by character, Grandma would slowly accomplish one word, then the next, so that a finished page would consume hours. I wept over the page representing my Grandma's recent hours invested in expressing her loving gratefulness to me -- whom she used to diaper! 一看到外祖母那熟悉的笔迹，我顿时回想起往日站在她的白色摇椅旁看她给亲戚写信的情景。外祖母一个字母一个字母地慢慢拼出一个词，接着是下一个词，因此写满一页要花上几个小时。捧着外祖母最近花费不少工夫对我表达了充满慈爱的谢意，我禁不住流泪――从前是她给我换尿布的呀。

24 Much later, retired from the Coast Guard and trying to make a living as a writer, I never forgot how those three \you\letters gave me an insight into how most human beings go about longing in secret for more of their fellows to express appreciation for their efforts.

许多年后，我从海岸警卫队退役，试着靠写作为生，我一直不曾忘记那三封“感谢”信是如何使我认识到，大凡人都暗自期望着有更多的人对自己的努力表达谢意。

25 Now, approaching another Thanksgiving, I have asked myself what will I wish for all who are reading this, for our nation, indeed for our whole world -- since, quoting a good and wise friend of mine, \wish for us, of course, the simple common sense to achieve world peace, that being paramount for the very survival of our kind.

现在，感恩节又将来临，我自问，对此文的读者，对我们的祖国，事实上对全世界，我有什么祝愿，因为，用一位善良而且又有智慧的朋友的话来说，“我们究其实都是十分相像的凡人，有着相似的需求。”当然，我首先祝愿大家记住这一简单的常识：实现世界和平，这对我们自身的存亡至关重要。

26 And there is something else I wish -- so strongly that I have had this line printed across the bottom of all my stationery: \

此外我还有别的祝愿――这一祝愿是如此强烈，我将这句话印在我所有的信笺底部：“发现并褒扬各种美好的事物。”

Thanksgiving, like Spring Festival, brings families back together from across the country. Waiting for her children to arrive, Ellen Goodman reflects on the changing relationship between parents and children as they grow up and leave home, often to settle far away.

如同春节那样，散居各处的美国人到感恩节就回家团聚。埃伦·古德曼在等待着子女回家的同时，思索着当子女长大离家，常常在远方定居之后，父母与子女关系的不断变化。

Where Is Home?

Ellen Goodman

1 \ 何处是家? 埃伦·古德曼

“孩子们要回家过节了。”

2 My friend announces this as we swap recipes and plans for Thanksgiving.

我们在相互交流着感恩节的菜单和节日安排时，我的朋友郑重其事地这么说。

3 I stop; amused for a moment at the language we now share. \the people who call their adult children, 'the kids'?\ 我愣了一下，不由对我俩用词相同感到有趣。“从什么时候起，”我问道，“咱们成了把长大成人的子女叫做‘孩子’的人？”

4 We laugh briefly at the passage of time, at thoughts of our own mothers who still refer to us as 'the girls,' and then she pauses.

想到时光流逝，想到我们自己的母亲仍把我们叫做 “丫头”，我俩不由得笑出声来，随后她止住了笑。

5 \asks my old friend, \our kids become the people who come home only at holidays?\ “从什么时候起，”我的老朋友问道，“我们的孩子成了到节假日才回家的人？”两人心头一时又酸又甜。

6 (1)This is the week when our friends bring in the younger generation, eagerly harvesting them from bulging airports. We noisily arrange children, nieces, nephews, cousins around tables, placing them like good china that we take out for special occasions. 这个星期是我们的朋友们将小辈带回家的时候，是急切地把子女从人满为患的机场接回去的时候。 我们忙乱地安排子女，侄子侄女，堂兄弟表姐妹什么的在餐桌旁一一就坐，就跟摆放在特殊场合才偶尔一用的精美餐具似的。

7 These energetic offspring do not come over the river and through the woods anymore. They struggle past check-in counters and wrestle their gear into stuffed overhead bins. They migrate back on airlines whose owners pray with their overbooked hearts that the weather will hold. 这些精力旺盛的后辈不再穿林过河而来。他们挤过检票处，使劲地把行李塞进座位上方满满的行李箱。他们搭乘着民航客机飞回家，那些公司心里想着客满的航班，祈祷着好天气持续下去。

8 (2)It is a testimony to the joyful pull of family that Americans saturated the air and highways this week to return to the place they no longer live but nevertheless call home. To get home for the holidays.

这个星期美国人挤满飞机和公路，都想回到他们已不再居住，却仍称之为家的地方。这证明了家庭具有能给人带来喜悦的吸引力的一个明证。 回家去过节。

9 Yet my old friend has touched, however delicately, on that other truth about a country scattered over generations and geography. We have gone from family life as everyday, from knowing every sock in our children's drawers and every frown on their faces, to welcoming them home to designated guest rooms.

但我的老朋友很微妙地触及了另外一个事实，即这个国家一代又一代的人散布在天南地北。我们的家庭生活原本平平淡淡，没有变化，连孩子抽屉里的袜子，他们脸上任何一道不悦神情都一清二楚，现在却要迎接他们回家，把他们安置在指定的客房里。

10 We have visitation rights in each other's lives now, say my friend, a mother in 617 who looks forward to greeting the children from 415 and 011. We keep in touch, we catch up, we say hellos and goodbyes. But we are still trying to learn how to compress \quantities.

我们相互拥有探视权，我的朋友说。她是位母亲，住在电话区号为617的地方，盼望着迎接分别住在区号为415和011地区的子女回家。我们保持联系，我们互通信息，我们相互问好，再依依道别。但我们仍试图学会如何把团圆的“美好时光”压缩的短些，但相聚的次数要多些。

11 My friend is not complaining. Neither of us longs to return to those wonderful yesterdays. The nests that once felt empty now feel roomy. 我的朋友并没有抱怨。我们谁都无意退回到那美好的往昔。一度显得空落落的老巢如今显得宽宽敞敞。

12 More to the point we raised our children to look over the horizons. We told them, the world is yours, go for it. One by one, they went for it, to 305 and 215 and 406. It is, after all, the American way.

更重要的是，我们把子女养育成人，是要他们眺望远方。我们跟他们说，世界是你们的，去拥有这个世界。他们一个个去拥有世界了，有的去了305，有的去了215，有的去了506。毕竟，这就是美国的生活方式。

13 So we email and travel and are grateful at how much easier it is to keep in touch -- at least virtual touch -- today than when our parents were young. We take joy in the \own lives.

于是我们收发电子邮件，我们旅行，想到如今保持联系――至少是虚拟的联系――要比我们自己父母年轻时便捷得多，不由心存感激。我们为孩子们创建自己的生活而深感欢欣。

14 Yet at times an unpatriotic thought crosses our minds. Is this American way, this long-distance family, an odd tradition as unique to our people as Thanksgiving?

然而，偶尔我们脑子里会掠过一个不那么爱国的念头。难道这就是美国方式，家庭成员相距如此遥远，这种与感恩节同样独特的不同寻常的国民传统？

15 We are a nation of movers, founded by people on pilgrimages, populated by those who were willfully or forcibly uprooted. Our national mythology is based on the lure of kicking out and starting fresh. (3)We moved west and west again on a promise of the last best place, which turned out to be just a way station. 我们是一个迁徙者的国度，由清教徒前辈移民创立，有意或被迫离乡背井者曾在这里居住。我们的民族神话建立在离开家园，重新开始这一诱惑之上。我们西进再西进，期待得到最后那片最好的土地，而那却只是路上一个小站而已。

16 Even Robert Frost's most familiar and most American definition -- \is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in\where you stay.

就连罗伯特·弗罗斯特那最为人所知,最美国化的定义――“家就是那个当你不得不

前往时，他们必须接纳你的所在”――也带有其潜台词，家不是羁留之所。

17 From the middle of the age spectrum, my friend and I have seen elders move from house to condo, north to south, aging sunbirds still migrating. On the other side of the generational sandwich we watch our children's words. They are \home\

作为中年人，我和朋友见过年长者从独立的住宅搬入公寓套间，从北方迁往南方，老了的太阳鸟仍迁徙不已。在一代又一代人的夹层的另一端，我们留意着自己子女的用词。他们星期二“回家来”，星期天 “回家去”。

18 Today many Americans find it hard to answer the question \all hold dual citizenship? Does the national concern about weaker family ties say less about our feelings than about our geography? 今天，许多美国人觉得难以回答“你是哪儿人”这个问题。我们是否都拥有双重籍贯？国民对越发薄弱的家庭纽带的关注难道更着眼于地域，而非我们的情感？

19 These questions hang lightly in the November air as we turn the subject from comings and goings of children to the advantages and disadvantages of chestnuts in the stuffing. This is the time, after all, of celebrating reunion, not musings about separation.

这些问题在11月的气氛中并不显得重要，我们的话题从子女归来转到火鸡填料里加栗子的好处与缺陷。毕竟这是欢庆团圆之时，不是默想离别痛苦的时候。

20 \table. It is each other. And somewhere between the turkey and pies we settle down to savor togetherness.

“孩子们”就要回家了。把我们带回摆满食物的餐桌旁的，不是食品匮乏，而是我们彼此。在享用火鸡与馅饼的间隙，我们定下心来品味团圆的温馨。

21 (4)Over this Thanksgiving holiday and in this restless country, we stop and feast on family. 在这个人们流动不停的国度里，整个感恩节期间我们始终留在家中享受天伦之乐。