佚名/Anonymous

Every year on my birthday, from the time I turned 12，a white gardenia was delivered to my house in Bethesda, Md. No card or note came with it. Calls to the florist were always in vain-it was a cash purchase. After a while I stopped trying to discover the sender’s identity and just delighted in the beauty and heady perfume of that one magical, perfect white flower nestled in soft pink tissue paper.

But I never stopped imagining who the anonymous giver might be. Some of my happiest moments were spent daydreaming about someone wonderful and exciting but too shy or eccentrics to make known his or her identity.

My mother contributed to these imaginings. She’d ask me if there was someone for whom I had done a special kindness who might be showing appreciation. Perhaps the neighbor I’d help when she was unloading a car full of groceries. Or maybe it was the old man across the street whose mail I retrieved during the winter so he wouldn’t have to venture down his icy steps. As a teenager, though, I had more fun speculating that it might be a boy I had a crush on or one who had noticed me even though I didn’t know him.

When I was 17，a boy broke my heart. The night he called for the last time, I cried myself to sleep. When I awoke in the morning, there was a message scribbled on my mirror in red lipstick:“Heartily know, when half-gods go, the gods arrive.”I thought about that quotation from Emerson for a long time, and until my heart healed, I left it where my mother had written it. When I finally went to get the glass cleaner, my mother knew everything was all right again.

I don’t remember ever slamming my door in anger at her and shouting,“You just don’t understand!”because she did understand.

One month before my high-school graduation, my father died of a heart attack. My feelings ranged from grief to abandonment, fear and overwhelming anger that my dad was missing some of the most important events in my life. I became completely uninterested in my upcoming graduation, the senior-class play and the prom. But my mother, in the midst of her own grief, would not hear of my skipping any of those things.

The day before my father died, my mother and I had gone shopping for a prom dress. We’d found a spectacular one, with yards and yards of dotted Swiss in red, white and blue, it made me feel like Scarlett O’Hara, but it was the wrong size. When my father died, I forgot about the dress.

My mother didn’t. The day before the prom, I found that dress-in the right size-draped majestically over the living-room sofa. It wasn’t just delivered, still in the box. It was presented to me-beautifully, artistically, lovingly. I didn’t care if I had a new dress or not. But my mother did.

She wanted her children to feel loved and lovable, creative and imaginative, imbued with a sense that there was magic in the world and beauty even in the face of adversity. In truth, my mother wanted her children to see themselves much like the gardenia-lovely, strong and perfect-with an aura of magic and perhaps a bit of mystery.

My mother died ten days after I married. I was 22 years old. That was the year the gardenias stopped coming.

从我12岁那年起，每年都有人在我生日那天把一枝洁白的栀子花送到家里（马里兰州贝塞斯达镇上），没有卡片，也没有字条。我多次打电话到花店询问，但总问不出个所以然来——这些花都是用现金支付的。后来，我就不再追查送花人，只是尽情享受那枝神秘的、用粉红绢纸包扎的雪白花朵的瑰丽和浓郁芳香。

我还是不停地猜测这位匿名送花者。有时，我最喜欢做的事就是揣测这个人，或许他是一个无比优秀的人，但过于腼腆或者性格古怪，而不愿透露身份。

母亲也和我一起猜测，很多猜想还源于她的点拨。她会问我，是不是给谁做了件好事，所以人家用这种方式来答谢。或许是邻居吧，我曾帮她卸下满满一车杂货。也有可能是马路对面的那位老先生，寒冬时，我帮他取过邮件，这样他就不必冒着滑倒的危险去取了。然而，正值花季的我，宁愿相信这个人是我喜欢的男孩，或是暗恋我而我浑然不知的某个男生。

17岁那年，一个男生深深地伤害了我。他最后一次打电话给我的那晚，我失声痛哭，后来，就不知不觉地睡着了。第二天早上醒来时，我看见镜子上有一行潦草的字，是用红色唇膏写的——“切记：半仙离去，真神到来”。我一直没擦去这些字。爱默生的这句话，我想了很久，最后终于想通了。于是，在我去拿玻璃清洁剂时，母亲知道一切又恢复正常了。

记忆中，我从未冲母亲发过脾气，然后甩门而去，还吼道：“你根本不理解！”因为母亲太了解我了。

在我高中毕业的前一个月，父亲因心脏病离开了人世。我的情绪波动很大，时而悲痛哀伤、自暴自弃，时而恐惧胆怯、怨气冲天。我知道，父亲再也不能亲眼目睹我人生中的大事了。我沉浸在这种痛苦中不能自拔，对临近的毕业典礼、演出和舞会全然没有了兴趣。而母亲，虽然也承受着巨大的悲痛，但执意让我参与那些活动。

父亲去世的前一天，我和母亲上街买我在舞会时要穿的衣服。我们选中了一件极漂亮的衣服，上面印有红、白、蓝三色小圆点。穿上它，我感觉自己像郝思嘉，只是大小不合适。父亲病故后，我就把那件衣服忘了。

但母亲没忘。毕业舞会的前一天，我发现那件衣服——大小适宜——挂在客厅的沙发上，看起来是那么华丽端庄。它并不是装在盒内，而是像店里送来的那样，亮丽典雅地呈现在我眼前。有没有新衣服，我无所谓，但母亲很在乎。

母亲希望我能感受到他人的情爱，能招人喜欢、有创造力，想象丰富，也希望我相信世间总有奇迹，相信即便是身处逆境，也会有美好。事实上，母亲希望我视自己为洁白的栀子花——可爱、健壮、完美——并带着神奇的芳香和些许的神秘。

我结婚10天后，母亲就撒手人寰了。当时我22岁，也就是在那一年，再没人送来洁白的栀子花了。

心灵小语

母爱是世界上最伟大的，没有豪言壮语，没有隽永的辞藻，却蕴含着所有的爱。

词汇笔记

deliver[di'liv?v.递送；发言；发动；提出

例 Milk is delivered every day.

牛奶每天都送来。

identity[ai'd?ntiti]n.身份；个性；一致性

例 Please note the identities in the two book.

请注意这两本书的相同之处。

mystery['mist?i]n.神秘（性）；不可思议；疑案小说（或电影、戏剧）

例 The UFO is yet an unsolved mystery.

UFO仍然是未解之谜。

小试身手

她会问我，是不是给谁做了件好事，所以人家用这种方式来答谢。

译________________________________________

我的情绪波动很大，时而悲痛哀伤、自暴自弃，时而恐惧胆怯、怨气冲天。

译________________________________________

而母亲，虽然也承受着巨大的悲痛，但执意让我参与那些活动。

译________________________________________

短语家族

I thought about that quotation from Emerson for a long time.

think about：想到

造________________________________________

My mother and I had gone shopping for a prom dress.

go shopping：去买东西

造________________________________________