Chapter 2: Leaving home and dreaming of traveling

"I want to go to Xinjiang and chase my dreams to a distant place", Min Haoran has an obsession with Xinjiang, and his determination to go to Xinjiang is unshakable.

The dream legend of King Zhou Mu's journey to the west, Zhang Qian's journey to the Western Regions through hardships and hardships, the bloody battle of the homeland of Turghut returned to the east, Zuo Zongtang pushed the coffin to Xinjiang despite the public opinion, Uncle Kurban rode a donkey into Beijing to see the chairman, Lin Gongqu and Zuo Gongliu...... Xinjiang has always been a battleground for soldiers, with a tragic and heroic history, and many heroes from ancient and modern times, all of whom have expressed patriotic feelings.

Xinjiang is the western border of the motherland, and it was once a necessary place for ancient silk, and it is this ancient road that connects the ancient Chinese culture, Indian culture, Persian culture, Arab culture and ancient Greek and Roman culture, and promotes the exchange of Eastern and Western civilizations. However, Xinjiang is a vast territory, remote location, harsh environment, and underdeveloped economy, and it is a virgin land to be developed, and a group of young intellectuals are needed to build the frontier. The teacher told the touching story of 3,000 Hunan women who went to the Tianshan Mountains, and the Hunan women sprinkled their youth and their blood in the desert Gobi, and gave birth to many heroes who dedicated themselves to the construction of the frontier, each of them is a book, a painting, and a song. Some of them are sacrificing there, some are old, and some are over the age of sixties, but their spirit needs the younger generation to inherit it for them and continue to write their youth.

Min Haoran's mind always appeared in the desert Gobi Ancient Road, the majestic golden iron horse, the scene of the struggle to expand the territory and fight the heavens and the earth, and the heroic and heroic people who went forward and followed him like a strong magnetic center of gravity pulled him.

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In the south of the Yangtze River in July, the sky is like a red-hot iron pot upside down, and the red soil on the road is smoking. There was not a hint of breeze, the two small ponds were like blue mirrors, calm and terrifying, and a water spider sprang out a line on the water surface. The grass by the pond, although it sucks the water, is still helpless to hang ***.

Not far from the ancient well, a little yellow dog spit out a foaming tongue and looked back at Min Haoran, who was squatting on the big bluestone, with his ears pricked up.

On the surface of the pond, a tile drift breaks the quiet space. Min Haoran stood up, picked up a small stone again, and aimed at the little yellow dog, the little yellow dog was not afraid, but "uh-huh-huh" shook his butt and wagged his tail and stuck out his tongue and walked towards Min Haoran, snuggled up next to Min Haoran, and looked up from time to time.

The little yellow dog seemed to see through Min Haoran's thoughts, and was inseparable from Min Haoran all day long.

Min Haoran walked along the path by the pond, bored, followed by the little yellow dog. Min Haoran pulled a dog tail grass on the side of the road, held it in his mouth, chewed, and in the paddy field on the side of the road, from time to time there was a frog chirping sound of "cluck, cluck", and the plump and golden rice ears and fish were tired and bent over like seeds.

At this time, not far away, a weak figure carrying wet firewood and grass was struggling to climb a small slope, Min Haoran hurriedly caught up, and moved the flat burden to his shoulder without saying a word.

"Child, why is it coming again on such a hot day, and it's not heavy," Min Haoran's mother said as she moved the flat shoulder to Min Haoran's shoulder.

In her spare time, Min Haoran's mother and the other women in the village go to the mountains a few kilometers away to chop firewood for cooking in the winter. Chopping firewood is hard work, people on hot days get into the dense grass to cut, pick it back and dry it and then stack it into a stack, and keep it for burning in winter.

Along the way, the mother and son did not say anything more, but the little yellow dog occasionally "Wang" twice, and the mother wiped the sweat on Min Haoran's forehead with the towel on her head from time to time. At this time, Min Haoran, tears and sweat were mixed with his face, and Shi Er picked up the clothes on his left shoulder and wiped his face. He thought it was time to make it clear to his parents. The firewood and grass on the burden were a little heavy, Min Haoran gasped, and sometimes switched between the left and right shoulders, thinking about how the thin mother persevered every day.

"Father, mother, there is one thing I want to discuss with you. ”

It is said to be a discussion, but in fact it is just an inform. Min Haoran swallowed a mouthful of rice, and stretched out his chopsticks to clip the dishes on the table as he spoke. His parents looked up at him at the same time, and the chopsticks in their hands froze. Hearing Min Haoran's serious words, I guessed that the child had a very heavy mind to talk to them, and his heart was seven up and eight down, and his heart had already mentioned the knot in his throat.

"It's been more than a month since I graduated from university, and after thinking about it for a long time, I decided to go to Xinjiang to work, and I received a letter from Xinjiang when I was in college. ”

Min Haoran has made up his mind, but he doesn't know how to speak to his parents, but the time is approaching day by day, so he can only say it head-on. He understands his parents' thoughts very well, and his parents have overcome all difficulties to provide him with school, just to let him have an iron job and have a good 'scenery' in the village. Rural people have a good face, and Min Haoran's parents are the same, but this kind of life at a glance is not the life he wants.

The parents were shocked by Min Haoran's words. They never thought that Min Haoran would have such an idea. The cool night fell silent. After Min Haoran finished speaking, he lowered his head and took rice into his mouth.

"Child, I'm in a hurry, I've already asked someone to find a relationship, so I'm working in Emen Township, iron rice bowl, waterlogging and drought to ensure harvest", the father broke the silence of the night.

"Xinjiang is so far away, and there is no relative, where can you put your heart and let the tender go. Mother put down her chopsticks and rubbed her eyes.

"Dad, mother, you can rest assured, I will take care of myself, I have also thought about it for a long time, and I still want to go out and break through. Time came to an abrupt end, except for a few cockroaches still crawling on the stove.

"Father, mother, I have grown up, no matter what the road ahead, I have to walk on my own. The parents were silent.

The mother cleaned up the dishes and chopsticks on the table and walked silently to the kitchen, and after a while, the clink of pots and pans sounded. My father lifted one barefoot on a long wooden bench, lit a cigarette, took a deep breath, and the thick white smoke came out of his nostrils, and he coughed dryly.

Min Haoran knew that his parents couldn't understand his thoughts, and he didn't want to explain too much. Min Haoran's decision to work in Xinjiang was also deliberate, and when the school mobilized the country to hope that a group of aspiring young people would go to the border areas of the motherland to support the construction of the frontier, he was enthusiastic.

Thinking of his parents' tired figure all year round, Min Haoran felt a pain in his heart, "I can't let my parents worry about me anymore." It was night, and Min Haoran couldn't sleep.

He knew that his parents were strong people, and in order to provide for him to go to school and save money, his tired hair was gray, his body was shaved, and a man in his forties looked like an old man and an old lady in his sixties, and he was wearing patched clothes. The family has only six acres of land, to support four brothers and sisters, but also to support grandparents, when the harvest in the field is good, barely keep food and clothing, in the event of a flood and drought, food and clothing are a problem, and in the southern hilly area, floods and droughts are a common thing.

As the saying goes, no one is rich without foreign wealth. In order to find money to supplement the family, to make some 'extra money' for their children to go to school, life is more prosperous, every summer, the parents in the middle of the night with foreign oil torches and tooth pliers to the paddy fields to catch yellow eels to sell to the city people, and during the day they have to be busy in the field. After walking for a long time in the dark field, my father would go to the torch and light a cigarette, then extinguish the torch, and sit on the ridge with my mother to chatter and slowly find the direction.

My father never stopped all year round, and my father, who had never gone to school, did learn several crafts, blowing suona, pulling a big saw, and getting some pocket money a year. Father is also a 'professional in the art industry' person, who does not know, but the suona blowing is famous, there is a red and white happy event within a radius of ten miles that needs suona hands, the first thing that comes to mind is Min Haoran's father, especially in the season, there are obviously more people who are married, and the people who ask their father to play suona line are lined up, in order to please his father to blow a few more sounds, he will let his father sit on the guest. At that time, timber was the main ingredient for building houses, and my father was tall and strong, so sawing wood was fast and accurate, which not only produced more work, but also saved materials, so the 'business' was good. When I really have nothing to do, I ride a broken bicycle, tie a wooden "refrigerator" with cotton wool on the back seat of the bicycle, go to the township cold drink wholesale department early to wholesale a box of popsicles, and sell "popsicles, mung bean popsicles, two corners and a popsicle in two corners, and a mung bean" in each school during the school year, and sell them in the fields of each village during the holidays. Although it is a penny profit, there is also an income of one or twenty yuan a day.

The first thing my father did when he got home after dark was to fix the "flying pigeon" bicycle that didn't even have pedals and how long it had been used, so that he could continue his "business" the next day. Min Haoran and his siblings turned out the money bag sewn by his mother, counted the corners and points inside, and used a roll of discarded paper for every ten coins, and the banknotes were neatly folded and handed over to his mother.

When he was young, he didn't know anything, and every time it was almost dark, Min Haoran and his brothers and sisters would sit on the bluestone slab at the entrance of the village and play while waiting for their father to come back. When they saw their father from afar, they ran over happily and chirped the popsicle box behind the overturned car, where there were always a few popsicles left by their father to satisfy their hunger. When they were children, they hoped that the weather would be bad, preferably sunny in the morning and rainy in the afternoon, so that their father's popsicles would not be sold, and they would take home more popsicles so that they could have enough to eat. Although it is not a good feeling to not make money after a hard day, when he sees the happy appearance of the children, his father will have a sincere smile on his face.

The mother takes care of the housework at home, raises chickens, feeds pigs, works in the fields, and from time to time brings some vegetables grown in the field, eggs laid by chickens and ducks, and lotus roots dug in the field to the village market to exchange for oil and salt money, and when she comes home, she will bring a few sweets to make the children happy. At night, while staring at the child's study, the mother mended the clothes and the soles of the shoes with the foreign oil lamp, and the family's clothes and shoes were sewn by the mother with a needle and thread. Sometimes the mother fell asleep with her head tilted forward, and was woken up by the needle in her hand to continue sewing.

In Min Haoran's impression, his parents are like a perpetual motion machine, silent, caring for each other, working at sunrise and resting at sunset, without stopping, just like that, Min Haoran's family is quite passable, and they are relatively wealthy in the village, so they can afford to go to school.

Min Haoran had made up his mind, and the next day he got up early, picked up the plow, led the oxen, and went to work in the field with his parents. On the way, he pretended to be relaxed and said to his parents: "Dad, mother, you see that I have grown up, good men are ambitious in all directions, Xinjiang is also a good place, when I am stable, I will take you over to enjoy happiness", after speaking, he raised his hand and "chirped" on the butt of the cow to smoke a 'stick'.

From the heart, Min Haoran can't bear to leave his parents, "his parents are here, don't travel far" is the tradition of his hometown, but Xinjiang attracts him so magically, like the 'nose needle' in the nose of a cow that ties his heart.

In the field, Min Haoran ploughed with one hand and ploughed with the other, and his father used a shovel to lift the high mud to the low place, and the falling mud occasionally splashed Min Haoran was covered in muddy water, Min Haoran would complain: "Dad, you look at the dots, cover me", and the father smiled honestly, spit and rubbed into the palm of his hand, so that he could tighten the shovel handle and continue to work. The mother was picking up rice in another field and planting rice quickly, and Min Haoran looked at them from time to time. There were beads of sweat on the faces of his parents, and there were tears in the beads of sweat, and Min Haoran felt a pain in his heart.

The paddy fields of the small mountain village in the south of the Yangtze River have two crops of rice a year, and at this time it is the time to rush to harvest and rush to plant, and each family is busy working in their fields, talking and laughing, shouting, splashing, greetings, the noise of chickens, ducks, pigs and dogs, and the quiet morning is spent in such a symphony every day.

At this time, the sun has climbed to the height of bamboo poles, the warm sunlight envelops the whole village, and the smoke from the stoves of every house wafts in the wind. Min Haoran took off his muddy clothes, wore only a pair of shorts, and slipped into the pond on the side of the road, and washed his muddy clothes by the way. The parents washed the muddy water on their hands and feet on the big bluestone by the pond, called Min Haoran to go home for dinner, and hurried home barefoot.

Whenever the farm is busy, Min Haoran's grandmother will also get up early and tie an apron to make breakfast busily.

Min Haoran knew that his decision was a surprise for everyone, especially Zhao Ruyan. In the future life, they will stay together, although they have decided, they have never discussed it with Zhao Ruyan, and they feel that they are so selfish. His decision finally made Zhao Ruyan's life bumpy and desolate.

How much Min Haoran hopes that Zhao Ruyan will go to Xinjiang with him, even if Zhao Ruyan promises to do one thing for him in his life, that is, to go to Xinjiang with him.