If reality and ideals really come to a fork in the road, if you have to choose one or the other, how do you choose?

This is the problem that Sergeant Luo Ping'an is encountering now.

Luo Ping'an ranked third at home.

He has an older brother who is six years older than him, and a younger sister who is four years younger than him.

For Sergeant Luo Ping'an, being a soldier is his biggest dream.

Originally, the children of a small mountain village did not have much concept of the army, but this village was on the way of the Red Army's Long March, and the Red Army who passed through here received selfless help from the local villagers, leaving a good story.

But that's all in the past.

If he hadn't met a soldier when he was a teenager, maybe Luo Ping'an's life would have been like other men in the whole village - at most he would go to the county seat to study in high school, then abandon school, return to the village to farm in his own land, and then go to the next village or the village to say a daughter-in-law, and walk on the road of his wife and children to hot kangtou.

That year, the school was on summer vacation, and Luo Ping'an, who was still in the fifth grade of primary school, saw soldiers for the first time.

Passing through the village is a trained field army, and in this small village, every little thing will become news, and it will soon spread from the head of the village to the end of the village.

Some men in military uniforms entered the village and camped in the village threshing floor and on the wasteland at the head of the village, with guns in their hands.

The temptation of a gun is fatal to a child.

In Luo Ping'an's county, many villagers still retain the habit of hunting, and almost everyone has a homemade gunpowder gun at home.

But after all, it's just a homemade shotgun, and it's no match for the real thing.

When Luo Ping'an arrived at the entrance of the village, he saw a large group of soldiers who were busy setting up tents from a distance, all carrying Type 81-1 automatic rifles on their backs.

In the sunlight, the jet-black body of the gun emitted an alluring glow.

This is the first time Luo Ping'an has seen a real gun.

Just at a glance, Luo Ping'an fell madly in love with this real guy.

He followed the children in the village and watched the soldiers' every move all day long on the edge of the wasteland at the entrance of the village.

Seeing this group of children staring at him, a soldier who couldn't figure out whether it was an officer or a soldier at that time took off his empty gun, and then beckoned Luo Ping'an to come over and let him touch it for a while.

This unit was stationed in the local area for three days, Luo Ping'an didn't do anything for three days, he woke up every day and ran to the stove, spooned a big bowl of sweet potato porridge, and then took the kind of cake left over after peanut oil was pressed with oil, fried with salt, and put a big bowl on it, and hurriedly ran to the entrance of the village, squatting for half a day.

During the three days they were there, the soldiers went to the hillside near the village to conduct several offensive drills, during which they fired a lot of guns and fired a lot of empty ammunition.

The sound of gunfire left a deep impression on Luo Ping'an's memory.

It turned out that the real gun was so crisp, and there was such a big difference from the dull shooting sound of the village adults.

One soldier even gave Luo Ping'an a bullet casing, which he kept as a treasure.

Three days later, the soldiers who had been trained were gone.

However, Luo Ping'an's heart was also taken away.

Luo Ping'an, who was only eleven years old at the time, had already vowed that he would definitely become a soldier when he grew up.

This ideal accompanied Luo Ping'an's growth until he graduated from high school in the county seat.

The young people in the village have graduated from high school and have a very high level of education, and in Luojia Village, where Luo Ping'an is located, there has not been a single college student since the founding of the People's Republic of China.

Therefore, young people who have graduated from high school have two paths to go - either go out to work and go to the coastal areas to earn money; Either stay in the village, farm the land and raise chickens and sheep, and then say that a daughter-in-law will get married and have a baby.

Luo Ping'an chose the third path.

He's going to be a soldier.

My father was very opposed, saying that if you go to the army, what will happen to the family?

It's realistic.

After graduating, my brother went to work on the coast.

My sister is in junior high school, and she is not a strong laborer, not to mention that her sister's grades are good, even if she is in a middle school in the county, she will always be the first in her class.

There was a reason why the father was against it.

Luo Ping'an knows that his father has been in poor health in recent years, and he has been coughing all the time, and many times his mother is taking care of the work in the field.

After graduating, it stands to reason that my father can breathe a sigh of relief, after all, he has a strong laborer. The eldest son went to work, and Luo Ping'an, who was the second child, was of course obliged to support the family.

Soldier?

It's been a few years, what's the matter? What should I do at home?

This is what the most realistic peasant thinks, unpretentious, resigned to fate.

Luo Ping'an did not accept his fate.

Since the age of eleven, he has already decided to become a soldier.

In a lifetime, maybe just one chance to be a soldier, how can you just miss it?

The two fathers and sons had a big quarrel about this and broke up unhappily.

Fortunately, the mother felt sorry for her son, and did a whole day of ideological work with his father, and three days later, his father called him with a tiger face, and the summer harvest passed, you can be a soldier, and you can plant me for half a year, and the growth will be good at the end of the year, and your father will promise you to let you go to be a soldier, and fulfill your dream, lest you have a black face with me every day at home, Lao Tzu is your father, not your enemy!

After listening to this, Luo Ping'an jumped up and shouted several times Long live Daddy!

This frightened the old man who had experienced that special era, and quickly reprimanded him, saying Long live is what you said? You are reactionary!

I don't know if it's reactionary, anyway, Luo Ping'an was like a tireless ploughing cow in the first half of the year from graduation to the end of the year, leaving early and returning late, and people were as black as charcoal pulled out of the stove.

Going well as a soldier is also going well.

My mother had a distant relative in the county armed forces department, and he was familiar with conscription.

One asked, saying that there are indicators for conscription at the end of the year.

So, Luo Ping'an was the first person in the county to sign up that year, went to the village committee early, found the cadres in charge of the armed forces, and shouted that he wanted to be a soldier.

In Luojia Village, the enthusiasm of young people to serve as soldiers was not high, and there were not many families in the village, so the county's indicators in recent years have simply not come here, and all other places in the county have completed the task.

This time, it was the first time that the village cadres had seen people in Luojia Village who had taken the initiative to ask to be soldiers.

Luo Ping'an's military uniform was dressed smoothly, but when there were still two months left for the physical examination, something big happened at home.

My father vomited blood and was taken to the hospital where he was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer.

Luo Ping'an was hit hard.

This means that his plan to become a soldier is about to come to naught.

As soon as he leaves, who will take care of him at home?

My sister is only in junior high school, do you want her to drop out of school?

My brother works in a coastal city, and he is so busy that he has just talked about a girlfriend, and he plans to take root in a coastal city and become a city man from now on.

Want him back? It seems that the idea is too selfish.

But in the end, Luo Ping'an still put on a military uniform and came to the army.

The reason is very simple, the mother saw the second Luo Ping'an's obsession with the army.

As a rural woman, she doesn't understand the big truth, and she doesn't know what ideals are.

However, if his son does not become a soldier and stays here, he will not be happy for the rest of his life.

She understands that.

Fight tiger brothers, go into battle father and son soldiers.

His elder brother, Luo Tianxiang, quit his job and returned to this small mountain village from the coastal city.

After the funeral of his father, after the first seven, Luo Tianxiang patted his younger brother on the shoulder and said, brother, go, go to be a soldier, and find your ideals. At home, my brother is holding on.

Luo Ping'an couldn't hold back all of a sudden, and cried on the spot.

Brotherhood is deep, nothing more than that.

More than a month later, Luo Ping'an put on a military uniform and left.

It is precisely because this military uniform is not easy to come by, Luo Ping'an works harder than any soldier of the same year.

When he first arrived in the army, he had already stood out from the time he was a recruit, and he was the best among the soldiers of the same year.

As soon as the recruit period ended, he was selected to the reserve unit of the special brigade, where he underwent strict intensive training, and finally passed five levels and cut six generals, and successfully entered the "Red Arrow" brigade.

Even in the "Red Arrow" brigade, when Luo Ping'an, the fourth squad leader of the third battalion, was mentioned, the cadres who knew him gave him a thumbs up and said: "Good soldier!" ”

But no one knew.

The reason why Luo Ping'an is so desperate is not only that his own ideal is to be a good soldier, but more importantly, if this soldier is not good, not to mention that he is ashamed of his father's spirit in the sky, and he is also sorry for everyone in the family - brother, mother and sister.

If nothing happens, Sergeant Luo Ping'an's future military career path should be like this - transfer to a non-commissioned officer, and then stay in the army to continue to serve, maybe there is an opportunity to participate in a special forces competition or the like, and receive awards for meritorious service with his proud military quality, and then be promoted.

Even if you don't get promoted, at least you can live a full life of soldiers, and then, like the veteran Zhang Zhiang, be a soldier who is not a cadre but is better than a cadre.

Reality is reality after all, though.

Some people are born destined to fight their way out of the thorns of life.

Luo Ping'an's military dream was hit by reality.

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