英语专业晨读美文-人物篇 13 Hepburn Forever

[00:01.98]Hepburn Forever

[00:04.92]Hepburn, the Daughter

[00:08.91]She told us how she felt pangs 1 of emptiness

[00:11.48]at the sight of other children in their fathers' arms,

[00:14.38]how she wished he were there so she could be like the others.

[00:18.02]As a child, she couldn't let go of that profound

[00:21.27]and natural desire. This is also why,

[00:24.36]after her divorces to both my father

[00:27.11]and my brother Luca's father,

[00:29.01]she did all she could to ensure

[00:30.81]that we continued to enjoy a complete relationship with both.

[00:34.16]That was my mother's world: feelings and emotions.

[00:38.37]Yet her feelings and emotions were never quite peaceful.

[00:41.52]Someone once wrote that feelings cause us to act,

[00:45.69]whereas emotions cause us to react.

[00:48.63]Well, she has feelings for all of us,

[00:51.76]yet she was never able to let go her emotions or

[00:54.81]find peace with herself. She was truly scared on some level.

[00:59.30]The abandonment of her father was a wound

[01:02.67]that never truly healed. She never really trusted

[01:05.81]that love would stay.

[01:07.50]Hepburn, the Wife

[01:09.55]Although too young to remember my parents together,

[01:12.11]I was told of romantic evenings,

[01:14.62]of candle light and soft music.

[01:16.87]Anyway, no one is to blame. There is only sadness

[01:21.30]when two souls cannot merge 3. The snarling 4 void

[01:24.42]left by her father's absence bore an equal share

[01:27.78]of the responsibility in the failure of both her marriages.

[01:31.27]My mother loved her husbands completely,

[01:33.96]and she hung on to the marriage for as long as she could.

[01:37.51]What she didn't do was to speak up and be heard

[01:40.78]when she needed to, and she didn't put up healthy boundaries.

[01:44.56]Exhausted by an authoritarian 5 mother,

[01:47.17]she wished for a world where caring and love came freely,

[01:50.58]but she had chosen two men who had to learn to cope with

[01:54.19]their feelings on their own.

[01:55.95]Hepburn, the Mother

[01:57.88]I remember school days, cramming 6 for exams for

[02:00.52]which she probably fretted 7 more than I did.

[02:03.06]She would test me before bed and again in the morning,

[02:06.47]waking up with the sort of sleepy head only adults enjoy.

[02:10.37]I remember her elation 2 at good grades,

[02:13.18]her support and positiveness for the “not so good ones.”

[02:16.72]I remember sleepovers on weekends,

[02:19.24]when we would chat with the lights out.

[02:21.46]We would talk about feelings and plans

[02:23.96]and people and things, but in that way

[02:26.53]that is specific to that darkness,

[02:28.51]like two souls suspended.

[02:30.34]I close my eyes and remember, through the nose,

[02:33.90]her scent 8: powdery, elegant, safe, strong,

[02:38.27]the scent of unconditional 9 love.

[02:40.72]I look down and see her delicate hands,

[02:43.78]their skin so thin I can faintly see their veins 10,

[02:47.06]her nails round, soft, and clear.

[02:50.15]They caressed 11 me, they walked me to school,

[02:53.36]and I held on to them when I was scared.

[02:56.26]Oh, how I miss them!

[02:57.76]Hepburn's Dream

[02:59.39]My mother's dream was always to be a prima ballerina.

[03:02.70]No matter how hard she had trained her most important

[03:07.06]and formative years had passed

[03:08.70]and could not be recaptured.

[03:10.50]The war had been tough on her,

[03:12.41]and poor nutrition had impaired 12

[03:14.92]some of her muscular growth and development.

[03:17.18]Besides, she was too tall for any male dancer of the era.

[03:21.60]My mother simply couldn't compete with the other dancers

[03:24.62]who had received proper training as well as

[03:27.60]proper sustenance 13 during the war years.

[03:30.02] The war had stolen her dream.

[03:32.04]She remembered going back to her room that day

[03:35.07]and “just wanting to die.”

[03:37.25]The dream that had kept her hope alive

[03:39.78]all those years had just vanished.

[03:42.14]Hepburn, the Actress

[03:43.96]My mother's acting 14 career was a second choice,

[03:46.67]a default choice. But the rules were the same as in ballet:

[03:50.99]hard work, discipline and professionalism.

[03:54.50]“Less is more” was at the core

[03:56.58]of my mother's basic “look” philosophy.

[03:59.18]Style is a word we often use,

[04:01.80]for a multitude of purposes.

[04:03.91]In the case of my mother it was the extension

[04:07.44]of an inner beauty reinforced by a life of discipline,

[04:11.10]respect for the other, and hope in humanity.

[04:14.14]She didn't go with the trends,

[04:16.37]didn't reinvent herself every season.

[04:18.57]She loved fashion but kept it as a tool

[04:21.89] to compliment her look.

[04:23.34]When she appeared, her clothes didn't scream out,

[04:26.64]“Look at me!” but, “This is me...no better than you.”

[04:30.56]And she truly believed in that.

[04:32.98]She didn't see herself as anything special or unusual,

[04:36.66]which is why she worked so hard

[04:38.53]and was always pleasant and professional.

[04:41.27]Her style was only an extension of who she was,

[04:44.47]the person we all admired, because down deep we knew

[04:48.28]that what we saw was not just clever packaging

[04:50.74]but an honest and 100 percent genuine human being.