On January 21, 2023, the Chinese New Year is coming.

The 26-year-old Xu Fei followed his parents back to his fourth uncle's house and spent the New Year with his grandma as usual.

At the New Year's Eve dinner table, he wondered whether his parents or relatives would urge the marriage in person, but luckily he "escaped."

After the first day of junior high school and the end of the big family reunion year, he breathed a sigh of relief.

  Xu Fei has been home for almost a month.

On December 26, 2022, he returned to his hometown in Hubei while studying in a 985 university.

At the beginning of the twelfth lunar month in the traditional solar terms, it is the day when the family buys new year's goods.

In order to welcome him back, his parents fed him an extra 30 catties of sausage.

  But as time went on, he found that these material security were not enough to bridge the "spiritual gap" between him and his parents.

In normal days, parents will urge marriage intentionally or unintentionally.

He had to adopt delaying tactics to avoid the outbreak of conflicts.

  Xu Fei had two relationships, but in his sensitive perception, neither of them could be called "love".

He always remembers Cai Lan saying: "You can believe in love, but don't be superstitious." He likes this answer, with anticipation of love.

In the tug-of-war, he reached the only consensus with his parents-feelings first, marriage later.

  Now, Xu Fei is about to graduate in one and a half years.

He plans to settle down in a second-tier city by relying on his major in computer science. Of course, he cannot do without the help of his parents.

He sometimes gets confused and feels that he may not be able to withstand the tempering of society.

But he still held out hope for a little more than his current life.

  The following is Xu Fei's dictation:

  On January 21st, New Year's Eve, my parents and I went to see my grandma. She lives at Sibo's house now, so I will go there for a New Year's Eve as usual.

It's the countryside over there, and we used to burn braziers to keep warm.

Now the conditions are better and the air conditioners are turned on, but the brazier still needs to be burned for a whole day.

The firewood must be filled enough and cannot be extinguished, which means that the New Year will be prosperous.

  We have two tables for the New Year's Eve dinner, one for adults and one for children.

I'm twenty-six, but I still like to squeeze the children's table.

Then watch TV with them, wait for the countdown to the Spring Festival Gala, and go to set off fireworks together at twelve o'clock.

The houses in my hometown town are all small buildings one by one, rising up along the roadside.

Every family has to set up the fireworks in front of their house before zero o'clock.

When the New Year's bell rings on the TV, fireworks along the main road illuminate the night sky of every household, and the New Year is here.

The garbage left over from fireworks and firecrackers cannot be thrown away. My grandma said that it is wealth and can only be thrown away after the New Year.

  My relatives in my hometown live close, so I went to my uncle's house to eat dumplings early in the morning on the first day of the Lunar New Year.

In the second day of junior high school, I "returned to my mother's house". I was not married, so I went back to my grandma's house with my parents for dinner.

  They started urging me to get married two years ago, and this year is no exception.

  On January 7, my parents and I were watching TV together. There were skits on the TV. The first one was about an older young woman being urged to marry, and the second one was about giving birth to a child.

I complained at the time that it was too boring.

My parents said, "You young people don't understand that you can be happy only if you have a family, and someone loves you and takes care of you." I said, "Young people are under a lot of work pressure now, and they can't support themselves." My mother thought, "Wait Once you have a child, no matter how hard or tired you are, once you go home and see the child, you will be happy." Having said that, I fell silent.

  It has been almost a month since I went home, and I returned on December 26 last year.

Sometimes after staying outside for a long time, I always want to go home and take a look.

But when I go back, I have to find ways to make my mother happy-get up early and eat breakfast on time.

I don't dare to order takeaway at home, my mother will think I'm a waste.

They came to pick me up when I got home that day, and cut a plate of my favorite sausage, which is a must-have for the New Year in my hometown.

Starting from the twelfth lunar month, New Year's goods are on the minds of parents.

As soon as they are on vacation, they will go to the market, and when they see good quality beef, mutton and fish, they will buy them, marinate them, dry them, and make bacon.

In previous years, my family would prepare more than 20 catties of sausages. In the past two years when I was outside, my parents prepared a lot, fifty or sixty catties.

  Two years ago, when my parents urged me to get married, they said that only with a stable family can I be motivated to take on the responsibilities of a man.

  But I don't think so.

During the New Year's Day holiday, my mother and I went to her cousin's house.

My mother's cousin is not married yet.

Every time after returning home, my mother said that her home was too deserted. Although it was comfortable, it was an unfettered and broken life.

  The ideal daughter-in-law of my parents is the same as that of most families - kind and filial, with comparable conditions.

But they still told me that the premise is that both parties must have feelings.

On the contrary, I sometimes advise them that times have changed, people's hearts are not so pure, and it is difficult to find a person who gives their sincerity.

You can do just fine by yourself.

  But they didn't listen, and they assumed that I would get married in two years.

I had to adopt procrastination tactics and paint big cakes: the fate has not arrived, the time is not ripe, and I will think about getting married after my job is stable... Sometimes I will use my eldest cousin who has repeatedly failed in blind dates as a shield: "Why are you so anxious? My eldest sister is 31 this year, and she hasn’t gotten married after several years of urging.” It’s only once that I can fool you once.

In two years, the conflict is expected to become more intense, so I can only avoid it.

  In their hearts, if I am not married, they have not fulfilled their mission.

  I have had two relationships.

For a period of time in college, it was the first time I really liked a girl.

There is also a recent entanglement with my childhood sweetheart.

Neither segment really goes together.

But for me, it was all done with my heart, and there was a deep sense of exhaustion at the end.

But sometimes I feel that liking them is just like liking a nice person, and I can't say I "love" them.

I also asked my friends, what is the state and feeling of love?

She said something I couldn't understand and told me to watch The English Patient.

  For me, love comes first and marriage comes later.

I don't believe in human nature, it's hard to start a relationship easily.

And marriage is more like an exam composition, a standard answer sheet for the last question.

When you get married at this age, the mainstream society judges you to pass.

I don't like loneliness, but compared to two people forced to marry, loneliness becomes more bearable.

  I have a college classmate who is also a fellow.

He went to work after graduation and worked as an operation and maintenance worker in an electronics factory. Last year, he got married under the urging of both parents. The woman was a former colleague. When he informed me of the marriage, it was very sudden. My impression of him was still in his university. When the first love.

At that time, he was very serious. Although they broke up later, it took him a year and a half to give up completely.

So that when I heard the news of his marriage, I was in a trance for a while, time passed so quickly.

  When we talked about it later, it was he who told me that life was stressful, that I had to repay the mortgage, and I had to take care of both parents.

I think he is very tired, but it seems that many people are in the same situation.

  Another good friend from elementary school is also married.

Looking at his circle of friends before, he took a pair of children to eat KFC, the children are very cute.

At that moment, I felt that he was very happy, and it also belonged to the kind of family happiness my parents believed in.

  But this doesn’t seem to be the life I’m looking forward to now. I remember that the day he posted the photos on Moments was on Wednesday. I laughed and complained to my friends: “All my elementary school classmates have both sons and daughters, but I don’t envy them. He wants to take the children to eat on Wednesday.” KFC, waste, I will endure the day and eat specials on crazy Thursday."

  Most of the elders in the family are using Douyin, and they also have a Douyin group, where they follow each other in a circle, and they also bring a selfie stick to do Douyin when they go out.

Pushing them back and forth is the same thing.

I also get bored seeing what they swipe.

For example, my mother used to love to watch masters explaining the truth, such as "What shortcomings do women have to get rid of in order to be happy", but now she loves to watch the videos of "Being filial piety first" and "Grateful to parents", and often forwards them to me.

  There are quite a lot of people in our hometown who use Douyin, not just middle-aged and elderly people.

Once a person I like (childhood sweetheart) sent me a Douyin video and reasoned with me - a certain "Buddhist master" on Douyin said: "If the road is blocked, you must learn to turn, and if you are unhappy, you must learn to look down. The answer will be tomorrow .” At that moment, I realized that we were not the same people at all.

  In fact, my parents are very kind to me.

I majored in computer science. After taking the postgraduate entrance examination for three years, I finally got a 985 part-time graduate student from a secondary school.

During this period, they did not force me to find a job to support my family and earn money. Instead, they continued to provide me with financial support.

I don't have any requirements for my job, I think it's good that I can support myself.

For the only child of our generation, many parents give everything they have, and my parents are no exception—they plan to buy me a house when I get married, prepare a down payment of 1 million yuan, and buy me a car when I work. I start life.

  There is a line in "The Thief of Time": "To be a man, you must always believe." I still think of this sentence in "The Thief of Time", and I still long for love.

Someone also asked Cai Lan on Weibo: "Can you still believe in love?" He replied: "You can believe it, don't be superstitious." I like this answer.

  Learning computer is not my hobby, but because it is a popular major, it has become my survival skill.

But this year's Internet employment is sluggish. I haven't officially started looking for a job yet, but I have to plan ahead.

In the future, I would like to live in a city with affordable house prices—Chengdu, Suzhou, and Changsha, all of which have their own unique flavors of life.

When I can't hold on anymore, I will consider going back to my hometown.

Sometimes I feel confused and feel that I may not be able to withstand the tempering of society.

But I still hold out the hope of living a little bit beyond what I have.

I usually like to listen to folk songs. When my job is stable and I am free, I want to learn an instrument and work for a band.

  (At the request of the interviewee, Xu Feiwei's pseudonym)

  The Paper reporter Lin Ziyao