The Ladder of Love (Part II) Zhang Baotong 2017.10.10

The staircase was still the same, but the stone steps had been trampled by the footsteps of pedestrians, and green moss had grown on the edges of the stone steps, and some grass had grown in the gaps between the stone steps. When I walked to the vertical ladder on the stone wall, I found that the ladder was no longer allowed to climb, and pedestrians could only walk up from a winding step reopened next to it, which was very safe and there was no thrill at all. So I told my wife and daughter how I had climbed the ladder to the top of the cliff when I passed through here. When they looked at the ladder, they were surprised and said, "It's scared." ”

However, it was the single-plank bridge made of a few tree trunks that really frightened the wife and daughter. Under the bridge is a constant cloud and mist, and you can't see the abyss at the bottom of the bridge, only the sound of the rushing mountain stream. The bridge is just four or five tree trunks five or six meters long, and there are no fences on either side. We all walked across this bridge at the beginning. That's the feeling of playing with a heartbeat. The wife said, "My mother, if this is the case, every time I walk across the bridge, it will be a test of life." I said, "Yes, but Uncle Liu and Aunt Xu don't know how many times they have walked on this bridge." ”

I think if my wife and daughter were allowed to walk across this single-plank bridge now, they would definitely choose to go back the way they came, and they would not risk their lives. It's just that the single-plank bridge has been fenced off and is not allowed to enter by tourists. Visitors are now walking on a simulated single-plank bridge made of reinforced concrete. However, the bridge is very safe with high fences on both sides.

After crossing the single-plank bridge, a stone staircase leads up to a high slope with a flat path. Walk under a large empty boulder on the side of the road, which is full of branches. A sign on the side of the road says that this tree skill can use the magic power to lift up boulders. He also said that every time Uncle Liu and Aunt Xu walked by here, they had to stick a branch under the boulder, and each time they planted a branch, it means that they had walked through here once, but when we walked through here, no one had ever planted a branch here, and they didn't even pay much attention to this boulder, because it was still a primitive state at that time. While the development of tourist attractions has changed this pristine state a bit, it has also added some legendary touches to this love story.

The tourist route is much easier than the road repaired by Uncle Liu before, so we walked very fast along the way. When the sun was still a long way from going down, we had come to the last cliff. I said to my wife, "This is where Aunt Xu comes here every day before the sun goes down to greet Uncle Liu, because the mountain road is difficult and dangerous, and she is always worried about Uncle Liu's safety." If the sun goes down and Uncle Liu doesn't come back, she will go down from the cliff to the bottom to find Uncle Liu. ”

The wife looked at the steep cliff ladder in an almost vertical state, sighed, and said, "Her courage is so great that she dares to die." I said, "Actually, Aunt Xu is not very bold, but she takes Uncle Liu's safety very seriously." Once, Uncle Liu fell from a high slope to the bottom of a hill, and everyone fainted. Aunt Xu was still carrying a half-year-old baby on her back at the time, standing on this cliff in the rain and waiting for Uncle Liu, but when it was almost dark and Uncle Liu didn't come back, she carried the baby down the ladder to find Uncle Liu. You think that if she had a slight mistake at that time, let alone what she would have fallen into, even the baby on her back didn't know what would happen. The wife said with emotion, "The relationship between the two of them is really good." ”

Walking out of the dense forest and going up to the top of the mountain, I felt that it was very close to the sun, and the golden light of the sun illuminated the top of the mountain brightly, and the heaven and earth suddenly opened up. Standing on the mountain, looking towards the distant mountains, there is a Danxia flowing cloud in front of you, and you can see the mountains above the sea of clouds, as if you have entered the fairy land of mythology.

We walked up the path next to the vegetable patch and up to the front of the house. The familiar adobe house was even more dilapidated, and the walls of the one to the west were already sloping, supported by a tree trunk. Smoke curls from the roof, and a mountain spring flows past the house. An old woman sits in front of the house sewing clothes, an old man chops wood on the dam, a big yellow dog watches us alertly, and a flock of local chickens leisurely foraging in the grass in front of the door. This scene is very similar to the slash-and-burn cultivation of the cowherd and the weaver girl, and the scene of male ploughing and female weaving.

Seeing us coming, the old woman shouted at us, "Do you want honey and local chicken?" Obviously Aunt Xu didn't recognize me, so I smiled and asked, "What is the selling price of your honey and local chicken?" Aunt Xu heard me ask the price, so she got up from the small stool in front of the door, walked in front of me, and said, "Ten yuan a bottle of honey, five yuan a pound of local chicken." I shook my head and said, "Why is it so expensive?" Aunt Xu said, "It's not expensive, this honey and local chicken are all produced and raised by us, there is no pollution, and it is natural." Hearing this, I was almost taken aback, Aunt Xu, who had never even been down the mountain a few times in her life, actually knew how to say such a thing. So, I said in a praising tone, "Aunt Xu, you are terrible now, and you have learned to do business." ”

Aunt Xu looked at me carefully, smiled, and said, "It's you, why haven't I seen you come again for a long time." I said, "I've changed jobs and I've been busy." As I spoke, I introduced myself to my wife, "This is the Aunt Xu Xu Chaoqing I told you." The wife took Aunt Xu's hand and said, "Hello Auntie." The daughter also shouted at Aunt Xu, "Hello, grandma." Aunt Xu said to my wife and daughter, "Okay, okay," and then shouted to my wife, who was chopping wood, "Young man, there is a guest." Uncle Liu put out his machete, walked over, and when he saw that it was me, he said, "You haven't been here for many years." So saying, he led us into the house.

When she entered the house, Aunt Xu turned on the electric light, and the room was bright. But the things in the house are still the same things from previous years, a small wooden table, chairs made of bamboo, stools made of wooden boards, and the big wooden box containing food still has the yellowed *** quotation. It's just that there is a large color TV on the edge of the room, which is very eye-catching. The two old men were still wearing the white-washed blue cloth clothes, but the blue cloth was no longer a kaki cloth, but a chemical fiber fabric, and a thick turban was wrapped around their heads, and the hair on the side of the turban was already completely white. Both of them had wrinkled faces and lost a single tooth, but they were in good spirits and optimistic.

I said, "You have electricity and a TV here, what a change!" Uncle Liu said, "It's all thanks to you, you wrote that article, so that the people of Chongqing, Jiangjin District, and Zhongshan Town knew about our life in the mountains, and we became famous all of a sudden, and even built tourist attractions here, making our lives better all of a sudden." I said, "I'm also worried that this will break the peace of your two elders' lives and bring you trouble and trouble." With that, we took out the fruits and pastries we brought to Aunt Xu and Uncle Liu and let them eat them.

I knew that Aunt Xu and Uncle Liu loved to eat apples, so I asked my wife to peel the apples for them to eat. However, Aunt Xu cut the apple with a knife and ate it one by one. At this time, I realized that the teeth of the two elders had fallen out. Not only are all the teeth gone, but people are also getting older. Six years ago, they walked quite energetically, but now their waists are bent, but they look much better, and their faces are always full of gentle and satisfied smiles.

After talking for a while, I said to them, "When will you two elders go down the mountain to live, Liu San is now doing business in front of the tourist attraction, and life is good, let me advise you to go down the mountain and live with them." Aunt Xu shook her head and said, "No, we live quite well in the mountains, no worse than under the mountains." I said, "It's not that life is good, it's that the two of you are old, and if you get sick one day, you can't go to see it." Aunt Xu said, "Don't you think our body is quite good?"

At this time, some tourists in front of the door were watching around the wooden sign of "Love Hometown". Aunt Xu came out of the house and shouted at them, "Do you want honey, do you want local chickens?" I said to Uncle Liu, "You can make a lot of money selling honey and local chickens?" Uncle Liu said, "Sometimes you make a lot of money, sometimes you can't make any money, if you earn well, you can earn one or two hundred yuan a day, and if you don't earn well, you can't even earn a penny a day." In general, it is no problem to earn seven or eight thousand or more than ten thousand a year. I said, "That's not bad, but you make so much money, how do you spend it?" Uncle Liu said, "We don't spend much money we earn, and we can't spend it." Almost all of them were given to the children. Now the road is easier to walk, the mountain is more convenient, and the children and grandchildren come to visit us during the holidays. The old mother gave them the money. Because some of the children have a better life, and some have some difficulties. She gave more money to her children who were poorer. She always felt that the two of us lived in the mountains, and we lost the children, so she wanted to compensate the children more. ”

While they were talking, some tourists came over and asked Uncle Liu to come over and take a photo with them. Uncle Liu readily agreed to them and went out to take photos with Aunt Xu with the tourists. I just finished taking a photo with some people, and others also asked to take a photo with the second elder. After everyone took a group photo, some people also took a photo with the two elders alone. I think I'm so annoyed that I always ask people to take pictures, but Uncle Liu and Aunt Xu are always happy, as if they are taking family photos with their own families.

While they were taking pictures with tourists, I was going to take my wife and daughter out to see the scenery. By this time, some tourists had already set up tents in the open space in front of the houses, preparing to spend the night on the top of the hill. Watch some tourists eating, drinking, sitting together and playing cards. My wife said to me, "These people are really interesting, they don't have to come here to play cards from so far away, not to mention staying at home to play." I said, "Everyone comes out to play, and the process of playing is nothing more than getting in the car to sleep, getting off the bus to pee, and going to the scenic spot to take pictures." As for what to see, it doesn't matter to them what to swim. ”

I took my wife and daughter to the edge of the cliff to see the scenery in the distance, into the cave to see the place where their family lived, to the corn field and sweet potato field where I worked with my uncle and aunt, to see the place where my uncle and I had threshed wild walnuts, and to see the place where my uncle kept bees. However, there are not a few boxes of bees raised by the uncle, but more than ten boxes.

While we were watching the bees flying in swarms on the grass and among the flowers to collect honey, Uncle Liu came over and asked us to go back to the house for dinner. We followed Uncle Liu back to the house.