Remember the wheat harvest at Mango Festival.

The scorching wind blows the smell of wheat harvest, and the dust raised is mixed with the smell of new wheat.

Open the calendar, tomorrow is the awning, which means the maturity of awning crops. The experience of the ancients is simple and scientific, and the formulation of solar terms is closely related to farming.

When I see the word "mans", I feel constrained and uncomfortable. Plus the process of wheat harvest, the impression is not very good. The wheat awn is very sharp, so there is a saying that "the tip of the needle is against the wheat awn". Not only sharp, but also hard, barbed, stuck in clothes can not be pulled out, not to mention flesh. I'm afraid all the children who grew up in the countryside have never suffered like this.

Our crops are divided into two seasons: wheat harvest and autumn harvest. As the saying goes, "competing for wheat for autumn" means that time is tight and tasks are heavy, just like fighting. You see, in the morning, some green wheat was blown by the "burning wind" at noon, and it dried up from root to tip. When I was a child, there were no harvesters, but they were all harvested manually. A few days in advance, every household grinds a sickle. Get up at dawn in the morning, and the family will go out while it is cold. Adults often stand on the ground and smoke a bag of cigarettes, then take a deep breath and bend down in unison. The sickle swings out a few pieces of wheat and falls. No one spoke, only heard "click" sickle and "wheezing" gasps. Occasionally, someone stands up and watches, and then bends down. Ridge after ridge, a long strip of wheat fell, and the sun shrugged and climbed up. Children can't be idle when the wheat is harvested. They will take a week's "wheat leave" to work in the fields with adults. I began to learn to cut wheat in the third and fourth grades of primary school. I can't cut any more, so I have to pick up the scattered ears of wheat after adults load them. "Grain returning to warehouse" is the simple wish of farmers. Yes, how can you waste half a year's hard work and the hope of family life?

Picking ears of wheat is a test of children's patience. After a long walk, we should pick up the long, short, full and dry ones scattered in the wheat stubble. Children play with their hearts. They walk in pursuit of a grasshopper. If they leave ears of wheat, they will be scolded by adults. The sun overhead is getting bigger and bigger, the earth's atmosphere is getting hotter and hotter, the dust raised by the wheat is choking on the nose, and the adults are nagging, and their hearts are full of grievances. Nowadays, I seldom watch the new TV series or literary works about rural themes, which are untrue and melodramatic-the shiny "old farmer" looks happy at the ripe wheat, and the children chase and play in the fields-at least not what I see. As far as I can remember, children rarely fight when they are busy with farming, because adults often turn tired and anxious emotions into resentment against children. The labor intensity is large and concentrated, and they are very tired; They are also very anxious: when will Dongpo be closed and when will the west slope be closed; Anxious about when the wheat piled in the ground can thresh; If it doesn't rain in a hurry, the wheat must be dried quickly and covered as soon as the weather changes; Anxiety never rains, and corn can't be planted in dry wheat fields; I'm also worried about harvesting wheat and paying public grain. I don't know what the standard and market are this year. ...

Fatigue and anxiety made Hua Song lose his temper with his children. At that time, children's crying and adults' scolding were often heard in the fields.

Wheat is transported from the field to the threshing floor, piled into a hill and queued for threshing. At that time, a production team was a threshing machine, which growled day and night, swallowed whole bundles of wheat with its big mouth open, and sprayed wheat straw and bran from another exit. Wheat grains leaked from the bottom, which would block the exit if they were not removed in time. Children are generally the main force in picking wheat grains. They use dustpans to shuttle back and forth from the grain outlet to the open space without stopping. Beating wheat requires more people, usually more than two companies to cooperate, which means a protracted war. In the dark night, the oversized light bulb on the telephone pole in the middle of the threshing floor cast a yellow light, attracting swarms of moths and mosquitoes to fly back and forth. No one spoke, the roar of the threshing machine was enough to devour all the conversations, and everyone was doing mechanical movements, continuing, picking, picking, walking and running. The dust stuck to the straw was released and flew everywhere, sticking to all the naked sweaty skin, and the clothes covered the skin. The chaff and awn are the lightest, flying around and falling on the head, neck and meat. Beating wheat often hits midnight, and the roar suddenly stops, and the head is still buzzing. Relaxed adults and children can fall asleep by leaning on straws. The fans quickly packed their things, leaving one person to watch the game, and the others went home to sleep, and continued to mow the fields at dawn.

Therefore, it takes no more than ten days to concentrate on high-intensity work, and fatigue is written on everyone's face. Although large-scale combine harvesters have been popularized in recent years, which has greatly liberated the labor force, they can hear their fatigue when they call their relatives in their hometown every year during the wheat harvest season. The last time I attended the wheat harvest was after the college entrance examination. I can't remember the details. I only remember the big sun, the flying dust, the wheat awn stuck in the meat everywhere, and my parents' locked brows and heavy sighs. I went to college, worked, left the land where I was born, and had no time to go back and help with the wheat harvest. At most, I went back symbolically to "express my condolences" to my relatives, and they no longer let me go to the fields, so I took a quick look and came back.

When I was a child, perhaps when I put down the wheat with a sickle in the sun, or when I tore off the wheat awn tied to my clothes with bare arms, I made up my mind to "go out and get rid of this land." To this day, I still have no regrets.

Just after Xiaoman this year, I took my children back to my hometown. The wheat is just full and green. I pinched a handful of ears of wheat and brought them back. I baked them on the fire and handed them to him. Inadvertently, a wheat awn stuck into my finger, so I had to pick it out with a needle, bloody. It really hurts!

(Image from the Internet)