Contentment in the 1980s

Mei Yinuo has hardworking, down-to-earth parents and gets along well with her siblings, though even the closest relationships have their frictions.

Her greatest wish isn't to marry out of the countryside. It's to buy a temporary vending permit from her cousin next door.

Some say that her ambitions reach the heavens, but her fate is as fragile as paper.

Some say that men should marry when they come of age, and women should do the same.

Some say that a woman should follow her husband wherever he goes, and that everything is determined by fate.

Mei Yinuo refuses to believe in fate. She rejects blind dates, arranged marriages, and obedience.

She wants to see what kind of life she can make for herself, how far she can go, and how high she can fly.

Xi Bogeng transferred out of the army and spent nearly four days and three nights traveling from his post back home, barely resting along the way.

On the final leg, from the county seat to the town, an overly excited and not at all wary young woman sat beside him. A pickpocket cut open her bag, and she didn't even notice.

His innate sense of justice drove him to step in and stop the thief. It would become one of the things he regretted most: not introducing himself properly.

The lives of two people, two families, and three generations, ordinary people weathering the changes of the times.