He was eight years old. A telegram came from the hospital, and since his father, a Russian immigrant, could not read English, Morrie had to break the news, reading his mother's death notice like a student in front of the class. "We regret to inform you . . ." he began.
On the morning of the funeral, Morrie's relatives came down the steps of his tenement1 building on the poor Lower East Side of Manhattan. The men wore dark suits, the women wore veils. The kids in the neighborhood were going off to school, and as they passed, Morrie looked down, ashamed that his classmates would see him this way. One of his aunts, a heavyset woman, grabbed Morrie and began to wail2: "What will you do without your mother? What will become of you?"
Morrie burst into tears. His classmates ran away.
At the cemetery3, Morrie watched as they shoveled4 dirt into his mother's grave. He tried to recall the tender moments they had shared when she was alive. She had operated a candy store until she got sick, after which she mostly slept or sat by the window, looking frail5 and weak. Sometimes she would yell out for her son to get her some medicine, and young Morrie, playing stickball in the street, would pretend he did not hear her. In his mind he believed he could make the illness go away by ignoring it.
How else can a child confront death?
Morrie's father, whom everyone called Charlie, had come to America to escape the Russian Army. He worked in the fur business, but was constantly out of a job. Uneducated and barely able to speak English, he was terribly poor, and the family was on public assistance much of the time. Their apartment was a dark, cramped6, depressing place behind the candy store. They had no luxuries. No car. Sometimes, to make money, Morrie and his younger brother, David, would wash porch steps together for a nickel.
After their mother's death, the two boys were sent off to a small hotel in the Connecticut woods where several families shared a large cabin and a communal7 kitchen. The fresh air might be good for the children, the relatives thought. Morrie and David had never seen so much greenery, and they ran and played in the fields. One night after dinner, they went for a walk and it began to rain. Rather than come inside, they splashed around for hours.
The next morning, when they awoke, Morrie hopped8 out of bed.
"Come on," he said to his brother. "Get up." "I can't."
"What do you mean?"
David's face was panicked. "I can't . . . move."
He had polio.
Of course, the rain did not cause this. But a child Morrie's age could not understand that. For a long time-as his brother was taken back and forth9 to a special medical home and was forced to wear braces10 on his legs, which left him limping-Morrie felt responsible.
So in the mornings, he went to synagogue-by himself, because his father was not a religious man-and he stood among the swaying men in their long black coats and he asked God to take care of his dead mother and his sick brother.
And in the afternoons, he stood at the bottom of the subway steps and hawked11 magazines, turning whatever money he made over to his family to buy food.
In the evenings, he watched his father eat in silence, hoping for-but never getting--a show of affection, communication, warmth.
At nine years old, he felt as if the weight of a mountain were on his shoulders.
But a saving embrace came into Morrie's life the following year: his new stepmother, Eva. She was a short Romanian immigrant with plain features, curly brown hair, and the energy of two women. She had a glow that warmed the otherwise murky12 atmosphere his father created. She talked when her new husband was silent, she sang songs to the children at night. Morrie took comfort in her soothing13 voice, her school lessons, her strong character. When his brother returned from the medical home, still wearing leg braces from the polio, the two of them shared a rollaway bed in the kitchen of their apartment, and Eva would kiss them good-night. Morrie waited on those kisses like a puppy waits on milk, and he felt, deep down, that he had a mother again.
There was no escaping their poverty, however. They lived now in the Bronx, in a one-bedroom apartment in a redbrick building on Tremont Avenue, next to an Italian beer garden where the old men played boccie on summer evenings. Because of the Depression, Morrie's father found even less work in the fur business. Sometimes when the family sat at the dinner table, all Eva could put out was bread.
"What else is there?" David would ask.
"Nothing else," she would answer.
When she tucked Morrie and David into bed, she would sing to them in Yiddish. Even the songs were sad and poor. There was one about a girl trying to sell her cigarettes:
Please buy my cigarettes.
They are dry, not wet by rain.
Take pity on me, take pity on me.
Still, despite their circumstances, Morrie was taught to love and to care. And to learn. Eva would accept nothing less than excellence14 in school, because she saw education as the only antidote15 to their poverty. She herself went to night school to improve her English. Morrie's love for education was hatched in her arms.
He studied at night, by the lamp at the kitchen table. And in the mornings he would go to synagogue to say Yizkor-the memorial prayer for the dead-for his mother. He did this to keep her memory alive. Incredibly, Morrie had been told by his father never to talk about her. Charlie wanted young David to think Eva was his natural mother.
It was a terrible burden to Morrie. For years, the only evidence Morrie had of his mother was the telegram announcing her death. He had hidden it the day it arrived.
He would keep it the rest of his life.
When Morrie was a teenager, his father took him to a fur factory where he worked. This was during the Depression. The idea was to get Morrie a job.
He entered the factory, and immediately felt as if the walls had closed in around him. The room was dark and hot, the windows covered with filth16, and the machines were packed tightly together, churning like train wheels. The fur hairs were flying, creating a thickened air, and the workers, sewing the pelts17 together, were bent18 over their needles as the boss marched up and down the rows, screaming for them to go faster. Morrie could barely breathe. He stood next to his father, frozen with fear, hoping the boss wouldn't scream at him, too.
During lunch break, his father took Morrie to the boss and pushed him in front of him, asking if there was any work for his son. But there was barely enough work for the adult laborers19, and no one was giving it up.
This, for Morrie, was a blessing20. He hated the place. He made another vow21 that he kept to the end of his life: he would never do any work that exploited someone else, and he would never allow himself to make money off the sweat of others.
"What will you do?" Eva would ask him.
"I don't know," he would say. He ruled out law, because he didn't like lawyers, and he ruled out medicine, because he couldn't take the sight of blood.
"What will you do?"
It was only through default that the best professor I ever had became a teacher.
"A teacher affects eternity22; he can never tell where his influence stops. "
-HENRY ADAMS
那会儿他八岁。一封电报从医院发来，由于他父亲--一个来自自俄罗斯的移民--不懂英语，只能由莫里来向大家宣布这个消息。他像站在班级前面的学生那样宣读了他母亲的死亡通知书。"我们遗憾地通知您……"他读道。
葬礼的那天早上，莫里的亲友们从位于曼哈顿贫困的下东区的经济公寓楼的台阶上走下来。男人们穿着黑西服，女人们戴上了面纱。附近的孩子们正在去上学。当他们经过时，莫里低下了头，他不想让同学看见他那个样子。他的一个姨妈，一个很壮实的女人，一把抓住莫里嚎啕大哭："没了母亲你可怎么办呀？你将来会怎么样噢！"
莫里失声痛哭起来。他的同学赶紧跑开了。
葬礼上，莫里看着他们将土铲在母亲的坟上。他竭力回忆着母亲在世时家庭所拥有的那份温馨。她患病前一直经营着一家糖果店，患病后大部分时间都是在窗前度过的，不是躺着就是坐着，显得十分虚弱。有时她会大声唤儿子给她拿药，在街上玩棍球的小莫里常常假装没听见。他相信，只要他置之不理，疾病就会被驱走的。
你还能让一个孩子如何去面对死亡？
莫里的父亲--人人都叫他查理--是为了逃避兵役而来美国的。他于的是皮毛业，但时常要失业。他没受过什么教育，不会说英语，所以一直很贫穷，家里大部分时间是靠救济度日的。他们的住房就在糖果店的后面，既黑又窄，令人十分压抑。他们没有一件奢侈品。没有汽车。为了挣钱，莫里和他弟弟大卫有时去替别人擦洗门廊的石阶，以换取一个五美分的硬币。
他们的母亲死后，兄弟俩被送到了康涅狄克州森林里的一家小旅馆，那儿好几个家庭住在一块，共用一间大的卧室和厨房。亲戚们认为，那里的新鲜空气对孩子们会有好处的。莫里和大卫从未见过这么大的绿色世界，他们在野外尽情地玩耍。一天吃过晚饭，他们外出散步时天下起了雨。他们没有回家，而在雨里折腾了几个小时。
第二天早上，莫里醒后一骨碌爬了起来。
"快，"他对弟弟说，"起床。"
"我起不来。"
"你说什么？"
大卫显得很害怕。"我不能……动了。"
他得了小儿麻痹症。
当然，淋雨并不是得病的原因。但莫里这个年龄的孩子是不会知道的。有很长一段时间--看着弟弟去一个专门的诊所治疗，两脚不得不戴上护套以致留下了跛脚的后遗症--莫里一直在自责。
于是每天早上，他都要去犹太教堂--独自一人去，因为他父亲不是个教徒--站在那些身穿黑长袍。身子不停晃动的人中间，祈求上帝保佑他死去的母亲和患病的弟弟。
下午，他站在地铁下面叫卖杂志，把挣来的钱交给家里买吃的。
晚上，他瞧着父亲默默地吃着东西，企盼有--但从未得到过--一点感情的交流和关心。
九岁的他感受到了巨大的压力和负担。
但就在第二年，莫里得到了感情的补偿：他的继母伊娃。她是个矮小的罗马尼亚移民，长得很普通，一头棕色的鬈发，有着超人的精力。她身上像光一样的热情温暖了这个本来显得抑郁的家。当她新嫁的丈夫沉默不语时，她会滔滔不绝，晚上她给孩子们唱歌。她柔和的声音。传授的知识和坚强的性格抚平了莫里受伤的心灵。他弟弟戴着护套从诊所回来后，他俩同睡在厨房的一张折叠床上，伊娃会来吻他们道晚安。莫里每天像小狗等奶吃那样翘首等待着她的吻，他内心深处感到又有了母亲。
然而，他们仍没有逃离贫穷。他们现在住到了布朗克斯区，那是特里蒙德街上一幢红砖楼房里的一套单问，紧靠着一个意大利露天啤酒店，夏天的晚上那儿常有老人玩室外地滚球。由于经济的萧条，莫里的父亲在皮毛业更难找到工作。有时，当一家人坐在餐桌前时，伊娃拿来的仅仅是面包。
"还有什么？"大卫会问。
"什么也没有了，"她说。
她在替莫里兄弟俩盖被子时，会用意第绪语唱歌给他们听，尽管都是悲伤的歌。其中有一首唱的是一个卖香烟的女孩：
请买我的烟。
干燥的烟没有被雨淋，
谁能同情我，谁能可怜我。
即使处在这样的境遇，莫里还是学会了去爱，去关心，去学习。伊娃要求他在学校成绩优秀，她把受教育视作脱离贫困的唯一解药。她自己也在上夜校提高英语水平。莫里在她的怀抱里养成了对学习的热爱。
晚上，他在厨房餐桌上的那盏台灯下学习，早上，他去犹太教堂为母亲求主眷念--为死者作祷告。但令人费解的是，他父亲从不让他提起死去的母亲。查理希望幼小的大卫把伊娃当作亲生的母亲。
这对莫里来说是个沉重的精神负担。许多年里，母亲留给莫里的唯一信物就是那封宣告她死亡的电报。他收到电报的当天就把它藏了起来。
他将把它珍藏一生。
莫里十几岁时，他父亲把他带到了他工作的一家皮毛厂。那还是在大萧条时期，父亲想让莫里找一份工作。
他一走进工厂，那厂房的围墙就让他感到窒息。厂房既黑又热，窗户上布满了垃圾，齐放在一起的机器发出犹如滚滚车轮的轰鸣声。毛絮到处飞扬，使空气变得污浊不堪。工人们彻楼着身子用针缝制着毛皮，老板在过道里巡视吆喝，不断催促他们干快些。莫里站在父亲的身边，害怕得要命，希望老板别对他也大喊大叫。
午饭休息时，父亲把莫里带到了老板那儿，将他往前一推，问是否有活可以给他儿子干。可成年人的工作都没法保证，没人愿意放弃手里的饭碗。
对莫里来说这是个福音。他恨那个地方。他又起了一个誓，这誓言一直保持到他生命的终结：他永远不会去从事剥削他人的工作，他不允许自己去赚别人的血汗钱。
"你将来准备做什么？"伊娃问他。
"我不知道，"他说。他把学法律排除在外，因为他不喜欢律师；他把学医也排除在外，因为他怕见到血。
"你准备做什么？"
我这位最优秀的教授由于他的缺陷而当了一名教师。
"教师追求的是永恒；他的影响也将永无止境。"
--亨利•亚当斯②
②美国历史学家和作者（1838－1918）。
收听单词发音 |
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tenement
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| n.公寓；房屋 | |
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wail
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| vt./vi.大声哀号，恸哭；呼啸，尖啸 | |
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cemetery
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| n.坟墓，墓地，坟场 | |
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shoveled
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| vt.铲，铲出（shovel的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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frail
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| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
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cramped
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| a.狭窄的 | |
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communal
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| adj.公有的，公共的，公社的，公社制的 | |
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hopped
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| 跳上[下]( hop的过去式和过去分词 )； 单足蹦跳； 齐足（或双足）跳行； 摘葎草花 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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braces
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| n.吊带，背带；托架( brace的名词复数 )；箍子；括弧；（儿童）牙箍v.支住( brace的第三人称单数 )；撑牢；使自己站稳；振作起来 | |
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hawked
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| 通过叫卖主动兜售（hawk的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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murky
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| adj.黑暗的，朦胧的；adv.阴暗地，混浊地；n.阴暗；昏暗 | |
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soothing
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| adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的 | |
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excellence
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| n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德 | |
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antidote
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| n.解毒药，解毒剂 | |
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filth
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| n.肮脏，污物，污秽；淫猥 | |
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pelts
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| n. 皮毛，投掷, 疾行 vt. 剥去皮毛，（连续）投掷 vi. 猛击，大步走 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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laborers
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| n.体力劳动者，工人( laborer的名词复数 )；（熟练工人的）辅助工 | |
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blessing
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| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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vow
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| n.誓(言)，誓约；v.起誓，立誓 | |
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eternity
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| n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷 | |
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