Chapter 62 Autumn Harvest: Busy from Morning till Night

It's National Day again, and my brothers' school started rehearsing the National Day-themed rally well in advance. The town is decorated with lanterns and colorful paper, with even more paper than when new recruits are sent off. The streets and alleys are filled with a festive atmosphere, which feels even more exciting than the Spring Festival.

Every household in these houses along the street has a five-star red flag hanging in the air.

The flag in their house was hung by their grandfather, with their older brother holding it from below. When Xiao Jiu squatted on the ground, looking up at the clear blue sky, the red flag fluttered freely in the autumn wind. Suddenly, he was moved. It was as if he had traveled back from seventy years in the future and could feel the prosperity and strength of his motherland more deeply.

On National Day, dragon and lion dance troupes moved from east to west and from south to north throughout the town, performing with great enthusiasm. Because it was a national holiday, everyone took to the streets with small colorful flags, chanting in unison: "Cheers to China! Bless our motherland!" and "Prosperity and strength! Patriotic China!"

There was also a series of slogans corresponding to the era, written in a very retro style, on colored paper, with smiles on the faces of patriots, and everyone wearing the most fashionable clothes of the time. Even the walls on the streets were painted white and then repainted with slogans from the era...

Xiao Jiu is young, and his grandparents are old, so even though the county town is not too far from the town, they don't have a chance to check on the shop's business during their holidays.

The older brothers wanted to go, but their father refused, for a simple reason.

“It takes most of the day to go there and back, and there’s nowhere to stay. What’s the point of going there? You can’t help much. The shop is too small to move around if there are too many people. You can just stay at home. The peanuts we planted are ripe, so you can harvest them.”

Peanuts flower above ground and bear fruit underground. His family has a total of eight-tenths of an acre of vegetable garden, of which about three-tenths is planted with peanuts. After the peanuts are harvested, his father plans to sow some cilantro and spinach, and also plant some garlic.

They usually harvest the autumn crops after National Day. Harvesting corn is no easier than harvesting wheat. First, you have to break off the corn cobs and carry them out. Then, you have to cut off the corn stalks with a sickle, dry them, and pull them out. After that, you have to cut off the remaining corn roots in the field with a hoe, then spread fertilizer, plow the land, level the ground, and prepare to plant winter wheat.

Peanuts are easy to pull out. Xiao Jiu sticks out her little bottom and pulls back hard like pulling a radish. The peanut kernel and the fruit below are pulled out of the soil. After shaking off the soil, the plump white peanut appears in front of her. Xiao Jiu can't wait to pull one out, rub off the soil, and put it in her mouth to crunch and eat. After spitting out the skin, the sweet aroma of the peanut instantly fills her mouth. It's so delicious.

Grandma knew it would be difficult for her to pull them up, so she got her a basket and let her sit on a small stool to pull the peanuts.

"Little Jiu, don't pull anymore, or you'll hurt your bottom. Just stay here and pull peanuts with your brother. Just leave the peanut kernels aside. Our sheep loves to eat these."

Her warehouse didn't have any freshly ripened peanuts, only plump peanut kernels. The warehouse was also seasonal; judging from when she arrived, it should be midsummer, because there were quite a few watermelons and cantaloupes in the warehouse, as well as lotus roots and early corn, but no fresh peanuts or sweet potatoes.

The other older brothers helped their grandparents pick peanuts, while she and her little brother ate and pulled peanuts at the same time, their mouths full of dirt, but they were still very happy.

The fragrance of the soil, coupled with the annoying mosquitoes, added a touch of happiness to their busy lives.

Anyone passing by the vegetable garden will say that the grandparents are happy.

The two older sisters didn't come to the vegetable garden because there were enough people; they stayed home to grow garlic sprouts.

After the garlic is split open, it can be divided into four types: large, medium, small, and single bulb. The large bulbs are kept for planting, mainly for harvesting the bulbs. The other three types are planted according to their categories, so that garlic sprouts can be eaten in winter. The more detailed the division, the more likely you are to harvest the garlic scapes according to the time.

Her family has a lot of garlic cloves, so in addition to planting them in the vegetable garden, they also grow quite a few at home. So, while her grandparents took the children to the vegetable garden, her two older sisters stayed at home and cleared out a small patch of land in the yard to plant garlic sprouts. That way, when the weather is bad, they won't have to go out to pull up the garlic sprouts.

Besides garlic, the family also had two moats of scallions around their yard, so they could eat scallions in the winter. Nowadays, the scallions they eat are still the small scallions grown in their vegetable garden.

This year, an additional type of scallion appeared in our vegetable garden: onions. Because she didn't know when to plant them, we've been harvesting and eating them since spring, crop after crop, but they haven't produced any fruit. So, she might have planted them at the wrong time.

The problem is that it's hard for her to find out now, and she doesn't seem to have heard of anyone growing onions in the area, so she might as well just eat them as scallion sprouts.

The sugarcane wasn't growing very well; some were tall and some were short, and the stalks weren't as long as the ones you buy on the street. However, it was already formed. She remembered that it was usually after November that she could eat the sugarcane, so it was fine not to harvest it for now. After all, the colder the weather, the higher its sugar content. There were only a few stalks, so it wasn't worth the trouble. She wasn't in a hurry to eat it anyway.

In addition, the potatoes at home should be harvested soon. This year, we planted some potatoes at home and some in the vegetable garden. Grandma said that after the peanuts are harvested, we should hurry up and harvest the potatoes.

It truly is autumn, the harvest season. Besides these, there are also corn, sesame seeds, soybeans, and sweet potatoes lined up for harvest.

At both ends of the sweet potato field, sesame and soybeans were planted. In Grandma's words, every little bit counts, and the sweet potatoes just need to be harvested before the first frost.

Because they had to be busy from beginning to end for the next month or two, no one in the Tao family was idle. Even the older brothers rushed home from school, pulling carts to the fields to fetch peanuts, sorghum, potatoes, and other crops.

Besides delivering goods to my mother's family, my father also spent his spare time working in the fields. My grandmother, being older, couldn't keep up, so she was responsible for sorting the fruits they brought home. For example, peanuts had to be dried first, otherwise they would easily mold and spoil.

You also need to rub the dirt off the potatoes.

She also had to take her and her brother to the peanut fields from time to time to turn the soil. In addition to removing the peanuts left on the ground, they also had to level the soil and prepare to sow vegetable seeds. In short, there was always work to be done, and there was no time to slack off.

At this time, the chickens, ducks, geese, rabbits, and sheep at home are left to the brother and sister to take care of. Sheep and rabbits are the easiest to manage; just give them the grass you cut and bring home. The peanuts and berries are dried and stored away to be given to them when there is no food in winter.