There is an old well outside the gate of my hometown. No one can tell how old it is. When I was a child, when no adults were blocking me, I secretly held the shaft of the pulley and and looked inside: the walls of the well had peeled off and became very wide, so wide that our dustpan could be laid down flatly.
There is an ancient Sophora japonica tree next to the well. The roots of the tree grow intricately around the wellhead. The several layers of stones built at the wellhead sit right on the roots of the tree. If you look down, you will only see a small speck of light the size of a mirror under the black hole, which is probably the water surface, and nothing else can be seen...
According to the legend of the elders, this well was drilled on a prosperous water eye.
There are more people taking advantage of the water, so the cowhide manhole ropes have to be replaced more frequently. The water was consumed from generation to generation, and the well ropes were replaced one by one. When it came to us, even the iron grooves at the bottom to which the buckets were attached were polished until they were slender... As a result, I often worried about this and had unfounded thoughts: Maybe one day, one of the iron grooves would break... I dare not continue to think about it. However, although the iron cave song will not break, buckets falling into the well do often happen. But that was probably because the novice did not know how to properly use the "boring gourd" that buckles the barrel; or the wooden barrel (the only way to fetch water at that time was wooden barrels) was too heavy and could not hold it when it reached the wellhead, so the "wild windlass" was released.
Often, people find that there are fewer buckets available at home, and there must be more buckets accumulated in the well. At this time, people started to get involved in fishing buckets.
The candidates for the job are readily available and have been the same for as long as I can remember. That is none other than my father.
My father is of medium build. Although he is not tall, he has a good body with strong muscles and bones due to his hard work throughout his life. He knew a little bit about writing when he was young, but because my grandmother passed away early, he started to take care of the housework very early. In the end, he only ended up with a fair and strong hand of block letters calligraphy. He usually doesn't speak much but often contains wisdom and courage. His dexterity and vigor are evident in his daily boring farm work.
The next step is to prepare supplies. You need to prepare two pairs of well ropes, one for tying people and one for tying buckets. A long bamboo pole is tied under the well rope to tie the bucket, and the iron hook for hanging meat in the "killing house" is fixed on the head of the bamboo pole. Then, take two long ladders, tie them together, and fix them at the lowest end of the rope that fastens the man to the well. My father told me that due to the long time of drawing water, the water surface at the bottom of the well collapsed more and more, just like a big splashing pool, and the lower end of the well wall was brushed with water to create a deep "edge". The lower part of a ladder cannot reach the bottom of the water, and the upper part cannot reach the well arm above the "inverted edge"...
Everything is ready, and father begins to appear. I saw him, wearing single clothes, without any protective equipment on his head, holding the well rope in his hands full of veins, sitting skillfully on the mallet tied to the well rope, and then crossed his legs together. The moment he took off, his whole body began to spin rapidly along with the well rope. Then, this "rotating" figure disappeared from people's sight.
The idle people in Yuan were sitting on the rocks. At this moment, one by one they lit up the dry tobacco bags pots, and started to puff out their croaks as the fragrant smell of smoke lingered around. It seems that the matter of fishing for the bucket and the people underground have nothing to do with them. One bag of cigarettes, two bags of cigarettes... After a while, my father sent a message down the well. The people above immediately took action, quickly put on another pair of windlass, and quickly winched the caught bucket upwards... This scene made me feel fresh and interesting, but it was a pity that the time interval between two bucket fishing was too long, and it often took a long time to see it again. Ever since, I secretly cursed the bucket to fall faster and faster. Although we cannot directly participate in it, we can often share the joy of success.
This job looks very simple, but it is actually very complicated.Not to mention how unbearable it was to stand on the ladder support for a long time while fishing for the bucket, with bare feet soaked in the cold well water. Not to mention the loneliness and loneliness of being unable to see anything in the dark surroundings at the bottom of the well... But is there a lack of oxygen at the bottom of the well? Are there any pests such as venomous snakes on the walls of the well? It requires a lot of courage and carefulness. The most terrible thing is that from time to time, some clods of soil will naturally fall off the well wall, and if you are not careful, it will hit you squarely.
Buckets fall in various ways, and the postures of sinking to the bottom of the water are also different: some are lying horizontally, some are inserted diagonally, and some are upside down... Therefore, the iron hook often touches it with a "bang bang", but it is difficult to hook it firmly. It often requires experience and patience, and sometimes it is necessary to use a mirror to refract the sunlight into the well to slowly "fish" it out. And this task of looking in the mirror is probably only suitable for older children.
In this way, a long time passed, and the windlass dragged the well rope up and down again and again, and the buckets that were fished out stood in a large area beside the well. Most of these buckets are in good condition, but some have broken beams, missing bucket boards, and missing bucket bottoms...
The buckets that have just been fished out often still have some mud hanging on the bottom and arms of the buckets. The color of their bodies is a bit dark, and the surface seems to be covered with a thin layer of gray-brown veil... After all, they spent a period of darkness underwater. Every time we caught one, we crowded forward to have a look. All we cared about was whether we could find a few lively little shrimps in the bucket of water. The "buckets" just stood there silently, as if they were a group of children who had done something wrong and had been lost for many days. Each of them had a lot of unspeakable grievances hidden in their hearts, and they were eagerly waiting for their families to come and take them home.
It’s time for the villagers to eat. The drama of fishing for buckets is gradually coming to an end. Finally, the man squatting by the well slowly raised his father from the well to the outside. My father stood up and simply patted the soil on his body. His body seemed particularly relaxed. Immediately afterwards, he pointed to the piece of bucket and said: Look who belongs to it, take it back quickly. So, the Zhang family's daughter-in-law, the Li family's aunt... walked to the bucket one by one, recognized their own buckets, and without even saying a word of thanks, picked up and walked away.
The father stood there, waiting for the last one to be claimed, and then he rubbed his hands, with a smile that was very difficult to detect at the corner of his mouth: and this was the entire and only highest spiritual and material reward he received after each labor!
About the author: Shanzi, born in 1950, Luoning County , with a college degree, had a military career and served as squad leader, platoon leader, and political instructor. After changing careers, he served as deputy township head and deputy director of the county CPPCC Office. He loves literature. In 1996, he began to publish prose, poetry and novels in magazines and newspapers.
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