母亲的礼物散文(6)

　　"Mom, you must have been terribly bored staying at home when I was a child," I said."Bored? Housework is boring. But you were never boring. ""妈，我小的时候，您老呆在家里一定觉得很烦吧？"我说。"烦？做家务是令人心烦，不过，你从来没使我感到心烦过。

　　"I didn't believe her, so I pressed."Surely children are not as stimulating as a career."我不相信这是实话，于是我又想法子套她的话。"看孩子哪会像工作那样富有刺激性呢？"

　　"A career is stimulating," she said." I'm glad I had one. But a career is like an open balloon. It remains inflated only as long as you keep pumping. A child is a seed. You water it. You care for it the best you can. And then it grows all by itself into a beautiful flower.""工作是富有刺激性的，"母亲答道，"很高兴我也有过工作。可是工作好比开了口的气球，你只有不停地充气，它才能鼓着劲。可是一个孩子就是一粒种子，你浇灌了它，全心全意地爱护它，然后，它就会独立自主地开出美丽的花朵来。"

　　Just then, looking at her, I could picture us sitting at her kitchen table once again, and I understood why I kept that flaky brown dandelion in our old family dictionary pressed between two crumpled bits of paper towel.此时此刻，我凝望着我的母亲，脑海里又浮现出儿时的我和母亲一起坐在饭桌旁的情景，也明白了为什么我还珍藏着夹在我们家里那本旧字典中的那朵用两小块皱皱巴巴的纸巾压平的蒲公英。