You Are a Young Man

In Jiangnan in 1976, the air was filled with an indescribable restlessness. It was an autumn when great men left and mountains and rivers lost their luster. It was also the eve of dawn when an ancient small town was about to embark on a new journey under the waves of the times. On the bluestone road in the misty rain, next to the deep house compound with white walls and black tiles, the small town middle school stands facing the lake. The lake is like a mirror, reflecting the ignorant and stubborn faces of the young people, as well as the grassy and forbidden land on the other side called "Jiang Taoyuan" - where their unopened youth and dreams are buried. Yang Dongsheng, a young man who depended on others and always had half a pencil in his pocket, squatted alone by the river in the dreary September when the whole country mourned, weeping for the deceased leader, and choked up for the unspeakable and humble artistic life that belonged to him. He didn't know that the gears of fate were beginning to turn with the thunder of the times. In front of him lay the rice wine bowl of his silent adoptive father, the sigh of his loving adoptive mother, the pencil handed over by his deskmate Qian Siyi, and the unsolved mystery left by the cold girl Su Manqing in the next row. This is a story about "loss" and "finding". Caught between political turmoil and daily necessities, how will young men use paintbrushes, books, and blood to paint their first splash of color? When the grass in Jiang Taoyuan is turned over by the spring breeze, when the thin ice on the lake is melted by the early sun, they will finally understand: the so-called growth means growing into a tree that will not bend even in the most barren soil.