My father met my mother in a poker¹ game. He said she was the best bluffer² he'd ever seen.She sat with 5 men at a table under an elm tree that shaded them from the hot Kansas city sun. Hey talent for subterfuge³ lay hidden behind her sHect. serene⁴ smile. She beat them all. My father couldn't take his eyes off her.

父亲是在一次牌局中认识母亲的。他说她是他所见过的出牌高手。她和5位男士一桌，头上遮天蔽日的榆树，把堪萨斯城火辣辣的太阳挡在了上空。她温柔而恬静地微笑着，高超的牌技深藏不露，她赢了他们所有的人。父亲的目光定格在她的身上，没法移开.

It was her company's annual picnic, and he walked her home. The next week, from his home in Chicago. he sent her a post card: Kernembcr me Please do. because be calling you one of these days.-David.

在她公司一年一度的野餐聚会后，他陪她步行回家。紧接着下个星期，父亲从芝加哥给她寄了一张明信片:“记得我吗?千万别忘记我，最近我会给你电话。大卫。”

She still has that post card am not sure what made her save Though he already had his heart set on her. She hadn't chosen him yet, at least not consciously.

至今她还珍藏着那张明信片，我不懂她为什么会把它给留下来当时，虽然父亲对她已是一则顷心，但她还没有钟情于他，至少还未意识到自己对他已经心仪.

As my father often told us while we were growing up, it was blind luck that he was at the  picnic that day.A salesman for a big electronics company. he was in town to meet with clients and happened to stop by the branch office that Saturday morning to make some calls. The telephone rang: it was the manager of a local radio station with whom my father had done some busines,. "Dave! Glad you're town!' he said, and invited him to come right over to their annual picnic.

正如父亲在我们小时候常说的那样，那天他会出现在野餐聚会上纯属偶然。当时他是一家大型电子公司的推销员，到城里与客户见面，在周六上午碰巧有儿个电话要打，就顺便去了分公司刚一进门，电话铃就响，是当地的一家电台的经理打来的，父亲同他有讨一此业务往来“大卫，你来的正是时候!”他要求父亲马上过去参加他们的年度野餐.

My mother was a writer at that radio ,ration⁵. If my tiithcr hadn't stopped by the office that morning, he told us, or if he'd gotten there two minutes later... we shivered with a delicious horror at the opportunity, the life-our lives- -that would have been missed.

母亲是那家电台的撰稿人，父亲说，如果那大上午他没去公司，或者迟去两分钟，那后果呢……我们带着甜蜜的恐惧为这稍纵即逝的机缘而稀嘘不已—果真如此的话，世上就没我们这几个孩子了。

My mother saw him when he was in town, but she dated other men, including a car salesman who entered our family lore⁶. Soon after she inet my father, the car salesman gave her a watch for her birthday. In those days the gift of a watch meant the relationship as moving towards an engageement. But she returned the watch, and one night a few months later. she woke her mother and told her she was going to mmry Dave.

此后每逢父亲进城，母亲都和他见面，但她当时也跟另外几个男人约会，其中包括我们后来时常提及的汽车经销商就在母亲和父亲相遇之后不久，那位汽车经销商还送给母亲一块手表作为她的生日礼物那时，手表常常作定情之物，意味着他们不久将一婚但母亲把手表退回去.并在几个月后的晚上，告诉我姥姥，她准备嫁给大卫。

A few months after the wedding. my father was transferred east. They settled in New York, in the house where I grow up.

婚礼后不久，父亲调往东部工作井在纽约定居下来，我就是在那儿长大的.

I was eight years old him when l met my fulurr husband. He was in high school,a friend of my brother's. I remember him only peripherally⁷. as I was much more interested in my brother's other friend-Francois, a Swiss exchange student, dark. mysterious and polished.

我8岁的时候就遇见了我未来的丈夫他当时在读中学，是我哥哥的一位朋友。我对他的印象并不深，因为我对哥哥的另一个朋友更着迷，他是瑞士籍的交换学生，皮肤黝黑，个性神秘，举止优雅.

15 years later the man I would eventually many came back to town for Christmas and stopped by my parents' house to pick up my brother for an evening out. When he saw me in the next room, he hissed⁸, "Who is that''"

15年之后，我最终要与之共度一生的男人回城过圣诞节。他顺便来我父母家，接我哥哥出去玩通宵，当他看到隔壁房间里的我时，低声问道“那是谁?”

My brother looked at him strangely and said. 'It was Lisa.'

我哥哥诧异地看了他一眼，答道:“那不是朋萨吗!”

He walked into the roots, reintroduced himself and pretended he didn't know how to wrap his Christmas gifts. 1 pretended to believe and helped. He came around a lot over the next few days. "I don't know who he 's interested in,"my mother told me, "you or your sister." I knew. But later that week I flew across the country to spend New Year's Eve with another man. Though I'd been chosen, I wasn't ready to admit it yet.

他走进房间，重新作了一通自我介绍，并假装不知道如何包装他的圣诞礼物，我也不拆穿他，腾出手来帮忙。接着几犬，他一个劲往我家跑。“我闹不清他到底是看上了谁，”母亲说，“你还是你妹妹。”可我心知肚明。不过在那个星期晚些时候，我飞往西海岸同另一个男孩共度除夕之夜。尽管我未来的丈夫已钟情于我，但是我还没有准备应允接受。

If the timing⁹ had been different,the distance less daunting¹⁰ and my heart not already--albeit unknowingly--engaged,I could have ended up with that man whom I went off to visit.Or if not him,them with someone else.

如果他不是在圣诞节来访，我同原先那个朋友又非远隔关山，而我又非早已心有所属—虽然我还没意识到这一点，我就可能嫁给远方的男友了，即使不是嫁给他，那也一定是另外一个男人.

Sometimes I think about at. How time ,weeps us along and puts us in a certain place where we're faced with one option or another , by chance and by the choice we make,we leave behind whole other live, we could have lived .full of different passions and   joys, different problems and disappointments.

有时我琢磨，时间是怎样把我们拢到一块，并置我们于某一特定的场合，让我们面对这样或那样的一种选择，我们放弃了其他很多条我们自己所作的抉择，我们放弃了其他很多我们可能走的充满不同激情和欢乐，不同困惑与失意的人生之路。

My father could have missed that picnic. Or my mother could have picked the car salesman She would have had other children and an entirely¹¹ different future.

我父亲本来有可能错过那次野餐，我母亲也有可能选择那位汽车推销商做终身伴侣，这样她就会有另外的孩子和一个完全不同的未来.

Other times--particularly w0hen I came home late to a sleeping house, nay¹² husband and daughter curled around each other after drifting off during the third reading of Jane Yolen's Owl¹³ Moon-I thank about the lives we would not have  had if chances or choices had brought us to a different place. And I shiver, much the way I did as a child at the story of my father's near miss, at the thought that I might have missed this life, this man, this child, this love.

有些时候，特别是当我夜深晚归之时，丈夫和女儿已经相拥人眠—他们一定是在第气次读简·约伦的《月下猫头鹰》时不知不觉人梦的，我就想，要是机缘或选择让我们置身别处，我们就不可能拥有眼前的生活r一想到我有可能错过这一生，这个丈夫，这个孩子，这一份爱，我就心有余悸，就像小时候听父亲故事那种感觉一样—父亲也是差点儿错过同母亲的姻缘.