Mama’s Soup Pot

There are too many treasures in life we take for granted, the worth of which we don’t fully realize until they’re pointed out to us in some unexpected way. So it was with Mama’s soup pot.

Mama’s soup was special because there was no recipe for it. It had been so since her girlhood in Italy, where she learned its secret from her grandma, who had inherited (继承) it from generation to generation. Also, it was a symbol of security. For our large immigrant family, Mama’s soup guaranteed we would never go hungry. And we could judge our economic conditions by its contents.

At one time, however, Mama’s soup pot became a source of embarrassment to me, for I feared it would cost me a new friend I had made at school. Sol was an unusual pal for me because his father was a doctor and they lived in the best part of our town. Often Sol invited me to his home for dinner, where I found the food was good but tasteless, lacking the heartiness of the one served from my mom’s flame-blackened pots. Moreover, the atmosphere matched the food and everything was so formal. Sol’s mother and father were polite, but the conversation around the table was not natural, which made me a little depressed. And no one hugged!

In my family, warm hugs were a constant-men, women, boys and girls-and if you didn’t kiss your mother, she demanded: “What’s the matter? You sick?” But at that time in my life, all this was an embarrassment.

I had known Sol would like to eat dinner at my house, but that was the last thing I wanted. My family was so different. No other kids had such pots on their stoves, nor did they have a mama whose first action upon seeing you enter the house was to sit you down with a spoon and bowl.

One day, Sol pointedly asked if he could come to my house. I had to say yes.

The day Sol came over I was nervous.

But Sol quickly finished his bowl and asked for one more.

My father and I disagreed about my curfew (晚间在家的时间). He would say I had to be in by 9:30 on weekdays, and 11:00 on weekends, and there was no exception. One day, I took courage to first show my opinion on my curfew. I told him it made me feel like a junior high school kid. He explained that though a curfew might sound like a restriction, it was really about people looking out for one another.

The very next Friday after that exchange, my dad and I had tickets to see our own town’s professional football game. On that day he was driving his car to a nearby city to meet some major clients and told me that his getting home and our leaving for the game would be tight.

I was beside myself with extreme anxieties, assuming the worst had happened.

The heavy stone in my heart finally fell to the ground.

On a windy day, Emily invited Nora to play football in her garden. “I go first!” Nora shouted as she kicked the ball towards Emily.

“Is that all you got? Watch me, the champion, hit the ball. It will travel off to infinity (无穷大)!”

Emily ran like the wind to the ball and kicked it so hard that it flew over the fence of her garden and into the neighbor’s house. There was a sharp cracking sound.

“Uh oh... what did you do?” Nora asked, feeling afraid.

“L…I don’t know. Oh no! 1 think I broke my neighbor’s window,” Emily cried as she dashed across her garden and hid behind some cherry bushes. Nora faded into thin air.

Terror was written all over Emily’s face. She saw the neighbor, Mr. Mason, picking up the pieces of sharp glass. There was anger, as well as panic, on his face.

The sun was setting. Emily knew that it was not secure for her to stay out so late. Eventually, as the light faded, she returned home, keeping her eyes wide open for the neighbor.

Her heart was shaking as she cautiously arrived home. Her mother saw the sweat on her face. She knew, her daughter had done something wrong. Mother sat next to Emily on the comfortable sofa and then asked, “Emily, are you okay? Is something wrong?”

Emily held her mother’s hands. Her eyes were wet with tears. “Mom, I did something bad, but it was unintentional. I hit the football so hard that it flew out of our garden and broke Mr. Mason’s window.”

Mother listened to her patiently as she calmed her and wiped her tears away. Then she held a sharp-tipped pencil. “Do you know why pencils have erasers?” Mother asked, surprising Emily since she wasn’t expecting such a question.

“To erase our mistakes, ” Emily replied.

With her heart beating fast, Emily walked up to her neighbor’s front door.

I am Denise Clarice, the only one in my class who does not have a pet. No dog waits for me at the bus stop. No cat sits beside me while I read. I don’t even have a tiny, furry hamster (仓鼠) to hold in my hand. But I don’t feel sorry. Why?

The rule about no pets at our house is not because I am too young to have pets, because I am 1l years old. Besides, I am very responsible. I always return library books on time and I do my homework every day, even when I would rather play in the grass. The rule about no pets is because of Kevin. He is my little brother and he is sensitive to pets, which make him sneeze (打喷嚏).

One day, when I was walking home from school, I heard a soft little sound from behind a garbage. I stopped and listened. There it was. I heard the sound again. I walked quietly up the driveway and looked behind the garbage. A tiny ball of gray fur looked up at me and said, “Meow.” Before I knew it, I was holding the cat. Before I knew it, I was walking toward home, holding the cat in my arms. She must be lost. “Finders keepers,” I thought.

I took the cat upstairs to my room. We played with a ball, and she jumped high to catch the ball. I was excited that I made a comfortable little bed for her in a box with a small blanket and gave her milk to drink. Soon, my mother called me to dinner.

Not long after I sat down at the table, Kevin started sneezing.

In the end, I had to return the cat.

In the back of my closet is a small box that has followed me to every new address. It’s the first thing I find a place for as the moving truck pulls away. The only remaining contents in it are dozens of notes in my mother’s tidy writing. My mother, who put her business degree to use running a small company with my father, while raising me, was always prepared and always gave me abundant love. By day she made marketing slogans and distribution strategies. By night: bubble baths and bedtime stories. She and I had the same February birthday. Each year my parents arranged wonderful parties.

When I was 3, she learned she had advanced breast cancer and immediately began to prepare by rescarching every available treatment. Each day, she would sit for hours at our dining table, her straight dark hair tied back, surrounded by piles of paper, studying, technical paragraphs.

When I was 7, the materials on the dining table began to change. Wrapping (包装) paper and ribbons (丝带) took the place of her highlighted pages. Paper creased (折) under her fingers. Knots (蝴蝶结) came together with a tiny creak. She had begun making a gift box for me.

Inside, she packed presents and letters for the milestones of my life she would miss—graduation, wedding, and every birthday until the age of 30. My mother died 10 days before our shared birthday. That morning, when I turned 12 and she would have turned 49, I woke up early and opened the box as my mother had shown me.

Neat rows of brightly wrapped presents glowed like the spring tulips (郁金香) that were just coming up in the front yard. In the package marked “12th Birthday”, I found a little ring with an amethyst (紫水晶) at its center. A white card curling around the present read: “I always wanted a birthstone ring when I was a little girl. I hope you like it, too. Happy birthday, darling girl! Love, your Mommy.”

On the morning of my high school graduation, I walked to the box.

Today I hit 31, and I sat in my room, holding the nearly empty box.

I always wondered how people would react if I tried to approach a stranger for help in a busy place like a street corner or in a bustling mall. I personally have hurried past a stranger who tried to catch my attention in a busy place.

Yesterday I had a taste of being stuck in such a desperate situation where your only hope of help would have to come from a total stranger.

I was in a busy shopping mall buying a large piece of luggage. After the purchase in one of the large and expensive shops, I picked up my phone from my pocket to call my driver waiting in the parking lot and my phone was dead.

I then requested the shop assistant selling me the luggage, which was not cheap at all, if she could ring the number of my driver for me. She replied, still all smiles, “I’m sorry Sir, but it is the shop policy that we cannot use mobile phones while working in the shop.”

As I was wondering what kind of policy that was, I saw a nice-looking teenage boy coming toward me. Remember my wife’s interesting theory that beautiful people are more likely to give you a hand when you’re in trouble, I thought I might have a chance. But before I could say a word, he walked past me. It turned out he simply didn’t see me.

I waited in the mall but it seemed nobody bothered to look at me. Disappointed and tired, I got out of the shop on to the busy street in front. I stood there with people rushing by, looking at their faces to see if they will show kindness to me. I began wondering how many times I had reacted to strangers like the shop girl and the teenager.

That was when I saw a young mother with her two kids.

Finally a man wearing a cheap T-shirt and dirty jeans seemed to notice me.

During breakfast, Alan suggested going to the Lego Land to have fun and his mom agreed.

“We’ll stop by the supermarket and buy some snacks and fruits. Now hurry and eat and then we’ll go. It’s going to be a lovely day. Grandma is coming with us. She’ll be here any minute.”

Alan ate his breakfast and then ran into his room to get his shoes. The problem was that he could only find one of them. He looked under his bed, but all he could see were dirty pants. He moved some of his toys out of the way, but still couldn’t find his shoe. After he had checked everywhere in his room, he ran into the kitchen. “Mom, I can’t find my shoe. Will you wait while I look for it?” he asked.

His mom thought about how many times she’d told Alan to clean his room up. She said something to Alan’s grandma in a low voice. Then, she said to Alan,“You will have to stay home. Your dad and I will take your brother Alex to the Lego Land. Grandma will stay at home with you.”

“No! Please wait for me. I want to go to the Lego Land,” Alan cried. “I’m sorry, Alan. I’ve told you a dozen times to clean your room and you did not do it. You can’t find your shoe now. It’s your own fault for not cleaning your room.You will stay home.”

Alan ran into his bedroom, crying. His mom came to the door and said, “Alan, clean that room of yours before I get home. I’ve told Grandma not to give you any sweets until you make your room clean and tidy.” She went out with Alex and the brothers’ dad. After a minute, they drove away.

Alan sat on his bed and cried for a long time.

Alan and his grandma were sitting at the table, eating when his mom, dad and Alex came home.