Pain is the best teacher of youth

Chapter 15 Detours of youth, you have to walk by yourself (1)
The creek is never straight all the way, it sings and flows in its twists and turns, leaving behind a moving picture; With a thrilling shock.The same is true for youth. Only when you have gone through a detour will you cherish the people and things in front of you more and know how to "turn" the next detour.

The road to growth is never smooth

The place where Chen Liang was born is a remote and isolated mountain village.As for how remote it is, I am afraid that children living in the city cannot imagine: to the north of the mountain village is the endless and vast Tengger Desert; to the east and south of the mountain village is the end of Qilian Mountain; This is the only direction the villagers can go out.

There are not many families living in the small mountain village, and there are less than 100 people in total.This small mountain village merged with several similar natural villages nearby to form a brigade.Go out of the village and go west about a hundred kilometers before you can see people again.

The primary school near the village has only four grades. In Chen Liang's impression, from the first grade to the fourth grade, there are no more than 30 students in his class.In the fifth grade, if you want to continue studying, you have to leave the mountain village and go to a distant place to study.Therefore, most children in the village drop out of school after finishing the fourth grade.Chen Liang's parents have never left Dashan all their lives and are illiterate, but they always hope that their son can be educated and become a talent.So, after Chen Liang finished the fourth grade, his father personally sent him to a school in a distant town.

That year, Chen Liang was 10 years old.

Far away from home, without the supervision of his parents, Chen Liang is still very self-conscious.From elementary school to the first year of junior high school, his grades were always among the best in the class. In the first half of the first year of junior high school, he also represented the school in the county math competition.At that time, Chen Liang was an excellent student in the eyes of teachers, a top student in the eyes of classmates, and a good boy in the eyes of his parents.

However, a math class in the second semester of junior high school made Chen Liang's life start to change.In that math class, the teacher criticized him, and he was not convinced, so he answered a few words.Who would have thought that the teacher would hit the back of his hand with a pointer, perhaps because it was too strong, and even a small piece of skin on the back of Chen Liang's hand was knocked off.

A top student who has always been excellent in his studies was criticized by his teacher until his face turned red and he was beaten in full view.This greatly hurt Chen Liang's self-esteem. In anger, he kicked the math teacher, knocking the desk and chair to the ground.Everyone was stunned. They didn't expect that Chen Liang, who was usually gentle, would suddenly become like this.

In the following days, Chen Liang changed.He started playing truant, at first he just skipped math class, then Chinese class and English class.In the end, I didn't take any classes at all.The top student in the class soon became a poor student, and his grades plummeted.The teacher's impression of him was greatly reduced, and the classmates talked about it in private. The name "Chen Liang" quickly spread throughout the school. Almost all the teachers knew that there was a "bad student" in class 3 of junior high school who didn't go to class all day. ".

The class teacher was extremely angry, but because Chen Liang's home was too far away from the school, and the remote mountain village did not have any convenient communication tools, it was impossible to invite parents to the school, so he had to turn a blind eye.

Chen Liang, who had nothing to do all day long, had nowhere to go, so he wandered in the wheat field behind the school, and lay down on the ridge of the field looking at the sky when he was tired.After wandering around for a week, Chen Liang really felt bored, so he thought of his distant uncle.At that time, the uncle had already been transferred to work in the county, and the house in the small town was usually unoccupied. In order to take care of his nephew who came to study from afar, the uncle specially gave Chen Liang a key.In this way, he went to his uncle's house alone.

My uncle is a teacher in the Chinese Department, and there are books at home besides books.When he was bored, Chen Liang could only read books.Before that, he hadn't read the world's famous novels, but after reading it, he didn't expect to actually read it.From Tagore's "Flying Birds" to Hugo's "Notre Dame de Paris", to Sholokhov's "Quiet River Don"... He was immersed in the ocean of books and forgot the time.For the whole half semester, he read books at his uncle's house, and he didn't realize that he had played truant for several months until he had read almost all the books.

Where do we go from here?He really didn't want to go back to school, but he didn't want to be like those gangsters on the street.Finally, he made a decision: quit school.Just before the final exam, he packed his luggage and returned to the small mountain village where he was born.

Paper can't hold fire, and parents know the truth.However, what is done is done?Although there was despair in the father's eyes, he had no choice but to admit it and said nothing more.Chen Liang, like the dropout children in the village, began to do farm work with his parents.Relatives, friends, neighbors, including Chen Liang himself, all feel that this is what they will do in this life, doing farm work, earning money, building a house, marrying a wife, having children, until they die.

No one expected that after half a year, a turning point would come.

That day, under the scorching sun, Chen Liang and his father were making soil clods at home for building a house.When the father and father were working, a familiar voice came in from outside the door: "Liangzi, there is a letter from you." Chen Liang recognized that it was the voice of grandpa, but he was suddenly confused again: "My letter Who will write to me?” Chen Liang hurriedly opened the kraft paper envelope without washing his hands, but he didn’t expect that there was an award notice inside—the “Bud Award” of the National Literature Summer Camp for Middle School Students.

"My God, the Bui Bui Award! This is the highest award in this competition." The China Youth Literature Foundation informed Chen Liang that he will attend a summer camp in Beidaihe in mid-July, and all expenses will be paid by the foundation.

Chen Liang suddenly remembered: one week before leaving school, when he was packing his things in the dormitory, he saw a call for papers in a middle school student publication of his roommate.At that time, on a whim, he wrote a short text in the dormitory, and sent it out by the way when he left school.In fact, he just wrote casually without any hope at all. After the article was sent out, he completely forgot about it.Unexpectedly, it actually won an award.

Aside from the excitement, Chen Liang still had a doubt in his heart: "It stands to reason that I have already left school, and the registered letter has not been accepted, so it must be returned to the original address. But, how did this letter arrive at home?" After a long time , he solved the mystery.

It turned out that the first person to receive this letter was Chen Liang's class teacher.The teacher found the address of Chen Liang's home in the contact list, and forwarded the letter to Chen Liang.It just so happened that Chen Liang's grandfather was guarding the door in the reception room of the brigade, and someone told him that the letter belonged to his grandson.Upon hearing this, the old man hurried over to deliver a letter to his grandson.

Knowing that Chen Liang won the award, his parents beamed with joy, and the grandfather was even more delighted with wrinkles on his face.How many days and nights have passed, and Chen Liang has never seen his father so happy.During dinner in the evening, my father made an exception and drank some wine, and said to Chen Liang: "Liangzi, you have to go to Beidaihe this time! You don't need to do the housework, you have me and your mother! Man, you have to go out and meet world."

Half a month later, Chen Liang set off.For the first time, he took a train, saw the sea, and took a ship; for the first time, he ate seafood that he had never heard or seen before, and sweet ice cream; for the first time, he could take a bath unscrupulously; Met several famous writers and poets; met so many talented teenagers of the same age for the first time.

This line of work has completely changed Chen Liang's concepts and ideals.On the return train, he was silent on the surface, but his heart was surging.He reminisces about the good times of the summer camp, and at the same time he is more determined about the future: to go out of the small mountain village, out of the small town, and go to a wider world.At this moment, his field of vision is no longer the desert near his home, nor the undulating Qilian Mountains, but a distant but temporarily unknown place.

Chen Liang's life trajectory is like a U-shaped line, falling from the highest point to the bottom of the valley, and now he is starting to climb up the rock little by little.Because of the bad influence in school in the past, the original school refused to accept him, but after hearing the news that he had won the Youth Literature Award, the principal of Aicai recommended him decisively to the principal of No. [-] County Middle School.

After a short absence from school, Chen Liang was specially recruited by No. [-] Middle School and returned to campus.Everything is like a circle, starting from a point, going around a circle, and returning to the original point.However, the mood and experience along the way are the most indelible imprints in the youth, and its name is - growth.

There is a detour in everyone's youth, and no one can complete it for others, but the future is always there. /Independent writer Lu Sihao
The journey away from home for the first time
He is a native of Northeast China, but God’s will tricks him. He chose to obey the adjustment when filling out the college entrance examination, and was placed in the southernmost part of China——a university in Hainan.

On the day he received the admission notice, he looked at the map. From his hometown to Hainan, even on a map that has been reduced in scale by more than N times, it is still a long distance.At that time, his impression and understanding of Hainan was the boundless sea, swaying coconut trees, brilliant sunlight, and clear blue sky.

He has expectations and fears for that distant place.However, people always have to grow up and go out on their own.

For the first time in 18 years, he left his parents and home, and embarked on a journey to study in a foreign land.On the day he left home, his parents kept telling him in the waiting room, and then kept waving goodbye on the platform.His eyes were sore and painful, and he tried hard not to let the tears flow down, but his mother's eye circles were red and swollen that couldn't be concealed.

At that moment, he experienced growth, as if he understood a certain meaning of life: Standing at the intersection of forked roads, you choose a road that belongs to you, bid farewell to those who love you, and meet new people on the journey people, write new stories.Joys and sorrows, self-knowledge of warmth and coldness, in the ups and downs of emotional gaps, learn to be strong and grow slowly.

The carriage was full of people.He was sitting on a seat near the outside, and beside him stood a girl about his age. Although she didn't wear makeup, she had a special charm, a feeling of "clear water comes out of hibiscus".After the train started, it bumped and moved forward.The girl helped the luggage, wiped off her sweat, took a breath, and leaned on the back of the seat.

He asked the girl, "Where are you going to get off?"

The girl said, "I'm in Linqing."

"Oh." He didn't know where Linqing was, so he asked again, "How many hours will it take?"

"One day and one night!" the girl replied.

After a moment of silence, he said: "Look, every carriage is quite crowded. You still need to stand for a standing ticket. Let's switch seats! I'm going to sit until the end, and I'm quite tired." He was about to get up .The girl was a little surprised, and said politely: "No, you sit down, I'm not very tired now." After such a pleasant exchange, the two of them immediately felt a lot closer.

During the chat, he learned that the girl is from Shandong and has been working in Harbin.He was a little startled, thinking that the girl was still a student just like him.Unexpectedly, the girl has already shouldered the burden of life at home.At that moment, he was a little bit emotional, always felt that he was a man of seven feet, but he was still "unfulfilled in his studies, unfulfilled career, and unfulfilled aspirations".

After nightfall, almost all the people with seats fell asleep, and the standing passengers were really sleepy too.After he slept for a while, he saw the girl kept changing her posture, she seemed very tired.He got up, pushed the girl, and motioned for her to sit down.The girl was still refusing at first, but seeing his sincerity, she sat down.Soon, the girl fell asleep.The air conditioner was turned on in the carriage, and it would still feel cold when sleeping in the middle of the night. He covered the girl with his slightly old coat.

About two hours later, the girl woke up.Seeing him standing beside him with his clothes still covering him, he was a little embarrassed.She said: "Otherwise, I'll move inside and you can sit here too!" It was the first time he was so close to a girl, although it was a little awkward, but in the silent and crowded carriage , but felt a family-like warmth.

Its daybreak.The two people who met by chance, talking and laughing, talked about the things around them, and the people around them also participated in it from time to time, and the long journey seemed not so lonely.

In the evening, the car arrived in Linqing.It was raining outside the car window, and it was a bit cool.He helped the girl get some luggage and walked her off the train.After a brief "goodbye", she was quickly dispersed by the crowd, and he returned to the train.This "goodbye" may mean "never meet again".He suddenly thought of Dai Wangshu's "Rain Lane": "She approached silently, approached, and cast her breath-like eyes... Like drifting in a dream, like a lilac... She quietly walked away, far away, When you reach the crumbling fence, walk through the rainy alley."

They met for no reason, and saw each other again for no reason. They were all moving forward for their lives and futures, but it was difficult for them to meet again.Such an ending may be a bit sad, but thinking of the caring for each other when we met, and the simplicity and beauty, it still warms my heart.

After traveling for more than sixty hours, he arrived at the terminal - Haikou.

When we got off the train, it was already evening.According to the requirements of the admission notice, I will report to the school tomorrow and live in the dormitory.Not wanting to waste the money on a hotel room, he found a 24-hour restaurant to eat and lie down there until dawn.

It was in that restaurant that he met Tian Ye, a sophomore.When he entered, Tianye was looking at a map with a huge backpack next to him.He sat down next to the field, chatted for a few words, and learned that he was from Yunnan, a backpacker, and arrived in Haikou after a transit.Unfortunately, the only bank card in his hand was swallowed, and he couldn't withdraw the money, so he had to sleep in the restaurant temporarily and go to the bank to handle business after dawn.

"How much courage does it take to be outside alone?" He was startled, filled with admiration.He handed over some dinner he had just bought outside and shared it with Tian Ye.He could see a touch of emotion in Tian Ye's eyes when he was in a foreign country and a stranger who had never met before sent such concern.Tian Ye handed him the MP3 in his hand and said, "I'll give this to you, it's the money for this dinner." He said, "No, this won't work, you can keep it for yourself."

That night, he and Tian Ye chatted in the quiet restaurant.They hit it off very well and chatted very vigorously. They used two bottles of mineral water instead of wine to celebrate their meeting by chance.In a strange city, an accidental encounter brought two hearts closer, not to mention how touching it was.While chatting, Tian Ye kept looking at the map and studying the route.

He looked at the baby face in the field, and thought of the Shandong girl on the train, with mixed feelings in his heart.It was the first time I went out for a long trip, and in just two days, so many things happened, it was really unbelievable.The same age and different experiences made him suddenly realize that everyone has youth, but everyone has different stories in their youth, and everyone chooses a different path.But no matter what kind of path you choose, you are bound to have loneliness and hard work, as well as joy and emotion.

In the early morning, he exchanged contact information with Tian Ye.At the moment of parting, he only hoped that Tian Ye could complete the trip safely and smoothly, and then go back safely.Walking out of the fast food restaurant, they all quickly disappeared into the crowd and started their respective youthful journeys.He picked up his luggage and walked towards the bus station.

The car was galloping on the road, and along the way he saw the blue sea in the south, and suddenly felt an urge to cry, thinking of the touch this journey had brought him, it was too great.He recalled the people and things he met on the way; he also thought of his anxiety and uneasiness, joy and emotion, and the ordinary gatherings and separations like ants. flowed down.

Perhaps, every growth path will be moved with tears and joy.The year when he left home for the first time, that long journey taught him the understanding of different lives.

I ran all the way, eager to find a face similar to mine in the crowded and hurried crowd, she and I had a similar fate.I can see the reference of my own destiny in her, where to go, no longer so hasty. /Novel "Little Demon's Golden Castle"

(End of this chapter)