It's important to be sophisticated, and that's something I felt with my grandmother when I was a kid, but I never did it well, and my father, brother, and I were the same.
When I was a child, people were sophisticated, mainly because of the contacts between relatives, and there were not many neighbors and production teams, not that there were no contacts or few contacts, but that there were not many people who ran errands at that time, and there were few people who needed to come and go.
Grandmother is in charge of this part, and she is the "head" of the family, which shows the importance of this matter. The "come" in the big exchanges, that is, to receive gifts, grandmother has let people write down in a book, when she finds out the book, let people read it, and then she decides how to return the gift to others.
For the rest, grandmother kept it in her head. Grandmother has a good memory about this. She remembered the birthdays of the elderly and adults among her relatives. At the same time, she has sharp ears and pays attention to inquire about the situation of her relatives at any time, who is pregnant and about to give birth, and who is sick. If you are going to give birth to a child in confinement, of course, you have to prepare nutritious eggs for gifts in advance, and relatives should visit in time when they are sick.
Grandmother did this very carefully, yes!
When my father took over this piece, he carried out "expansion". My grandmother was still there, but she was bedridden, and she gave it to my father, who would ask for her advice and discuss it with her.
The three brothers in the courtyard are very strong and snobbish. He has a younger sister who is married to a young man who replaces his father in the supply and marketing cooperative. This man's home is in another village in our township. Later, his father celebrated his 60th birthday, and my family also went. My father asked my uncle to take the things, and the family sent me as a representative to go with the uncle's family. My father and grandmother's decision may have been out of consideration for building a good relationship, but people still didn't appreciate it and didn't buy it, and later, they intensified their bullying of our weak family. Uncle's sister-in-law, who got married, came back to help them bully us, and this brother-in-law of the uncle also spared no effort, running faster than anyone else and jumping higher than anyone else.
After the death of the eldest father, the eldest aunt found a stepfather for several cousins. Their stepfather had a daughter, who was married at the time, and had two children under the age of 10. If there is anything going on at her house, our family will go too. This new cousin and cousin-in-law don't have many hearts, they are not bad, and they don't talk much honestly, but their stepfather is not simple, and they have many eyes! He rarely speaks, and he doesn't have a big ups and downs and exaggerated expression on his face, but he does things quietly and unconsciously, and the intensification of the conflict between his cousin and our family is what he instigates behind his back. Later, after we reconciled with my cousin, my cousin told the truth that his stepfather was afraid that our two families would be fine, and my father would provoke my cousin and his relationship and make my cousin treat him badly. Therefore, he took the lead and spoiled the relationship between the two families first.
I put my hopes in others, but they all came to naught. The father's actions made people feel sad and speechless, leaving behind a painful lesson.
However, there is no time to sum up and learn this lesson, and we repeat the mistakes of the past. This time, it was the brother who fell hard.
The brother inherited this aspect of his father's affection. He is a non-landing "walking relative". There was even one time when he had a brother-in-law's child who was "cold", not a "big student" like "full ten", and this relative didn't want to do it, because the brothers and daughters-in-law were sisters, and there were many brothers-in-law, and there were several tables of guests, which was very troublesome! But the brother insisted on asking people, "Is it exciting, can it be done?" "If you want to do it, tell me, I'll make up more people for you!"
Nowadays, the rural areas are not as good as before, and there are more local "things", every family is 10 years old, marriage, the death of the elderly, etc., and some new items have been added, such as children being admitted to universities. The range of walking has also expanded, not limited to the production team, but a family, neighboring. For example, the second team on the opposite side of the hometown chong and the fourth team on the other side of Tudingao, everyone is also moving around and coming and going. Now that the two groups have merged into one group, there are more people who have something to do.
Now the gift money in the countryside is at least 200 when there is something. For more than a month, the gift money given out will be thousands or even 2,000. The brothers' families have many children, and the children are small, and the family is in difficulty. In this way, it is very good for the brother to find some money and deal with this lover!
It's not that you don't want to talk about favors, it's not that you don't talk about it! The countryside is also complicated, and some people are sophisticated. Some people, he doesn't mean a person, like my brother, people say hello and look up to you! People don't look down on you, they still look at the strength of the family, whether they have money, whether they will make money, whether they have the ability! Gone are the days of simple reasoning and affection! If you have money, you are the eldest brother, so please take a seat. If there is anything wrong, others will forgive me, don't care! If you don't have money, you are not a small thing, and in the eyes of others, it is also a big problem! The so-called favor, to a large extent, is a money word. But how can my brother see through this, wake up, and understand it?
(Picture from the Internet)
Wang Liangju June 30, 2024 Beijing