"Being poor and enjoying the Tao, being content with advancing interests, all the Confucian scholars in the three auxiliaries admire him." Biography of Wei Biao in the Later Han Dynasty
Xiaoli is located in the northwest of Chang'an City. It is a Luli close to the city wall. It is a civilian Luli with low walls and is the most noisy. The houses are crowded, one next to another, and the main roads that were originally used for carriages and horses have also been blocked.
The residential houses on the roadside encroached into a path for two people to walk side by side.
It was three o'clock in the morning, and it was the time for Li Shu to have breakfast and lunch. A few wisps of gray smoke curled up from the courtyard, and there were the sounds of chickens crowing and dogs barking everywhere, farmers carrying farm tools on their backs chatting and laughing together on the way back, and
The sound of a woman standing at the door with her arms akimbo and scolding the naughty boy when he comes home for dinner.
Only then will Xiaoli, who was originally deserted, be filled with the atmosphere of human fireworks.
An old man in his forties or fifties was standing by the door with his hands behind his hands. Although the long robe he was wearing was simple, he looked so out of place with the civilians around him who were wearing coarse linen and short brown clothes. He stood at the door of his house like an outsider.
He squinted his eyes and observed the various behaviors of all living things.
"Luan Jun, don't look there, come over and have a meal." A woman in her forties greeted in the corridor with a food table. She was tall and thin, wearing shabby clothes, and her expression was a little...
Impatient.
"Oh, oh!" the old man responded briefly, his eyes still staring at the laughter coming from the large courtyard opposite. There were several families living in that courtyard, and they always gathered together during meals to share their stories.
The men will talk loudly about which store has the best wine, and they will arrange to have a drink after finishing the autumn harvest. The women will discuss whose daughter is about to leave the palace and what kind of makeup the bride should buy.
Ordinary people's homes do not have any rules about eating and sleeping, nor do they have any complicated etiquette restrictions. Some homes do not have enough desks, so it is common for several people to sit at the same table and eat together. All of this is looked down upon by mainstream scholars.
Because Li Shu's rude behavior was so cute in the eyes of the old man surnamed Luan, he still stood there until his wife urged him several times before reluctantly turning around and leaving. When he left, he was still reciting two lines of poetry: "Beauty."
The bean is the sour taste of drinking wine. The brothers are both happy and happy."
Luan Gui walked slowly to the hall. The originally beautifully woven mat had shown wear and tear after long-term use. Some of the larger holes had been sewn with pieces of linen, making it look ugly. Luan Gui didn't mind either.
Slowly sat down.
On the table were a few isolated pottery plates and pottery bowls, containing cabbage, salted vegetables, and a small bowl of millet rice.
Cai Ying is the pickled vegetable of later generations, and salted vegetables are salted vegetables. Threshed millet refers to brown rice with only the hull removed. Cai Ying millet rice, and occasionally add soybean soup, this is what ordinary people in the Han Dynasty would eat
staple food.
Luan Gui was not in a hurry to move the chopsticks. He first looked at his bowl of millet rice, which was also mixed with beans. For such a simple meal, he nodded happily and said: "Good, good! Master Chen Cai Zhi'e,
Soup with beans and rice is not enough to satisfy my appetite, so I can be considered as eating the same thing as Master."
The wife sitting opposite was a little speechless, but her husband didn't move the chopsticks, and she, the wife, couldn't move either, so she raised her voice and said, "Can you move the chopsticks?"
"Okay, okay." Luan Gui said and picked up the chopsticks. As soon as he put them down, he saw that his wife sitting opposite had only two bowls of vegetables on the table and no rice. He couldn't help asking: "Is there no corn at home?"
"
"I said the day before yesterday that the corn and wheat at home were going to be gone, but when did you take this matter to your heart?" the wife said coldly.
Luan Gui was about to speak but stopped: "That"
"Every family has borrowed it. The autumn harvest is not over yet, and no one can squeeze out the remaining grain to help us." The wife put a piece of salted radish into her mouth and chewed it loudly: "Luan Jun, you are the head of the family.
, you have to think of a way, otherwise when winter comes, how will we survive without winter clothes and firewood?"
Luan Gui did not respond hastily, but instead frowned and looked at his wife chewing salted radish with some disgust: "Can you eat without making any noise?"
"How long has it been since you paid attention to this?" The wife suddenly put her chopsticks on the table and said sternly: "Do you think you are still the doctor who is worth 600 shi! Who is still giving you 50 hu of dendrobium every month?
Rice, more than three thousand dollars? What’s the use of just being careful about food and sleep all day long!”
Luan Gui took a breath and glared at his wife, but was glared back by the aggressive wife. The two looked at each other for a moment, and in the end, it was his wife who had the upper hand. Luan Gui looked away and whispered: "
A basketful of food and a spoonful of drink will not change the happiness."
"Are you still happy?" The wife looked sad and angry at her misfortune, and then sighed: "Others suffer from poverty because they have no chance to climb into a rich family. What about you? You have it and you don't want it! The emperor's cousin
Ah, what an amazing person. He can make our family live a good life with just a few words. You don't recognize it even if you don't recognize it. You even went out of your way to avoid them and moved from Xuanpyeong-ri to Xiaori. What on earth do you think you did?
Thought?"
Luan Gui was silent for a long time, and then he said: "Li Wenyou is a member of my hometown party, and I studied under the same discipline."
He and Li Ru were both from Heyang, Zuo Fengyi. They were recommended to Cao Quan by Heyang and became a doctor. Li Ru was good at maneuvering and was quickly appreciated by Dong Zhuo. He participated in a series of events such as the poisoning of the young emperor.
Luan Gui was dissatisfied with this matter and parted ways with Li Ru. Later, when the imperial court moved westward, the family home and fields that his wife managed in Luoyang disappeared overnight. After arriving in Chang'an, he relied on the support of his former relatives and friends, and he was able to live well.
It was not until later that the emperor's uncle Wang Bin came to Chang'an and wanted to find a teacher for the Wang Duan brothers. Since Dong Zhuo was in power at that time, many people did not dare to have a relationship with Wang Bin. Wang Bin looked around and finally found Luan Gui.
With Wang's care, Luan Gui stayed in Xuanping Village until Dong Zhuo died one after another, Li Ru was executed for plotting to assassinate the emperor, and his relative Wang's family became prominent. Luan Gui came here to avoid suspicion.
, and secondly, he did not want outsiders to think that he was clinging to power, so he moved away from Xuanpingli.
"So what?" the wife retorted: "He was the one who poisoned the emperor and plotted against him, not you. You didn't do anything, so why are you afraid of being implicated? Besides, with the Wang brothers here, who would dare to poison you?"
Please go to Tingwei Prison? You are just being pedantic!"
"Okay, okay." Luan Gui was helpless by what she said. He picked up his own bowl and poured half of the rice into his wife's bowl. He persuaded her nicely: "Let's eat first. We have corn, wheat and charcoal at home."
Let me figure it out."
The wife looked at Luan Gui half angry and half relieved. If Luan Gui hadn't treated her well, and if Luan Gui hadn't had a bright future behind him, how could she have continued to stay here? She said angrily.
: "What else can you think of? Now is the busy time for farming, and six-year-old children have to go to the fields to pick wheat. Who would leave their children to you to read poetry?"
"Then I will go up the mountain to collect firewood and take it to Xiaoli City to sell it." Luan Gui thought of a way and thought of a good precedent for this: "Zhu Maichen, who was in the reign of Emperor Xiaowu, was in his forties and had no property.
, and they also go up the mountains to cut firewood to make a living.”
"Luan Jun, you should rest." The wife looked at Luan Gui's frail body and said, "There are many wolves on the mountain at this time, so don't let the wolves pick you up."
Luan Gui was a little impatient: "This won't work, and that won't work either. Do you have any ideas?"
The wife was waiting for his words. She rolled her eyes, pursed her lips and smiled, and said, "Of course I have a way."
"Say yes first, I won't look for them." Luan Gui saw the other party's expression and immediately stopped talking.
The wife couldn't help but clicked her tongue and said instead: "That's not what I'm talking about. What I want to say is, haven't you memorized everything in those books? Since you have memorized everything, why keep it?"
After saying that, she glanced at the several bookcases stacked in the corner.
"No!" Luan Gui immediately changed his face: "You will never sell books even if you risk my life!"
"Luan Wenbo, you are so ignorant!" the wife scolded angrily: "What's the use of guarding these books! Can't you survive this day? I don't care, you must give me an accurate letter today, or go to the Wang family's two
Young Master, or I will sell the book for you tomorrow!"