Chapter 21 Chapter 21

Writing is hard.Accompanied by it is the hardship of life. Generally speaking, I am never demanding on living conditions.This has something to do with my poor family background.Teenage As mentioned, I struggled with hunger almost all the time.Therefore, apart from tabooing big meat (not for religious reasons), as long as it can fill your stomach, you will be satisfied.When writing is tense, I often forget to eat, and one meal a day is enough. But life here is a little too simple.It's not that they don't want me to eat well, the people here have been doing their best, but there are no conditions.In the deep mountains, there are tens of thousands of families of miners. When it rains in autumn and snows in winter, the traffic is often interrupted. It is said that flour has to be airdropped here one year.There are no vegetables, no eggs, and it's hard to get even some tofu.I don't eat in the morning.At noon, there are usually only steamed buns, rice soup, pickles, and sometimes noodles at night, sometimes exactly the same as at noon.This is a mining hospital, and the doctors and staff all go home to eat, and few are hospitalized, and the food is quite difficult.

If it's not work, this meal is fine too.It's just that I usually have to work more than ten hours a day, and this kind of food can't make up for the physical exertion.There might be a commissary or something in the mining area across the river, but I don't have time to go out. No time!Don't even dare to delay for half an hour.In order to restrain my will, the daily tasks are very restricted, and if I can't finish it, I can't go to bed and rest.The workplace has actually become a prison cell, and strict "prison rules" have been formulated, which must not be violated.

Every day at noon, after eating two steamed buns and a bowl of porridge, I hurried back to the workplace like leaving behind a baby in swaddling clothes. When I was preparing for the work of the day, I boiled water in an electric heating cup to make a cup of coffee, and immediately sat down to work.After dinner in the evening, I have to bring two steamed buns, and before going to bed after work in the early morning, I will make a cup of coffee and eat two cold steamed buns whether it is supper or early. Later, I brought an extra steamed bun after dinner because there were more "guests" in the room.

The uninvited guest is a mouse. The number of rats in coal mines is astonishing.It is said that the miners often littered leftover steamed buns, which attracted so many rats. There are two mice that frequent my room.God knows where they came in, and they didn't take me seriously in the first place.They run around on the ground, frolicking and chasing, making cheerful "squeaking" sounds, and regard this place as their "Disney" paradise.They even dared to run to the sofa opposite my desk and stare at me at work.Sometimes, I wantonly jumped onto the window sill where I piled up materials, and performed running skills between me and me.

When I was very nervous about using my hands and brain, I didn't care about the order to chase away the guests. Sometimes I was really anxious and chased after them with a pen and notebook in my hand. Of course, they would disappear without a trace.As soon as I sat down, the damn thing did it again.Especially at night, as soon as I pulled the lights out, these two guys would start a fight, and a few times they would actually get into bed and run around my head. I had no choice but to call some staff from the hospital to block the doors and windows, and finally wiped out one.But the other one still came to visit me as scheduled.

That's why I "had a brainstorm" and simply changed from militarism to appeasement, taking an extra steamed bun behind the door for them to enjoy every night.In this way, the mice will not make trouble at night.Every day after getting up at noon, I habitually cast a glance behind the door: there will always be a pile of leftover steamed buns there without exception. Afterwards, I lived peacefully with this mouse until I left here.And it has become my only companion in this lonely world.Until now, I still remember how it squatted opposite me, how it stared at my work with a pair of bright little eyes.What I feel guilty about is that I joined others in killing its partner--that may have been its husband or wife.