《纽约时报》公布最佳申请文书，看看“别人家”的文书怎么写的……

文章作者：小永哥留学     发布时间：2022-11-18 21:54:43     点击量：853

  《纽约时报》每年都会邀请当年被录取的申请者分享自己的文书，且从中选出思想和故事俱佳的优秀文书进行刊登。

  而被刊登的文书是从上百篇文书中精心挑选出来的，筛选团队基本是在教育和升学领域的专家，他们所挑选的文书具有一定的权威性。这些文书来自不同背景的学生，这些学生往往敢于在文书里突出个性，注重细节描写，这能够帮助我们构思自己的文书、开阔思路，对于即将进入美国留学申请季的准留学生而言极具参考价值。

  美国高中生的优秀文书到底长什么样？他们凭什么能够得到大学的青睐？下面随着小编一起来欣赏这五篇优秀文书吧！

1

作者：Zoya Garg

New York — Bronx

High School of Science

  My mom finds a baffling delight from drinking from glass, hotel-grade water dispensers. Even when three-day-old lemon rinds float in stale water, drinking from the dispenser remains luxurious. Last year for her birthday, I saved enough to buy a water dispenser for our kitchen counter. However, instead of water, I filled it with handwritten notes encouraging her to chase her dreams of a career.

  As I grew older, I noticed that my mom yearned to pursue her passions and to make her own money. She spent years as a stay-at-home mom and limited our household chores as much as she could, taking the burden upon herself so that my brothers and I could focus on our education. However, I could tell from her curiosity of and attitudes toward working women that she envied their financial freedom and the self-esteem that must come with it. When I asked her about working again, she would tell me to focus on achieving the American dream that I knew she had once dreamed for herself.

  For years, I watched her effortlessly light up conversations with both strangers and family. Her empathy and ability to understand the needs, wants and struggles of a diverse group of people empowered her to reach the hearts of every person at a dinner table, even when the story itself did not apply to them at all. She could make anyone laugh, and I wanted her to be paid for it. “Mom, have you ever thought about being a stand-up comedian?”

  She laughed at the idea, but then she started wondering aloud about what she would joke about and how comedy shows were booked. As she began dreaming of a comedy career, the reality of her current life as a stay-at-home mom sank in. She began to cry and told me it was too late for her. I could not bear to watch her struggle between ambition and doubt.

  Her birthday was coming up. Although I had already bought her a present, I realized what I actually wanted to give her was the strength to finally put herself first and to take a chance. I placed little notes of encouragement inside the water dispenser. I asked my family and her closest friends to do the same. These friends told her other friends, and eventually I had grown a network of supporters who emailed me their admiration for my mom. From these emails, I hand wrote 146 notes, crediting all of these supporters that also believed in my mom. Some provided me with sentences, others with five-paragraph-long essays. Yet, each note was an iteration of the same sentiment: “You are hilarious, full of life, and ready to take on the stage.”

  On the day of her birthday, my mom unwrapped my oddly shaped present and saw the water dispenser I bought her. She was not surprised, as she had hinted at it for many years. But then as she kept unwrapping, she saw that inside the dispenser there were these little notes that filled the whole thing. As she kept picking out and reading the notes, I could tell she was starting to believe what they said. She started to weep with her hands full of notes. She could not believe the support was real, that everyone knew she had a special gift and believed in her.

  Within two months, my mom performed her first set in a New York comedy club. Within a year, my mom booked a monthly headlining show at the nation’s premier comedy club.

  I am not sure what happened to the water dispenser. But I have read the notes with my mom countless times. They are framed and line the walls of her new office space that she rented with the profits she made from working as a professional comedian. For many parents, their children’s careers are their greatest accomplishment, but for me my mom’s is mine.

译文

  我妈妈发现从酒店级的玻璃饮水机上喝水有一种莫名其妙的快乐。即使是三天前的柠檬皮漂浮在陈旧的水中，用饮水机喝水仍然很奢侈。去年她生日时，我攒够了钱，为我们的厨房柜台买了一台饮水机。然而，我在里面装的不是水，而是手写的纸条，鼓励她追逐自己的职业梦想。

  随着我年龄的增长，我注意到我妈妈渴望追求她的激情，渴望自己赚钱。她花了好几年时间做家庭主妇，尽可能地限制我们的家务，把负担压在自己身上，以便我和我的兄弟可以专注于我们的学业。然而，我可以从她对职业妇女的好奇心和态度中看出，她羡慕她们的财务自由和随之而来的自尊。当我问她关于再次工作的问题时，她会告诉我专注于实现美国梦，我知道她曾经这样梦想过。

  多年来，我看到她毫不费力地点燃了与陌生人和家人的谈话。她的同情心和理解不同人群的需求、愿望和困难的能力使她能够触及餐桌上每个人的心灵。她能让任何人笑，而我希望她能因此得到报酬。"妈妈，你有没有想过做一名脱口秀演员？"

  她一听就笑了，但随后她开始大声想知道她会在舞台上开什么玩笑，以及喜剧节目是如何展开的。当她开始梦想着喜剧生涯时，她目前作为家庭主妇的生活的现实也随之沉沦。她开始哭泣，告诉我对她来说已经太晚了。我不忍心看着她在野心和怀疑之间挣扎。

  她的生日快到了。虽然我已经给她买了礼物，但我意识到我实际上想给她的是最终把自己放在第一位并抓住机会的力量。我在饮水机内放置了鼓励的小纸条。我要求我的家人和她最亲密的朋友也这样做。这些朋友告诉了她的其他朋友，最终我建立了一个支持者网络，他们通过电子邮件向我表达了对我母亲的钦佩。从这些电子邮件中，我手写了146份小纸条，归功于所有这些同样相信我妈妈的支持者。有些人向我提供了一些句子，有些人提供了长达五段的文章。然而，每张纸条都是同一种情感的迭加。"你很搞笑，充满生机，已经准备好登上舞台了"。

  在她生日的那天，我妈妈拆开了我形状古怪的礼物，看到了我给她买的饮水机。她并不感到惊讶，因为她已经暗示了很多年了。但是，当她继续拆开包装时，她看到饮水机里面有这些小纸条，填满了整个东西。当她不断挑出并阅读这些纸条时，我可以看出她开始相信这些纸条所说的内容。她开始流泪，手里拿满了纸条。她不相信这些支持是真的，不相信每个人都知道她有特殊的天赋并相信她。

  两个月内，我妈妈在纽约一家喜剧俱乐部表演了她的第一场演出。一年之内，我妈妈在全国首屈一指的喜剧俱乐部订下了每月一次的演出。

  我不清楚饮水机发生了什么。但我已经和我妈妈一起读了无数次这些笔记。它们被裱起来，在她的新办公场所的墙上挂着，那是她用做职业喜剧演员的利润租来的。对许多父母来说，他们孩子的事业是他们最大的成就，但对我来说，我妈妈的事业就是我的。

2

作者：Adrienne Coleman

Locust Valley, N.Y. —

Friends Academy

  “Pull down your mask, sweetheart, so I can see that pretty smile.”

  I returned a well-practiced smile with just my eyes, as the eight guys started their sixth bottle of Brunello di Montalcino. Their carefree banter bordered on heckling. Ignoring their comments, I stacked dishes heavy with half-eaten rib-eye steaks and truffle risotto. As I brought their plates to the dish pit, I warned my female co-workers about the increasingly drunken rowdiness at Table 44.

  This was not the first time I’d felt uncomfortable at work. When I initially presented my résumé to the restaurant manager, he scanned me up and down, barely glancing at the piece of paper. “Well, you’ve got no restaurant experience, but you know, you package well. When can you start?” I felt his eyes burn through me. That’s it? No pretense of a proper interview? “Great,” I said, thrilled at the prospect of earning good money. At the same time, reduced to the way I “package,” I felt degraded.

  I thought back to my impassioned feminist speech that won the eighth-grade speech contest. I lingered on the moments that, as the leader of my high school’s F-Word Club, I had redefined feminism for my friends who initially rejected the word as radical. But in these instances, I realized how my notions of equality had been somewhat theoretical — a passion inspired by the words of Malala and R.B.G. — but not yet lived or compromised.

  The restaurant has become my real-world classroom, the pecking order transparent and immutable. All the managers, the decision makers, are men. They set the schedules, determine the tip pool, hire pretty young women to serve and hostess, and brazenly berate those below them. The V.I.P. customers are overwhelmingly men, the high rollers who drop thousands of dollars on drinks, and feel entitled to palm me, a 17-year-old, their phone numbers rolled inside a wad of cash.

  Angry customers, furious they had mistakenly received penne instead of pane, initially rattled me. I have since learned to assuage and soothe. I’ve developed the confidence to be firm with those who won’t wear a mask or are breathtakingly rude. I take pride in controlling my tables, working 13-hour shifts and earning my own money. At the same time, I’ve struggled to navigate the boundaries of what to accept and where to draw the line. When a staff member continued to inappropriately touch me, I had to summon the courage to address the issue with my male supervisor. Then, it took weeks for the harasser to get fired, only to return to his job a few days later.

  When I received my first paycheck, accompanied by a stack of cash tips, I questioned the compromises I was making. In this physical and mental space, I searched for my identity. It was simple to explore gender roles in a classroom or through complex characters in a Kate Chopin novel. My heroes, trailblazing women such as Simone de Beauvoir and Gloria Steinem, had paved the road for me. In my textbooks, their crusading is history. But the intense Saturday night crucible of the restaurant, with all the unwanted phone numbers, catcalls and wandering hands, jolted me into an unavoidable reckoning with feminism in a professional world.

  Often, I’ve felt shame; shame that I wasn’t as vocal as my heroes; shame that I feigned smiles and silently pocketed the cash handed to me. Yet, these experiences have been a catalyst for personal and intellectual growth. I am learning how to set boundaries and to use my professional skills as a means of empowerment.

  Constantly re-evaluating my definition of feminism, I am inspired to dive deeply into gender studies and philosophy to better pursue social justice. I want to use politics as a forum for activism. Like my female icons, I want to stop the burden of sexism from falling on young women. In this way, I will smile fully — for myself.

  "摘下你的口罩，亲爱的，这样我就能看到你那漂亮的笑容了。"

  我只用眼睛回敬了一个训练有素的微笑，因为这八个人开始喝他们的第六瓶啤酒。他们无忧无虑的戏谑，近乎于嘲笑。无视他们的评论，我把吃了一半的肋眼牛排和松露烩饭的盘子堆在一起。当我把他们的盘子端回厨房里时，我警告我的女同事们，44号桌的人越来越醉，越来越吵。

  这并不是我第一次在工作中感到不舒服。当我最初向餐厅经理出示我的简历时，他上下扫视了我一眼，几乎没有看一眼那张纸。"嗯，你没有餐馆经验，但你知道，你可以被包装得很好。你什么时候可以开始工作？" 我感到他的目光灼灼地看着我。就这样了？没有适当的面试伪装？"太好了，"我说，对挣钱的前景感到兴奋。同时，沦落到我的 "包装 "方式，我感到很没面子。

  我回想起我在八年级演讲比赛中赢得的慷慨激昂的女权主义演讲。我徘徊在这样的时刻：作为高中 "F字俱乐部"的领导者，我为我的朋友们重新定义了女权主义，他们最初拒绝这个词，认为它很激进。但在这些情况下，我意识到我的平等观念如何在某种程度上是理论性的--一种由马拉拉和R.B.G.的话语激发的激情--但还没有生活化或妥协化。

  餐厅已经成为我的现实世界的课堂。所有的经理、决策者都是男性。他们制定时间表，决定小费，雇用年轻漂亮的女人来服务和主持，并厚颜无耻地斥责那些低于他们的人。这些顾客绝大多数都是男性，他们是那些在饮料上花费数千美元的高消费人群，他们觉得自己有资格向我这个17岁的孩子展示他们卷在一叠现金里的电话号码。

  愤怒的顾客，对他们错误地拿到了通心粉面而不是扇贝形的意大利面感到愤怒举动最初让我感到震惊。此后，我学会了安抚和舒缓自己的情绪。我已经建立起信心，对那些不愿意戴面具或粗鲁得令人吃惊的人采取坚定的态度。我为能控制我的餐桌而感到自豪，每天工作13个小时，自己挣钱。同时，我一直在努力把握接受在哪里划清界限的界限。当一名工作人员不适当地触摸我时，我不得不鼓起勇气向我的男性主管提出这个问题。然后，花了几周时间，骚扰者被解雇了。

  当我收到第一份工资时，伴随着一叠现金小费，我对自己所做的妥协产生了质疑。在这个身体和精神的空间里，我寻找着自己的身份。在课堂上或通过凯特-肖邦小说中的复杂人物探索性别角色很简单。我的英雄们，如西蒙娜-德-波伏娃和格洛丽亚-斯坦尼姆等开拓型女性，已经为我铺好了道路。在我的教科书中，她们的讨伐行动已经成为历史。但是，星期六晚上餐厅的激烈考验，以及所有不想要的电话号码、猫叫声和徘徊的手，使我对职业世界中的女权主义产生了不可避免的清算。

  我常常感到羞愧；羞愧我没有像我的英雄们那样大声说话；羞愧我假装微笑，默默地把递给我的现金装进口袋。然而，这些经历一直是个人和智力成长的催化剂。我正在学习如何设定界限，并利用我的专业技能作为增强能力的一种手段。

  不断地重新评估我对女权主义的定义，我受到启发，深入研究性别研究和哲学，以更好地追求社会正义。我想利用政治作为行动主义的论坛。像我的女性偶像一样，我想阻止性别歧视的负担落在年轻女性身上。通过这种方式，我将充分微笑--为了我自己。

3

作者：Hoseong Nam

Hanoi, Vietnam — British 

Vietnamese International School

  Despite the loud busking music, arcade lights and swarms of people, it was hard to be distracted from the corner street stall serving steaming cupfuls of tteokbokki — a medley of rice cake and fish cake covered in a concoction of hot sweet sauce. I gulped when I felt my friend tugging on the sleeve of my jacket, anticipating that he wanted to try it. After all, I promised to treat him out if he visited me in Korea over winter break.

  The cups of tteokbokki, garnished with sesame leaves and tempura, was a high-end variant of the street food, nothing like the kind from my childhood. Its price of 3,500 Korean won was also nothing like I recalled, either, simply charged more for being sold on a busy street. If I denied the purchase, I could console my friend and brother by purchasing more substantial meals elsewhere. Or we could spend on overpriced food now to indulge in the immediate gratification of a convenient but ephemeral snack.

  At every seemingly inconsequential expenditure, I weigh the pros and cons of possible purchases as if I held my entire fate in my hands. To be generously hospitable, but recklessly drain the travel allowance we needed to stretch across two weeks? Or to be budgetarily shrewd, but possibly risk being classified as stingy? That is the question, and a calculus I so dearly detest.

  Unable to secure subsequent employment and saddled by alimony complications, there was no room in my dad’s household to be embarrassed by austerity or scraping for crumbs. Ever since I was taught to dilute shampoo with water, I’ve revised my formula to reduce irritation to the eye. Every visit to a fast-food chain included asking for a sheet of discount coupons — the parameters of all future menu choice — and a past receipt containing the code of a completed survey to redeem for a free cheeseburger. Exploiting combinations of multiple promotions to maximize savings at such establishments felt as thrilling as cracking war cryptography, critical for minimizing cash casualties.

  However, while disciplined restriction of expenses may be virtuous in private, at outings, even those amongst friends, spending less — when it comes to status — paradoxically costs more. In Asian family-style eating customs, a dish ordered is typically available to everyone, and the total bill, regardless of what you did or did not consume, is divided evenly. Too ashamed to ask for myself to be excluded from paying for dishes I did not order or partake in, I’ve opted out of invitations to meals altogether. I am wary even of meals where the inviting host has offered to treat everyone, fearful that if I only attended “free meals” I would be pinned as a parasite.

  Although I can now conduct t-tests to extract correlations between multiple variables, calculate marginal propensities to import and assess whether a developing country elsewhere in the world is at risk of becoming stuck in the middle-income trap, my day-to-day decisions still revolve around elementary arithmetic. I feel haunted, cursed by the compulsion to diligently subtract pennies from purchases hoping it will eventually pile up into a mere dollar, as if the slightest misjudgment in a single buy would tip my family’s balance sheet into irrecoverable poverty.

  Will I ever stop stressing over overspending?

  I’m not sure I ever will.

  But I do know this. As I handed over 7,000 won in exchange for two cups of tteokbokki to share amongst the three of us — my friend, my brother and myself — I am reminded that even if we are not swimming in splendor, we can still uphold our dignity through the generosity of sharing. Restricting one’s conscience only around ruminating which roads will lead to riches risks blindness toward rarer wealth: friends and family who do not measure one’s worth based on their net worth. Maybe one day, such rigorous monitoring of financial activity won’t be necessary, but even if not, this is still enough

译文

  尽管有嘈杂的音乐、电玩城的灯光和成群的人，但很难从街角的摊位上分心，因为那里有一杯杯热气腾腾的炒年糕--一种用热甜酱混合的米糕和鱼糕。当我感觉到我的朋友拽着我的外套袖子时，我咽了咽口水，预计他想尝尝这个。毕竟，我答应过他，如果他在寒假来韩国看我，我就请他吃。

  这杯用芝麻和天妇罗点缀的炒年糕，是街头食品的高端变种，与我童年时的那种完全不同。其3500韩元的价格也与我记忆中的完全不同，只是因为在繁忙的街道上出售而被收取更多的费用。如果我拒绝购买，我可以安慰我的朋友和兄弟，在其他地方购买更多的食物。或者我们现在可以花钱买高价的食物，沉浸在方便但短暂的零食的即时满足感中。

  在每一笔看似无关紧要的开支中，我都会权衡可能的购买的利弊，仿佛我的整个命运都掌握在我手中。是慷慨好客，但不计后果地耗尽我们需要跨越两个星期的旅行津贴？还是精打细算，但有可能被列为小气？这就是问题所在，也是我非常厌恶的一种计算方法。

  由于无法保证以后的就业，又被赡养费的问题所困扰，在我父亲的家里，没有任何空间可以让我为紧缩开支或争抢面包屑而感到尴尬。自从有人教我用水稀释洗发水后，我就修改了配方，以减少对眼睛的刺激。每到一家快餐连锁店，都要向他们索要一张折扣券和一张包含完成调查的代码的过去的收据，以换取一个免费的奶酪汉堡包。利用多种促销活动的组合，在这类机构中最大限度地节省开支，感觉就像破解战争密码学一样惊心动魄，对减少现金伤亡至关重要。

  然而，虽然有纪律地限制开支在私下里可能是良性的，但在外出活动中，即使是在朋友之间，少花钱--当涉及到地位时--自相矛盾地花费更多。在亚洲家庭式的饮食习惯中，通常每个人都可以点一道菜，而总的账单，无论你吃了什么或没吃什么，都是平分。由于羞于要求自己不为我没有点的菜或没有参加的菜买单，我已经选择了完全不参加餐会的邀请。我甚至对那些邀请人主动请客的饭局也很警惕，担心如果我只参加 "免费饭局"，就会被当作寄生虫而被钉死。

  虽然我现在可以通过T检验来提取多个变量之间的相关性，计算进口的边际倾向，并评估世界上其他地方的发展中国家是否有陷入中等收入陷阱的风险，但我的日常决定仍然围绕着基本的算术。我感到不安，被强迫从购买的物品中减去几分钱，希望它最终能堆积成一美元，仿佛一次购买中最轻微的错误判断会使我的家庭资产负债表陷入无法挽回的贫困。

  我是否会停止对过度消费的压力？

  我不确定我是否会。

  但我确实知道这一点。当我交出7,000韩元以换取两杯炒年糕，在我们三个人--我的朋友、我的兄弟和我自己之间分享时，我被提醒，即使我们没有辉煌的成就，我们仍然可以通过慷慨的分享来维护我们的尊严。如果一个人的良知只局限于思考哪条路会通向财富，就有可能对更稀有的财富视而不见：那些不以净资产来衡量一个人的价值的朋友和家人。也许有一天，这种对财务活动的严格监控将是不必要的，但如果没有，这仍然是足够的。

4

作者：Neeya Hamed

New York — Brooklyn Friends School

  Sitting on monobloc chairs of various colors, the Tea Ladies offer healing. Henna-garnished hands deliver four cups of tea, each selling for no more than 10 cents. You may see them as refugees who fled the conflict in western Sudan, passionately working to make ends meet by selling tea. I see them as messengers bearing the secret ingredients necessary to truly welcome others.

  On virtually every corner in Sudan, you can find these Tea Ladies. They greet you with open hearts and colorful traditional Sudanese robes while incense fills the air, singing songs of ancient ritual. Their dexterous ability to touch people’s lives starts with the ingredients behind the tea stand: homegrown cardamom, mint and cloves. 

  As they skillfully prepare the best handmade tea in the world, I look around me. Melodies of spirited laughter embrace me, smiles as bright as the afternoon sun. They have a superpower. They create a naturally inviting space where boundless hospitality thrives.

  These humble spaces are created by people who do not have much. Meanwhile, in America, we possess all the tangible resources. Why is it, then, that we fruitlessly struggle to connect with one another? On some corners of Mill Basin, Brooklyn, I discovered that some people don’t lead their lives as selflessly.

  I never imagined that the monobloc chair in my very own neighborhood would be pulled out from under me. Behind this stand, the ingredients necessary to touch my life were none but one: a friendly encounter gone wrong. While waiting for ice cream, a neighbor offered to pay for me. This deeply offended the shop owner glaring behind the glass; he resented my neighbor’s compassion because his kindness is reserved for those who do not look like me. The encounter was potent enough to extract the resentment brewing within him and compelled him to project that onto me.

  “I guess Black lives do matter then,” he snarked.

  His unmistakably self-righteous smirk was enough to deny my place in my community. It was enough to turn a beautiful sentiment of kindness into a painfully retentive memory; a constant reminder of what is to come.

  Six thousand three hundred and fifty-eight miles away, Sudan suddenly felt closer to me than the ice cream shop around the corner. As I walked home, completely shaken and wondering what I did to provoke him, I struggled to conceptualize the seemingly irrelevant comment. When I walk into spaces, be it my school, the bodega or an ice cream shop, I am conscious of the cardamom mint, and cloves that reside within me; the ingredients, traits and culmination of thoughts that make up who I am, not what I was reduced to by that man. I learned, however, that sometimes the color of my skin speaks before I can.

  I realized that the connotations of ignorance in his words weren’t what solely bothered me. My confusion stemmed more from the complete lack of care toward others in his community, a notion completely detached from everything I believe in. For the Tea Ladies and the Sudanese people, it isn’t about whether or not people know their story. It isn’t about solidarity in uniformity, but rather seeing others for who they truly are.

  Back in Khartoum, Sudan, I looked at the talents of the Tea Ladies in awe. They didn’t necessarily transform people with their tea, they did something better. Every cup was a silent nod to each person’s dignity.

  To the left of me sat a husband and father, complaining about the ridiculous bread prices. To the right of me sat a younger worker who spent his days sweeping the quarters of the water company next door. Independent of who you were or what you knew before you got there, their tea was bridging the gap between lives and empowering true companionship, all within the setting of four chairs and a small plastic table. Sometimes, that is all it takes.

译文

  坐在各种颜色的单体椅子上，倒茶的女士们提供着治疗服务。抹了指甲油的手递上四杯茶，每杯茶的价格不超过10美分。你可能认为她们是逃离苏丹西部冲突的难民，热情地通过卖茶来维持生计。我认为他们是携带着真正欢迎他人所需的秘密成分的信使。

  在苏丹的几乎每个角落，你都能找到这些茶叶女郎。她们敞开心扉，穿着五颜六色的苏丹传统长袍迎接你，空气中弥漫着清香，唱着古老仪式的歌曲。她们触动人们生活的灵巧能力始于茶摊背后的原料：自产的豆蔻、薄荷和丁香。当他们熟练地准备世界上最好的手工茶时，我环顾四周。活泼的笑声的旋律拥抱着我，笑容像午后的阳光一样灿烂。他们有一种超能力。他们创造了一个自然诱人的空间，在那里，无边的热情蓬勃发展。

  这些简陋的空间是由那些并不富裕的人创造的。与此同时，在美国，我们拥有所有的有形资源。那么，为什么我们在相互联系方面的努力毫无结果呢？在布鲁克林米尔盆地的一些角落里，我发现有些人的生活并不是那么无私的。

  我从来没有想到，我自己社区的单人椅会从我脚下被拉走。在这个摊位的背后，触动我生命的必要因素只有一个：一次出错的友好相遇。在等待冰激凌的时候，一位邻居提出要为我付钱。这深深地触怒了玻璃后面的店主；他憎恨我邻居的同情心，因为他的善意只留给那些长得不像我的人。这次遭遇足以使他内心深处的怨恨爆发出来，并迫使他把这种怨恨投射到我身上。

  "我想黑人的生命确实重要，"他讽刺道。

  他那毫不含糊的自以为是的傻笑足以否认我在我的社区中的地位。这足以把一个美丽的善意的情感变成痛苦的记忆；不断地提醒我将要发生的事情。

  在六千三百五十八英里之外，苏丹突然感觉比街角的冰激凌店更接近我。当我走在回家的路上，完全被震撼了，不知道我做了什么来激怒他，我挣扎着要把这个看似无关紧要的评论概念化。当我走进空间时，无论是我的学校、杂货店还是冰激凌店，我都意识到居住在我体内的豆蔻薄荷和丁香；这些成分、特征和思想的结晶构成了我是谁，而不是我被那个人贬低的样子。然而，我了解到，有时我的皮肤颜色比我更能说明问题。

  我意识到，他话中的无知内涵并不是困扰我的唯一原因。我的困惑更多来自于他的社区完全缺乏对他人的关怀，这种观念完全脱离了我所相信的一切。对于茶叶女郎和苏丹人民来说，这不是关于人们是否知道他们的故事。这不是关于统一的团结，而是看到他人的真实面目。

  在苏丹的喀土穆，我敬畏地看着茶叶女郎的才能。她们不一定要用茶来改变人们，她们做的是更好的事情。每一杯都是对每个人的尊严的无声点头。

  在我的左边坐着一位丈夫和父亲，抱怨着荒谬的面包价格。我的右边坐着一个年轻的工人，他整天在隔壁的自来水公司的宿舍里扫地。不管你是谁，也不管你在到那里之前知道什么，他们的茶都是在四把椅子和一张小塑料桌的环境中，弥合了生活之间的差距，并赋予了真正的伴侣关系。

  有时，这就是它所需要的一切。

5

作者：Chaya Tong

Lafayette, Calif. —

 Miramonte High School

  I was the ultimate day care kid — I never left.

  From before I could walk to the start of middle school, Kimmy’s day care was my second home. While my classmates at school went home with stay-at-home moms to swim team and Girl Scouts, I traveled to the town next door where the houses are smaller, the parched lawns crunchy under my feet from the drought.

  At school, I stuck out. I was one of the few brown kids on campus. Both of my parents worked full time. We didn’t spend money on tutors when I got a poor test score. I’d never owned a pair of Lululemon leggings, and my mom was not versed in the art of Zumba, Jazzercise or goat yoga. At school, I was a blade of green grass in a California lawn, but at day care, I blended in.

  The kids ranged from infants to toddlers. I was the oldest by a long shot, but I liked it that way. As an only child, this was my window into a sibling relationship — well, seven sibling relationships. I played with them till we dropped, held them when they cried, got annoyed when they took my things. And the kids did the same for me. They helped as I sat at the counter drawing, and starred in every play I put on. They watched enviously as I climbed to the top of the plum tree in the backyard.

  Kimmy called herself “the substitute mother,” but she never gave herself enough credit. She listened while I gushed about my day, held me when I had a fever and came running when I fell out of the tree. From her, I learned to feed a baby a bottle, and recognize when a child was about to walk. I saw dozens of first steps, heard hundreds of first words, celebrated countless birthdays. Most importantly, I learned to let the bottle go when the baby could feed herself.

  And I collected all the firsts, all the memories and stories of each kid, spinning elaborate tales to the parents who walked through the door at the end of the day. I was the memory keeper, privy to the smallest snippets that go forgotten in a lifetime.

  I remember when Alyssa asked me to put plum tree flowers in her pigtails, and the time Arlo fell into the toilet. I remember the babies we bathed in the kitchen sink, and how Kimmy saved Gussie’s life with the Heimlich maneuver. I remember the tears at “graduation,” when children left for preschool, and each time our broken family mended itself when new kids arrived.

  When I got home, I wrote everything down in my pink notebook. Jackson’s first words, the time Lolly fell off the couch belting “Let It Go.” Each page titled with a child’s name and the moments I was afraid they wouldn’t remember.

  I don’t go to day care anymore. Children don’t hide under the table, keeping me company while I do homework. Nursing a baby to sleep is no longer part of my everyday routine, and running feet don’t greet me when I return from school. But day care is infused in me. I can clean a room in five minutes, and whip up lunch for seven. I remain calm in the midst of chaos. After taming countless temper tantrums, I can work with anyone. I continue to be a storyteller.

  When I look back, I remember peering down from the top of the plum tree. I see a tiny backyard with patches of dead grass. But I also see Kimmy and my seven “siblings.” I see the beginnings of lives, and a place that quietly shapes the children who run across the lawn below. The baby stares curiously up at me from the patio, bouncing in her seat. She will be walking soon, Kimmy says. As will I.

译文

  我是最守规矩的托儿所儿童--我从未离开过。

  从我还不会走路到上初中，金米的日托所就是我的第二个家。当我在学校的同学们和留在家里的妈妈一起回家参加游泳队和女童子军时，我却去了隔壁的小镇，那里的房子比较小，干旱时干枯的草坪在我脚下嘎吱作响。

  在学校里，我很突出。我是校园里为数不多的棕色孩子之一。我的父母都是全职工作。当我考试成绩不好时，我们没有花钱请家教。我从未拥有过一条Lululemon紧身裤，我妈妈也不精通尊巴、爵士舞或山羊瑜伽的艺术。在学校里，我是加州草坪上的一棵绿草，但在日托所里，我融入了其中。

  孩子们从婴儿到学步儿童都有。我是最年长的一个，但我喜欢这种方式。作为一个独生子女，这是我了解兄弟姐妹关系的窗口--嗯，七个兄弟姐妹关系。我和他们一起玩，在他们哭的时候抱着他们，在他们拿走我的东西时感到恼火。而孩子们也为我做了同样的事情。当我坐在柜台前画画时，他们帮助我，并在我上演的每部戏剧中担任主角。他们羡慕地看着我爬上后院的梅花树顶。

  金米称自己为 "替代母亲"，但她从未给自己足够的评价。她听我讲述我的一天，在我发烧时抱着我，在我从树上摔下来时跑过来。从她那里，我学会了给婴儿喂奶瓶，并认识到一个孩子什么时候会走路。我看到了几十个第一步，听到了几百个第一句话，庆祝了无数个生日。最重要的是，我学会了在婴儿能够自己吃东西时，让奶瓶离开。

  我收集了所有的第一次，所有的记忆和每个孩子的故事，在一天结束时向进门的父母们讲述精心准备的故事。我是记忆的守护者，了解那些在一生中被遗忘的最小的片段。

  我记得阿丽莎让我在她的小辫子上插上梅花，还有阿洛掉进马桶的那次。我记得我们在厨房水槽里给婴儿洗澡，以及Kimmy如何用海姆利希法救了Gussie的命。我记得"毕业"时的泪水，当孩子们去上学前班时的泪水，以及每次当新的孩子到来时，我们破碎的家庭如何自我修复。