What was discussed that day, Li Xianglu never asked for an answer, always saying it had nothing to do with her, but she vaguely felt it absolutely related to her.
However, thinking about it was pointless. Literacy classes would end before the New Year, and a small exam was to be taken; everyone had to pay 50 cents for the exam paper.
In mid-October, when Li Jianqing went to Jigu Commune, he still had two yuan left after buying notebooks and pencils. The exam fee was not even worth mentioning, he definitely paid it.
Li Xianglu was curious and asked, "Mom didn't take it away?"
Li Jianqing said with a chuckle: "Of course, she wanted to take it, but I didn't give it to her. I said it was all spent."
Li Xianglu looked at her third brother with a bit of amusement. With the exam approaching, she needed to make time to review with Li Jianqing. The junior high in the township would be recruiting new students next April, and Li Jianqing would be attending junior high. His current knowledge was insufficient; they needed to borrow some textbooks and give him extra lessons in math.
This year's Lunar New Year came early, just a few days after New Year's Day, and Guanzhong people placed great importance on the New Year.
On the twenty-third day of the twelfth lunar month, they worshiped The Kitchen God. Now it's a new society, those New Year's customs were feudal superstitions, not to be believed, and could not be performed openly. Hence, each family carefully, secretly placed offerings on the kitchen's stove, kept it simple and quickly cleared it away once done.
After the twenty-third, the New Year began. At that time, material conditions were poor, so don't even think about making fried meatballs or fried lotus root slices. Families in better situations would steam some yellow steamed buns, which meant mixing millet with some wheat flour to ferment, then stuffing them with red bean paste or brown sugar.
The golden buns were particularly fragrant and sweet, not something every family could afford. In Li Family Village, only a few households could afford them. This year, Li Erfu's house also steamed a pot, which was personally executed by Ge Sanmei.
Li Xianglu watched attentively; in her previous life, she had never tasted buns made from millet flour, especially the sweet aroma when they were steaming, wafting throughout the house, causing everyone's taste buds to salivate, swallowing involuntarily.
Li Jianqing was also curious about why they were steaming yellow buns this year, peering into the kitchen. An Cuicui, even more so, didn't leave the stove for a moment while holding her child.
A pot of yellow buns had twenty, each with a red date in the middle. Ge Sanmei made a special trip to her parent's home twenty miles away just to borrow twenty dates, not one more.
Once the yellow buns were steamed, with the unique fragrance of millet and the scent of red dates, the entire kitchen was filled with the fragrant steam. An Cuicui anxiously said, "Mom, why keep them all? Give me some, I'll feed a bit when it cools down. The child has been able to eat more recently and hasn't tried such good food yet."
By now, Li Xianglu and Li Jianqing were already standing outside the kitchen. Unexpectedly, they didn't hear any scolding. Soon they saw An Cuicui holding a bowl, hurrying towards her own cave dwelling, as if afraid someone would chase her and snatch her treasure.
Li Xianglu shook her head, ready to leave, when she heard Ge Sanmei say, "San'er, Xiang, come in. One for the two of you to share, each has some. The rest must be kept for gifting. Our home is poor, that's all there is." A rare explanation that surprised them both. Li Jianqing, being Ge Sanmei's biological son, immediately brightened up and went in, returning with an orange-yellow bun the size of an adult man's hand.
Ignoring the heat, he tore it into two pieces—one bigger, one smaller—and unhesitatingly handed the bigger piece to his younger sister, then quickly bit into the smaller half he held in his own hand.
Li Xianglu accepted it with a smiling face, and instead of eating it right away, she tore off half of it. At that moment, Li Erfu was sitting on the kang in the east cave, smoking. Seeing his daughter smiling and handing him the small half of the cornbread, he didn't refuse and took a bite. It was sweet and delicious. Seeing his children eating with such delight instantly lifted his spirits.
Lately, his wife had been treating their daughter much better, a situation that made this honest rural man Li Erfu very happy. He couldn't help but give her all of the few dollars he had secretly saved, but his wife's expression wasn't very good—probably because she was upset that he was hiding money from her.
On New Year's Eve, Li Erfu's family prepared dumplings filled with lamb and carrot, a custom in Northern Guanzhong where, no matter how hard times were, one must have a meal of dumplings.
In Northern Guanzhong, dumplings were typically made with white flour skin, yellow carrots, and lamb filling, shaped like ingots, so locals called eating dumplings "eating ingots," in the hope of attracting wealth and treasures.
During regular years, a tradition was to deliberately wrap coins inside the dumpling fillings to predict whether the year would be fortunate. If anyone bit into a dumpling with a copper coin, it meant they would have an open wealth door and great luck for the entire year.
Of course, there would also be some pure meat dumplings wrapped up; eating a dumpling filled entirely with meat meant a year of good flavors, with a bounty of food.
However, in these years, these customs had become old habits, part of the Four Olds, and couldn't be practiced anymore, or one would be labeled a bad element.
On New Year's Eve, Li Erfu's family also had lamb and carrot dumplings, but they had wrapped them and brought them over to Li Dafu's house to cook and eat together. In these tough times, people had to bring their own provisions even when visiting relatives, let alone celebrating the New Year. With a large family and many mouths to feed, hosting a meal at any home was unaffordable. It was better for everyone to bring their own food and enjoy the familial warmth together.
But this year, Liu Aidang was a bit gloomy. In previous years, to save on food, the amount of dumplings during the New Year celebration was always insufficient. The Li family had a tradition—no matter what, they would ensure the younger generation had a full meal during the New Year. So, out of irritation, she would have to secretly prepare more. Otherwise, with four men and three women—seven mouths to feed—in Li Erfu's house, how could those few dumplings be enough? If they didn't eat well, the mother-in-law would surely blame her, the eldest daughter-in-law, for not managing things well.
But this year was indeed strange. Li Erfu's family actually brought over at least thirty large dumplings per person. What's happening? Did Ge Sanmei really change her ways?
Liu Aidang didn't believe it. A cow brought to Beijing was still a cow, right? It couldn't possibly turn into a wolf, could it?
The extremely stingy and miserly Ge Sanmei suddenly becoming a generous and tolerant woman was utterly impossible, unless...?
Unless she was hiding something from everyone?
But recently there wasn't anything noteworthy at all.
The year 1974 had arrived. Lying on the warm kang, Li Xianglu listened to the deafening firecracker sounds from the production team, and her mood slightly improved. A time of change was upon them; she was also growing older, and the recent days had been quite pleasant. Could it be that before long, she would be able to take control of her own life independently?
Hopefully so.