"Hello dear passengers! It's been a hard trip! The train is accompanied by singing and laughing, and our journey is coming to an end, this train departs from Guiyang Station, and after 29 hours of travel, it will arrive at the final station, Shanghai South Railway Station. Passengers, when you are about to leave this train and part ways with us, on behalf of all the train staff, I would like to thank you for your support and assistance in our work. At the same time, I also hope to take our train again on the next trip, and may we meet again! The sweet voice of the conductor sounded in the train, and the faint people woke up from the silence of the night, and in the early hours of the morning, speaking the dialect of the north and south of the river, began to pack their luggage and prepare to get off the train.

I looked out the window as the train moved slowly, dozens of tracks staggered and vanished into the plain sky. At four or five o'clock in the morning, the sun was already rising like a fireball, and the golden rays of sunlight passed through the endless plain space of Shanghai, forming a Tyndall effect, which made me know that my journey would also reach the end.

The people in the train carried large bags of luggage, dragged huge suitcases with difficulty, crowded in the aisles of the carriages, and crowded at the junction of the carriages. I only have a backpack with a few changes of clothes and documents, and only a power bank and a few packs of cigarettes. This trip was not for the purpose of pleasure, but for an appointment, and this appointment did not allow me to have leisure and elegance.

Shanghai South Railway Station is very large, and it is a huge building that is almost circular, and I have always had a very poor sense of direction, and I followed the crowd in the station in a daze, and I didn't know what to do. The mobile phone vibrated in the bag, and I took out my mobile phone and a message came into view: "Xiao Chen, I'm waiting for you at the southeast exit." It was Robben who sent the message. I was going to find Robben by myself, but Robben said that he was afraid that I would come to the big city like a headless fly to meet a wall, so he simply arrived in Shanghai from Zhejiang to pick me up. Watching the gentle screen of my phone fluoresce with information, I feel a sense of relief and satisfaction. I thought of the vicissitudes of life but the gentle and down-and-out painter who used to be in Cafe 31.

Roughly calculated, Robben and I haven't seen each other for nearly two years, and in the two years we haven't seen each other, the only intersection between Robben and I is to leave comments under our respective circle of friends. Knowing that Robben transferred the No. 31 café in Yuzhi Ancient Town, Guizhou, knowing that Robben's parents finally forgave Robben, their family was happy, and also knew that Robben came to Xitang Ancient Town in Jiashan, Zhejiang Province to open an inn. Now Robben's life is not distempered but it feels real, and in the big world full of fireworks, it is no longer like a dream like a rain stop in an ancient town.

"Big Brother Robben!" Across the crowd, I saw a familiar man standing next to the trash can at the exit of the station, blurting out reflexively. The man looked up at me, grinned, extinguished the cigarette butt, threw it in the trash, and walked towards me.

"Xiao Chen?" Robben asked tentatively.

"Alas, I can't imagine it, Brother Robben, you forgot me like this, you can't recognize me as a stupid person like 1.7 meters!" I deliberately pretended to be pitiful and asked rhetorically.

"Hahaha, you kid, in addition to your height, you are still so short, and your hair has also become longer, you used to be as fat as O'Neill, but now you are thin like this, of course I can't recognize it." Robben patted me on the shoulder as he walked, "Yes, yes, I'm getting stronger." ”

I looked at Robben, still with his long hair tied back in a haphazard manner, his angular face, and his sparse and messy green beard, this man still exuded a faint melancholy temperament in art as before. I took out the cigarette from my bag, and it was still a yellow fruit tree in Guizhou. Robben took the cigarette and lit it, taking a deep breath, like an addict lying in bed in the Qing Dynasty. "Ah, that's good, I haven't smoked an authentic yellow fruit tree for two years. Even the air smells of memories. Robben spat out the smoke ring, looked at the burning yellow fruit tree and said affectionately, his eyes like looking at the woman he had just turned over and the rain lingering.

"Let's go, go and sit on the chair in front, the Jinshan Railway won't start operating until half past five."

"Okay." Robben and I smoked cigarettes and walked through the crowd of people entering and exiting the station and sat on chairs outside the station.

"Brother Robben, are you still drawing?"

"Occasionally, I can't sell it for money, and I can't make money painting as a hobby. Let's live, we still have to put firewood, rice, oil, salt, sauce, vinegar and tea in the first place. As for adult life, half reality, half dream. Half of them are crumbling and falling, crawling into the abyss, and half of them are desperately healing themselves, yearning for the sun. Robben smoked a cigarette and looked across the street at the hotel that was already preparing for the hot work.

"Alas, sure enough, what I said on the Internet is quite right, I sold my ideals in exchange for firewood, rice, oil and salt." I pretended to be sad and sad.

"Sometimes the way, people, you have to live, even if it's not for yourself, you have to be for your family, if it weren't for the pack of cigarettes, I wouldn't even bother to use an umbrella when it rains, if it wasn't for my family, I wouldn't even feel in trouble to live." Robben stretched out his fingers holding the cigarette like a street lamp, and the light of the street lamp penetrated through his fingers into his pupils. In that moment of light, I felt a slight pity: these hands were originally holding the paintbrush, creating beauty.

"Brother Robben, why do you say that firewood, rice, oil, salt, sauce, vinegar and tea are the only ones in the first place?" I am indeed puzzled, firewood, rice, oil, salt, sauce and vinegar tea, people take food as the sky, firewood, rice, oil, salt, ginger and vinegar tea should be the first in rice, why is it the first in firewood?

Robben was obviously also stumped by this question, he had no words, he smoked one after another, the smoke slowly rose into the air and diluted the air, dissipated, and then he said word by word: "Song Wu Zimu's "Dream Lianglu Fish Shop" said: "Cover people every day, firewood, rice, oil, salt, sauce, vinegar and tea." "And firewood, rice, oil, salt, sauce, vinegar, tea, the reason why firewood ranks first is to tell us that a good life needs a material foundation. Firewood represents pyrotechnics, just imagine, will a family without pyrotechnics be a complete family? Those who are in a cold pot every day are either single dogs or lonely old people, and these do not belong to the category of complete families. Having firewood means that you have a home and need to cook. It's like people nowadays don't ask you if you have a house, but ask if you have a parking space. Only those who have a house will consider parking spaces, and only those who have a home to cook need firewood. Firewood is the minimum guarantee of a family's material foundation, and having firewood means that the family has basic food security. Rice, oil and salt maintain the basic life, sauce and vinegar give life a spice, and tea is the beginning to enjoy life, so firewood is the first, and tea is last. ”

"Brother Robben, listening to your words is like an enlightenment, and the mouth is suddenly opened. The best taste in the world is Qinghuan, and the most beautiful thing is fireworks! In the plain but real life, there is the most beautiful hope in the world. For example, the noisy streets and alleys, the soy milk fritters in the shops downstairs, or the bustling vegetable markets in the south and north of the city, one after another through our lives reappear in front of us, this is the breath of fireworks. "I was talking eloquently, full of pride.

"Mmmm, yes, yes, yes, the children can be taught." Robben laughed, threw the cigarette butt in his hand to the ground, and then ravaged it with his toes until the cigarette went out and the filter rotted into cotton wool. "Let's go, the Jinshan Railway is about to open, let's go buy tickets."

After a few dozen minutes of driving, I quickly fell asleep in my seat due to the exhaustion of the train journey. Later, Robben woke me up, and I numbly followed Robben out of Jinshanwei Station, and the sun shone on the earth, and I bathed in it as if I was reborn.

followed Robben out of the station to a nearby breakfast shop, and the two dealt with the general situation. Robben went to a nearby parking lot and drove a tattered Volkswagen. I stood at the intersection, surprised that Robben had only been back in Zhejiang for two years but had already bought a car, Robben rolled down the window and shouted to me: "Don't look, get in the car, second-hand." When I got into the car, I found that the car was indeed tattered and shivering, and the interior could only be described as simple, like a patient with soap epilepsy, Robben started the car, and the engine roared like a lung disease old cow wheezing. The car is like a leaf, entering the sea of cars in a moment, along the Xinwei Expressway, Tingfeng Expressway towards Jiashan.

After arriving in Jiashan, Robben returned all the way back to Xitang Ancient Town, his inn. The quaint streets, the timeless wooden houses, the simple and quiet town, the green trees in the inn courtyard, and the gurgling river flowing in front of the door and beside the courtyard. "Castle in the Sky", that's the name of Robben's Inn. "Ye Wei hasn't arrived yet, it should be in the afternoon, you go to the inn to rest first." Robben shouted towards the inn as he spoke: "Shen Yan'er, arrange a room for my little brother to live in!" "I know, it's been arranged a long time ago!" There was a sweet woman's echo in the inn, and it was a pure girl who did not fall into the ordinary, I saw her phoenix eyes with spring, long eyebrows into the temples, and a smile at the corner of her mouth, about twenty-four or five years old, wearing a white printed dress. I sighed: Sure enough, the women in Jiangnan are all small jasper, gentle and amiable.

After saying hello shyly, he followed Shen Yan'er to the room on the second floor of the inn, the room was clean and tidy, the quilt was neatly spread on the bed, the room as a whole revealed an antique and graceful atmosphere, there were a few paintings framed on the wall, which was the real handiwork of Robben, and after a few rough glances, I fell on the bed and fell asleep.

It wasn't until the afternoon that I recovered from my exhaustion, and the laughter of tourists came from outside the window, so I simply went downstairs, and Shen Yan'er was introducing the rooms of the inn to several tourists at the front desk. Then the passengers will be familiar with the road to check in. Several travelers nodded in satisfaction and walked to the second floor with smiles on their faces.

"Sister, what about Big Brother Robben? Why isn't he there? ”

"Your big brother Robben, you know every day to be a hands-off shopkeeper." Shen Yan'er smiled and pretended to complain. But he couldn't hide his joy in his eyes. I know that the relationship between Shen Yan'er's sister in front of me and Robben is definitely not ordinary.

"That's it, my big brother Robben is free by nature, Sister Yan'er, you have to take good care of him." I deliberately raised my voice like a duckling and roared.

"Hahahaha, you and Robben are the same, you are not on the right track, your eldest brother Robben went to pick up Ye Wei, you may have to come back later, come to Xitang for the first time, you can go around, and we will eat when Roben Yewei comes back." Shen Yan'er laughed, and her voice was as straight as a wind chime.

Xitang in the evening is lively, the current Xitang ancient town still preserves a very complete ancient buildings of the Ming and Qing dynasties, especially the corridor and the long lane can be called "double unique", it is rare to see in many ancient water towns in the south of the Yangtze River, and at the same time it is full of the unique civilian culture and architectural culture of the ancient town of the water town, so the ancient town of Xitang is called "the living millennium ancient town". Therefore, many tourists come to travel every day, and the promenade is crowded with people, and many people are taking photos on each bridge. Walking through the ancient streets, shuttling through the small shops with different characteristics, here, I met a prosperous merchant and distinctive Xitang, which is different from the original Yuzhu Ancient Town. After the ancient street, you will come to the bridge wharf, the evening afterglow is evenly sprinkled on the water, the sorrow of the ancient town, just like the blue-black bricks and stones under the feet of pedestrians come through hundreds of millions of years of moaning, just like the history of the lush thousand-year-old tree rings, just like the Jiangnan water town, the unique and slow charm of the Jiangnan boat. There are no mountains in Zhejiang, and the sunset is in Hangzhou Bay. The warm afterglow is like a gentle firelight, and the laughter of wind chimes and the freedom of catkins in the wind are mixed with the shouts of the residents of the ancient town, like a peaceful peach blossom source. The sad mood of "the sunset is infinitely good, but it's just near dusk" arises spontaneously, which makes me understand that I am getting closer and closer to what Ye Wei is about to bring. At the moment, I am confused, because I don't know what kind of mentality to face in the end.