Chapter 1 Life and Marriage in the 1980s This is a poor and relatively backward rural area. In the 1980s, some people lived in red brick and blue tile houses, while some people still lived in mud and thatched houses.

Chapter 1 Life and Marriage in the 1980s

This is a poor and relatively backward rural area. In the 1980s, some people lived in houses with red bricks and blue tiles, while some people still lived in mud houses with thatched roofs. .

People in the village don’t know what the outside world is like. The farthest place the older generation in the village has ever been is the farthest road they have walked with their feet. It is a road of escape because they have experienced famine, war, and have fled everywhere. , some people fled to this small village. Because their surname was Sun, the name of the village was Sunzhuang.

Let’s talk about young people. Many of them make a living by farming, basically one person per acre of land. When encountering drought or floods, life for farmers is particularly difficult. Many young people begin to go out to work, and most of them work with contractors as masons, which are now known as construction workers, and are now known as migrant workers.

Some of them have been to Xi'an, some to Tianjin, and some to Xinjiang. As soon as they returned to the village, they couldn't help but share their experiences on the road with others, telling them vividly, and everyone around them listened. Fascinated, you talked to each other, and it seemed that in this conversation, they seemed to have been there.

This is the most effective way for them to understand the outside world. At that time, none of the dozens of households in Sunzhuang had a TV.

In the autumn of 1987, Sun Jingtai, a 20-year-old poor young man from Sunzhuang, married Gao Yunling, a 23-year-old older woman from another village. The two villages are ten miles apart (one mile is equal to 500 meters).

The betrothal gifts included a sewing machine, a Phoenix brand beam bicycle (formerly an old-fashioned bicycle) and a watch. The man prepared these betrothal gifts on credit.

Gao Yunling came with her generous dowry. Her dowry caused quite a stir in the village.

's dowry included a vertical oscillating fan, a radio (with a recording function), a high and low cabinet, and a large wardrobe, which made many people envious. Especially the 14-inch Panda brand black and white TV, it is even more difficult to take your eyes away!

The whole village was involved in this wedding, not only to watch the bride and have a wedding ceremony, but more importantly, to see what the TV looked like. This TV was the only one in the village! You take a look, I take a look, I can't wait to touch it, and some can't help but stretch out their hands to fiddle with the buttons on it. As soon as they stretched out their hands, they were patted down by sharp-eyed people, and even received a sideways look: " Don't touch it blindly, don't get it damaged!" The person being photographed wasn't angry either. A few people with quick thoughts have already decided to watch TV tomorrow.

From then on, there will always be people coming over to watch TV, but due to high electricity bills, the time when the TV is turned on is very short.

But for Sunzhuang, this is a great event.

Sun Jingtai is 1.78 meters tall, with a square face, sharp edges, regular facial features, a well-proportioned figure, and handsome appearance. The two sisters above are married, and there is a brother below.

His younger brother is five years younger than him, and his second sister is five years older than him. Three mud rooms, with mud walls and wooden beams, covered with gray mud tiles.

As soon as you enter the door, you can see all the furnishings in the house. A wooden bed is placed against the corner; a square table, and a kerosene lamp on the table. Look, there is a stone under one of the table legs. The ground is black and yellow soil, which has been stepped on until it shines.

It was broad daylight, and the room was a little dark. If I looked carefully, I saw that there was not a single window on the back wall. Almost no house in this village has a window in the back wall. Because there are many thieves breaking into houses here, over time, people no longer open windows on the back wall, and some people even seal the windows.

Sun Jingtai's family is extremely poor.

Gao Yunling's family worked hard and lived a good life. She has two older brothers, three older sisters, and one younger brother. Her father and mother were good leaders. Her father was one of the earlier people to devote themselves to housing construction. Her mother could not read a word but opened a small shop.

Her father would often bring fish and meat home during the holidays. Every time he brought it, he would wrap it in bags secretly, for fear that others would see it.Because at that time, there were so few people who could eat meat, and they were afraid of being jealous. Sometimes they also bring something popular in town. At that time, a very popular fabric called "dí Queliang" was actually the current polyester fabric .

Gao Yunling is the first person in their village to wear clothes made of "Qingliang" fabrics, which makes her friends envious. When I arrived at school, there were many little girls around, asking questions, which was very strange. But it also made some girls jealous and would deliberately cause trouble for her.

But she is not afraid. She grew up in a good family, with loving parents and respectful brothers and sisters. She is optimistic and daring to work hard.

When the matchmaker asked Sun Jingtai and Gao Yunling to meet each other, Gao Yunling's father did not agree with the marriage. The young man's family background was on the one hand, and the most important thing was that the young man walked irregularly, with sloping shoulders. Looking at him crookedly, such a person may not be able to become a useful person.

Gao Yunling, who is already considered an older leftover woman, doesn’t think it’s a big problem. Being poor at home is not a problem. As long as men are willing to work hard and women take care of the housework, life will always get better and better.

Although Gao Yunling looks good, with a small face, a square face, and small eyes, they are shining. He is 1.6 meters tall, neither tall nor short, with a plump and well-proportioned body shape. If I hadn't been delayed by working at home, I could actually have found a well-matched family.

But at this time, her age could no longer wait. At that time, a 23-year-old woman was already considered an older leftover woman, and many women had basically given birth to children at this age. Some people get married at the age of 18, and those who get married later will definitely get married at the age of 20.

So after meeting Gao Yunling this time, he felt that Gao Yunling was not bad. In addition, the matchmaker kept talking to Sun Jingtai: "The ancients said, 'Female juniors, hold gold bricks.'" The two sisters also responded. My natal family followed suit. In the end Sun Jingtai agreed.

At that time, good-looking young men rarely married women who were older than themselves, not because their families were poor.

Just like that, this marriage is settled.

The next step was to talk about marriage, and Gao Yunling's family gave her a generous dowry. The Sun Jingtai family's betrothal gifts also had to be affordable, so Gao Yunling asked for three things. It didn't take long for them to get married.

After getting married, the whole family lived in a simple mud house. The house was dark and shabby, and smelled of decay.

The bride price prepared by Sun Jingtai's parents when they got married was 300 yuan owed to the merchant, and they had to repay the 300 yuan themselves. In the 1980s, a person in the village would be rich if he had only ten thousand yuan. Sun Jingtai worked everywhere with the contractor. He was a good worker and earned only 2 yuan a day.

Men go out to make money if they can, while women and children farm at home. When the farming is busy, the whole family, old and young, is busy in the fields, covered with stars and moon. During the off-season, Lala does household chores, sewing new clothes, arranging shoe soles, and knitting sweaters. The days are peaceful and quiet.

Chapter 2 The 21st century, life and marriage of the post-80s generation

"Dad, I have a girlfriend." Sun Jingtai's son Sun Haiyang told his father the news.

Sun Jingtai immediately sank and hesitated: "How long have you been dating this person? What should you prepare for marriage?"

Gao Yunling also asked: "You can ask clearly in advance, or tell the girl about our family's situation. If the girl's conditions are very high, we can't take it out and we can't delay the girl."

There is a young man in the village who wants to be good-looking and tall, but he is almost thirty and has not found a wife yet. I also went on many blind dates. The woman asked for a house in the city, which cost hundreds of thousands or nearly one million. How much money can she afford? Old farmers have been farming at home all their lives. When the economy developed, they went out to work as migrant workers. Nowadays, life is getting better and better, and the food and clothing are countless times better than before.

Many people have moved their old houses, built new ones, built courtyard walls, and some have installed air conditioners. Sun Jingtai's family also built a courtyard wall and two tile-roofed houses. The stove was knocked down and a gas stove was used. The well at home was also sealed and tap water was used.

However, marriage has become a big problem for those born in the 1980s.Buying a house and marrying a wife stumps many rural youths. There were more than 20 young men in the village, and they grabbed a lot of them, but there were still some left. On the one hand, the boys are not enterprising, and on the other hand, in rural areas where the economy is underdeveloped, the income of villagers is indeed limited.

It is difficult for boys in the village to get married, but there are no girls in the village who cannot get married. Even the somewhat silly daughter of the old man's family in the east of the village got married. Just this spring, the son-in-law's family paid for the old man's daughter to be married off. The mud and thatched house was renovated and two brick houses were built for him.

A family in the west of the village fell in love freely and then got married. After two years of marriage and one son, they got divorced due to family conflicts. After the woman left, she wandered around outside. After being introduced, she was said to have married into a good family. As for the man, he has not been able to find his wife again.

A family in the north of the village was introduced to get married and gave birth to a girl. The relationship between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law was very bad and they got divorced. The man found a new wife with a child. This was a reorganized family, and another child was born after they got married. Is it good to be a stepmother? Is it easy to be a stepfather? The most pitiful thing is that the first child has become a situation where the stepmother does not love and cares for his biological father, and only the grandparents care for him.

These are bloody facts. People of the older generation rarely get divorced, and the world of young people seems difficult to understand.

Sun Haiyang said: "You don't have to worry about this. This girl I talked about online is far away from our home. We have a good relationship. She didn't ask me for a house or a car. She said she just wanted to see her. "Fuck me."

My parents were naturally dubious.

"I think back then, it was difficult for very poor people to talk about their wives. Now that living conditions have improved so much, why is it still so difficult for them to talk about their wives?" Sun Jingtai smoked the cigarette in his hand. Looking at the cigarettes in my hand, a pack of cigarettes used to cost one or two yuan, but now the cheapest cigarettes cost seven or eight yuan, and they still have to be snatched up. Sun Jingtai looked at the cigarette in his hand and took a puff, followed by a long silence.

There was a family in the village who was discussing marriage, and they talked about the bride price. The woman said that if there is no house in the prefecture-level city, then buy a house in the county-level city. There should be no less than one piece of jewelry, and another 128,000 yuan in cash for the bride price. Calculating this would cost hundreds of thousands. The man gritted his teeth and agreed. After that came the hard years when the man had to raise money.

Sun Jingtai let out a long sigh when he heard about this.

Finally, Sun Haiyang is getting married. The free-love couple finally walked on the red carpet, paid tens of thousands in gifts, and lived in an old house. Because the woman's family had undergone tremendous changes and had become extremely difficult, she also had a younger brother, and the bride price was given to her younger brother.

The wedding was very lively. It had been a long time since the village had held a happy event to marry a wife. I heard that many people go to big hotels in the city to do it, and some people do it in restaurants in the town. Sun Jingtai and others wanted to hold a wedding ceremony in the village, so they invited people from the village to host it. There would be a master of ceremonies, a "band", someone who played suona, someone who played yu, someone who beat gongs, someone who played drums, and some who sang. Dancing. All in all, it was lively.

The days after marriage were peaceful. Sun Haiyang went out to work and his wife lived in her hometown.

Today, Sun Haiyang is the father of two children. The number of unmarried young people in the village has not decreased, and some are already in their thirties.

Those born in the 1980s have witnessed thirty years of rapid economic development. When I was a child, I saw one-cent coins, bought a box of matches with five cents, touched fish in the river with bare feet, killed pigs and sold meat during the New Year in the village, and chickens, ducks and geese ran rampant in the village. I also realized the bitterness and suffering of working in the city, worried about my children's education, afraid of getting sick, and overwhelmed by the high housing prices. However, we still have to move forward because we have to live.

Life is endless and struggle is endless.

After working for so many years, it is rare to go home once a year. Most of the people working in the fields are still the same people who were in their 20s or 30s, but some of them are already stooped, and some are already gray-haired. In the fields, there are also the sounds of children playing. Most young people go out to work and make money. In their eyes, they can make more money by working in the city than by working hard in the fields. The more money they make, the more they can save and support their families.Those who have not found a partner hope to try their luck in the factory. How many young people know how to farm?

Today’s villages are old, small, and lack vitality. As this generation of farmers ages, will the land still be able to produce heavy rice and full-grained wheat as before?