"I want to iron each wrinkle the width of the same
Let you be by the lake, or on the lawn, waiting for the wind to blow
You can also run, but you must let the skirt float
with a curve, like a flower"
- Excerpted from Wu Xia's poem "Suspension Skirt"
Wu Xia, a worker poet born in the 1980s, went south to Shenzhen to work at the age of 14. The high-intensity workshop work and the lack of freedom of work system once made her lose her belief in life.
In order to relieve the boring and depressing life, Wu Xia began to write poetry through all the gaps in her labor, and she put all her depression and yearning in poetry. There is no pain or resentment. The beauty in the heart is typing into words and converging into poetry, giving others and yourself hope and dreams.
Since 2001, Wu Xia’s works have been published one after another, and she has participated in the filming of the documentary “My Psalm”. She has been a guest of “ Lu Yu’s About ” and has also appeared on the CCTV stage.
However, these glosses did not really change her life situation. She was still crowded with her parents and her family in a simple rental house, and was worried about the rent that would increase again.
This book "My Sling" published by Hualing Publishing House records the entire experience of Wu Xia's family working in Shenzhen. The words are simple and plain, and the emotions are sincere. The language does not mention pain, but it makes readers feel full of love for her.
Life weighs a thousand pounds, and the skirt is flying
Wu Xia is a girl who loves beauty. She has loved taking photos since she was a child and wears beautiful skirts. Once, when I visited my aunt's house in the city, I was envious when I saw the buildings and decided to become a city-like person and live in a building in the future. After I came back, I wrote down 27 dreams on paper in one breath.
Because of a TV series " Foreign Girl ", Wu Xia was very disgusted with working, but she still dropped out of school when she was in junior high school. Since ancient times, there are only two ways to enter the city. One is to study and the other is to work. You can only choose one of two. Before Wu Xia could react, she was hurriedly arranged to enter the Songgao Garment Factory where her mother was.
The work in the factory is not easy, and it takes more than ten hours a day from morning to night. Wu Xia was only 14 years old at the time, she was thin and short, and even used someone else's ID card. So in those years, she could only support someone else's name Yu Zhenlian.
However, such a work is not only sad, but also grievance.
Once Wu Xia was brushing her teeth in the corridor, and was fined 200 yuan by the guard to capture the label. Although her mother was angry, she could only persuade her to endure it. From then on, Wu Xia was full of disgust with this factory and wanted to escape immediately.
"I feel like I am like a flower and plant in the crack of the rock. Even if a stone presses on me, I will push it away stubbornly. I will hold my head up and grow towards the sun."
The heavy work, the suffocating system, and the desire for a better life have all melted into words and flowing in Wu Xia's pen. She uses all her time to write. For her, that was venting, and even more hope.
For life, Wu Xia has worked hard as a clerk, a front desk, a warehouse manager, and a manuscript. Although repeated rejections have hit her a big blow, she has never retreated and has been writing for more than ten years. At this time, the words were no longer just a means of making a living, but also became a witness to her life and her closest friend.
Wu Xia would still run to the bathroom alone in a suspender skirt when it was late at night, looking at herself from the reflective glass in the window, showing a satisfied smile. Who doesn’t love beauty?
A heavy marriage, a busy family
2000, my sister also dropped out of school and went to work, and Wu Xia felt very sad. She has deeply understood the hardships of the past few years. She hopes that her sister can study hard and no longer suffer the hardships she has suffered. However, everything was a foregone conclusion and she was unable to change it at all.
My sister has musical cells and good singing. She will participate in singing competitions. She has won rankings and won prizes. Her dream is to become a singer, but her dream seems to be even more out of reach than becoming a writer.After my sister got married and had children, she sang only as a memory and a pastime. The existence of dreams seemed to be for shattering.
"A good marriage makes women more and more beautiful like flowers, and a bad marriage makes women gradually wither like flowers."
In 2011, Wu Xia and her boyfriend returned to his hometown with their boyfriend to re-issue the marriage certificate for the sake of their upcoming child. During the days when she gave birth to a child at her mother-in-law's house, she was full of disappointment in her marriage. I have always fantasized that my partner can share the burden on me and get warmth and considerate, but all I can wait for is the disregard of my husband's gambling and ignore the family.
After giving birth, Wu Xia returned to Shenzhen to continue working with her parents. She didn't want to go back to her mother-in-law's house during the Chinese New Year, but her husband forced her eldest daughter back. Wu Xia had no choice but to go back, and her parents rushed over with her youngest daughter.
Later, her husband cheated on him and Wu Xia proposed to divorce. Her husband refused to hand over the custody of his eldest daughter, and even punched Wu Xia. After Wu Xia's repeated insistence, she finally got rid of this marriage, but due to her lack of financial strength, the custody of her eldest daughter still belonged to her ex-husband.
Since Wu Xia’s family came to Shenzhen to work, Shenzhen has become a hometown, and its hometown seems to have become a foreign land. is the reason why he is unwilling to go back, and the feeling of powerlessness of not having the means to make a living when he goes back.
So Wu Xia took her daughter and parents to rent a house in Shenzhen, first to save money and share the rent with her colleagues. But everyone had their own worries and kept quarreling. Later, my sister and her family also came to Shenzhen, and then the whole family rented a house and lived together.
During that time, Wu Xia started a stall business with her parents and sister, and was cheated, bullied, and robbed. She struggled for a long time but didn't make much money. After the small business ended in failure, the whole family had no choice but to start working in the factory again.
Unfortunately, it always seems to linger on the heads of suffering people. But no matter what, as long as the family is together, flowers can bloom in the humble dust and shine with the glimmer of fate.
Work hard for the house, and working is still in progress
Since she was a child, the idea of owning her own house has emerged in her heart. Since then, she has been working hard for the house, but has been spending time renting and moving.
After working for two years, Wu Xia began to think of being a writer. In order to create conditions, she tried hard to get into trouble, and her mother finally agreed to rent a house outside. At first it was a single room of the school. After the school did not rent it, it moved to Cuijing Garden Community. This is an old-fashioned community, also known as the "migrant worker community".
Wu Xia joked that there was no flower in Cuijing Garden. She was a migrant worker and the community she lived in was also called a migrant worker community. It seems that this label is already tightly attached to myself and grows into my body and cannot be removed no matter how hard it is.
In order to share the rent, this spacious two-bedroom and one living room was filled with tenants, and even the kitchen was occupied. That's not all. In order to order water and electricity bills, tenants have been quarrels and gangs, and open and secret struggles have been staged one after another, which has exhausted the whole family.
At this time, Wu Xia’s idea of owning a separate house was particularly strong. But the missed opportunities and the sky-high price houses that were speculated can only be considered, and even the rising rents are almost unbearable.
Wu Xia said in the book:
"The home I imagined has a clean living room, a snow-white kitchen and bathroom, a spacious bedroom, a soft Simmons bed, a clear window and a beige floor-to-ceiling curtains. There, I was free and free, and I had no quarrels, tears and worries anymore."
Later, the farmers' houses in Shenzhen were renovating apartments, and it was Cuijing Garden's turn. Although I was full of fear of moving, I still had to find a house again. After many twists and turns, Wu Xia and his family reluctantly rented a single-family building with a yard. In order to save some moving fees, my mother moved little by little like ant . After some trouble, the family finally had a place to live.
With the development of the times, Shenzhen, as the forefront of reform, has undergone earth-shaking changes. Most of the factories that were once everywhere have disappeared. With the popularity of artificial intelligence , the vast crowd of workers disappeared.
As the second generation of migrant workers, Wu Xia devoted her entire youth and dreams here, and tried all her strength, but in the end she was unable to take root here.
Faced with Shenzhen now, people without education can only go to shopping malls, restaurants, and supermarkets to do the lowest work. Although I am tired of working, where can I go if I don’t stay? The only way is to go back to his hometown. Thinking of this, Wu Xia couldn't tell what it felt.
is written at the end:
Close this book and I feel very lucky. Although life may not be very good, it is not that bad either.
Wu Xia comes from the bottom of life. She exchanges the heaviest labor for meager wages and is sincere and kind, but she is discriminated against and looked down upon. However, she was wearing a suspender skirt in the deserted desert with her head held high, and her skirt fluttered in the wind, full of vitality.
Work is not divided into high or low, and the soul is not high or low. Even if you are in the soil and sandwiched between the cracks of the rocks, as long as you live hard, the blue sky above your head also belongs to you.
Because the prosperity of life is the most beautiful scenery in the world.
