing the size of a house, full of grass, and in front of it, there is a low broken brick wall that I can walk over, and the grass grows taller than the wall .It is said that this open space used to be the stable of the haunted house, but it has collapsed long ago, and no one has repaired it, so it has become an empty grass field.

I looked at the dense and tall grass, next to it was the wall of a haunted house, and said to Fang Decheng and the others:
"I won't kick over there, there is no one living in that room."

As soon as the two of them heard this, they turned around and ran towards the opposite side.How happy it is to kick the ball to the wall and hit it back again.

This is a blind alley. Traders enter by the handle of the spoon, walk around the bottom of the spoon, and then have to go out the same way.At this time, the shaving picker came over, and the two iron clips buzzed "calling the head", but no one came out to shave the head.The sugar gong maker also came. His picks include jujube noodles, stamped people, hawthorn slices, and beads, all of which I like, but if my mother doesn't give me money, what can I do!The old man who beat the sugar gong saw me standing in front of his pick, so he said softly to me:

"Go, go, go home and ask for money!"

Teaching people to ask for money, this old man is really bad!I thought to myself and walked away.I couldn't help walking to the opposite side, standing in front of the broken brick wall in the empty grass, to see if Fang Decheng and Liu Ping would ask me to play football.The ball rolled to my feet, I quickly picked it up and threw it to them.It rolled to a farther wall, and I also ran to pick it up for them.This time Liu Ping kicked the ball high and high, and he even boasted: "Look at how good I am!" But this time the ball fell from a high place into the tall grass.

"Yingzi, don't you like to pick up balls? Go pick them up for us now!" Liu Ping said with sweat.

What's wrong?Immediately, I turned and stepped into the broken brick wall, stepping into the grass taller than me.I pushed the grass away with both hands and then remembered, where did the ball fall?How can I find it all at once?I couldn't help but look back at them; the two of them had already run to the candy gong pickers, drinking the three soda bottles with their necks up.

I leaned forward and took two steps towards the haystack, when Liu Ping called me, "Watch out for shit under your feet, Lin Yingzi!"

I was so scared that I stopped immediately and looked under my feet. Fortunately, there was nothing.I pushed the grass on the left and the grass on the right, but I couldn't find the ball.Going further in, I was almost at the innermost corner, and I touched something under my feet. I picked it up and saw that it was a pair of pliers, but it was useless. The grass in front of him, only then did he realize that the pliers landed on a copper plate, and the plate was turned backwards.really weird!I couldn't help squatting down, and lifted the copper plate. Underneath was a neatly folded table rug with tassels and a very elegant silk dress.I quickly covered it again with a copper plate, my heart was pounding, and I was very panicked, as if someone had discovered that I had done something wrong. I looked up, but there was no one. The grass was blown forward by the wind and hit With my head, I only see the blue sea far above the grass, no, the blue sky.

I stood up and walked towards the exit, thinking, should I tell Liu Ping and them?When I came out, I saw that the two of them were playing glass balls on the ground again, and the old man who hit the sugar gong had also left.Liu Ping asked me without raising his head:

"Did you find it?"

"No."

"Forget it if you can't find it. It's too dirty in there. Dogs go in to shit, and people go in to pee."

I leave them and go home.Mama Song was collecting clothes in the yard, and she frowned when she saw me (the little carrot skin immediately fell off her temples!) and said:
"Look at the dirt covering this body and face! Just playing football with those two wild boys like this?"

"I didn't play football!" I didn't play football.

"Who are you kidding!" Mama Song said with her lips curled up, and then brought up my braids, "Your mother is famous for her tight hands when combing her hair, look! It can make you play loose! You say you have a lot of money! Where is the hair rope?"

"It was hooked off by the nail on the door just now." I argued, pointing to the nail on the door where the shoe duster was hung.At this time, I looked down and saw that my shoes were also full of dirt, so I stomped on the brick floor a few times, and a lot of dirt fell down.As soon as I looked up, I saw my mother pointing at me through the glass window in the room. I tilted my head, wrinkled my nose, and smiled at my mother.When she sees me laughing like this, she will forgive me everything.

The next day, the third day, several days passed, Fang Decheng and the others no longer mentioned the ball, but I was thinking about it. What I was thinking about was not the ball, but the grass, the pile of things in the grass.I really wanted to tell Mom or Song Ma, but the words got out of my mouth and I took them back.

Today I finished my homework very quickly. The addition of two people is really difficult. I have to carry and add points. I only have ten fingers, and I am too busy to add.The arithmetic is too hard, I have to recite "Let's go to the sea", I think, lying on the white sailboat in the sea, I will be blinded by the sun, the boat is shaking on the water, I must will fall asleep. "Let's go to see the sea, let's go to see the sea", I recited like this when I packed my pencil case; I hung my schoolbag on the bed rail, and I recited like this;

Dad and Mom are in the yard, Mom is holding the little sister, Dad is cutting flowers and grass, he said that the oleander leaves are too many, the flowers will bloom less, and some leaves should be removed; he tied the branches with string, The few oleander trees were not so scattered; he also tied thin ropes to the trumpet flowers by the wall and nailed them to the high part of the wall. The morning sun shone on the wall, and the trumpet flowers were red and purple. The yellow and blue ones are in full bloom, but it's not morning, and a few petunias have withered.

Mom said to Dad:

"Bring back the lock, thieves are making a scene, even on Xinhua Street!"

Dad was concentrating on cutting flowers and plants, with his nostrils one by one. He said casually: "Xinhua Street, it's still far from our place!" He looked up and saw me and said, "Isn't it? Yingzi!"

I nodded, and the empty grass flashed before my eyes.

The little sister broke away from her mother at this time, she just liked me to lead her when she could walk.I took her with dancing steps, the little sister was so happy!Giggling, I said "Let's go to see the sea" again in my mouth, and said a word, danced a step, and jumped to the door like this.Song Ma had just finished eating, and she was picking her teeth with her white fungus pick. Every time she picked her teeth, she sucked in her breath. It took a lot of effort to pick her teeth, as if her teeth were very important!The little sister hugged her legs, she wiped the ear picks on her body, and inserted them into her bun.

Song Ma picked up her little sister and walked out of the street. She said to her sister:

"Let's go shopping! Let's go shopping!" Song's mother was very addicted to shopping in the streets, and after she came back, she told her many new things, such as gods, monsters, monsters, mules, horses, donkeys and cattle.

Song Ma left, but my little sister was still waving to me. It was still dark, but the sun was gone, and there was only a glimmer of light on the corner of the empty house opposite.Looking at it again, there was still a piece of sun shining brightly on the empty grass next to it, and the grass was gently moved by the wind. I was stunned and couldn't help walking towards it.In front of the door next door to my house, a picker for buying junk stopped, but no one was there, probably he went to someone’s house to buy junk!At this time, there was no one in the open space in front of the door.

I walked towards the empty grass, and while stepping over the broken wall, I thought to myself, if Mama Song or someone saw me coming here, I would say, I was looking for the ball, so it was!

I didn't concentrate on looking for the ball, but I also hoped to see it. My steps were towards the mysterious corner.I held my breath, moved the tall grass, and stepped forward lightly, for fear of stepping on something again.

Can those things still be here?Why didn't I dare to take a closer look that day, and turned back immediately?Now if these things are still here, what should I do?Of course there is no way, I just want to take a look, because I like weird things.

But when I pushed aside the clump of grass, I gasped and cried out in surprise:
"Oh!"

There is a man squatting on the grass!He also turned around in shock and said "oh".He stared at me for a while, then he smiled:
"Little girl, what are you doing here too?"

"Me," I couldn't answer, was stunned for a moment, and finally figured it out: "I'm here to find the ball."

"Ball? Is it this?" He said, and took out a ball from the pile of things behind him. It was indeed the one that Liu Ping and the others threw.I nodded, took the ball and turned to leave, but he stopped me:
"Well—little girl, please stop, let's talk."

He was wearing short pants and a jacket, with a bald head and thick eyebrows. His thick lips reminded me of what Uncle Li, who knew physiognomy, said: "He has thick lips, and he looks like an honest man." I was a little scared at first, but it's much better when I think of this sentence.His voice seemed to be trembling a little, and he refused to stand up, but I knew there was a pile of things behind him, maybe it was the copper tea tray from that day or something.He said:
"Little girl, how old are you? Have you gone to school?"

"Seven years old, in the first grade of Changdian Primary School." People often ask me the same question, so I can answer it right away.

"Drink! That's a good school. Who will pick you up and take you to school?"

"Myself." After answering, I thought of my father, so I said again: "My father said that children should develop self-reliance early on. Now, do you know that the city wall of Xinhua Street has been opened, called Xinghuamen. I You don’t need to go around the Shunzhi Gate!”

"The little girl can talk, tutor well." He kept nodding. "Your father is right. Children should learn from themselves early on, um—follow their own skills, alas—!" He suddenly lowered his head and sighed, looked up at me again, and smiled. He smiled and asked, "What do you think I'm here for?"

"You—I can't guess." I shook my head, but suddenly remembered, "Did you come here to take a shit?"

(End of this chapter)