Unit 3

Text A

Have you ever paid tributes to your mother? Have you ever expressed your emotions on the theme of mothers? Here industrialist Ross Perot and Professor Michael DeBakey are eager to salute their own mothers.

Mothers

An old Jewish proverb says, "God could not be everywhere, and therefore he made mothers."
Ann Taylor expressed her emotions on the theme of mothers with the following:
Who ran to help me when I fell,
And would some pretty story tell,
Or kiss the place to make it well?
My mother.
On account of the many tributes paid to mothers from the time of Eve, one might think the subject exhausted. But not so. Here, Industrialist Ross Perot and Professor Michael E. DeBakey are ready, indeed eager, to salute their own cherished mothers.

My mother was an angel.
Our family lived six blocks from the railroad tracks. During the Depression, the freight trains were filled with hoboes wandering from town to town looking for work. Every day they would come by our house asking for food. My kind mother would always share our food with them.
These people were poor and desperate, but we had absolutely no fear of them. When they knocked and asked for food, there was no concern that they might break in and steal things.
One day, a hobo said, "Lady, don't you have a lot of people stopping by here?"
My mother said, "Yes, we do."
"Do you know why?" he asked.
She replied, "Not really."
Then he took her out to the street and showed her a mark on our curb. He said, "Lady, this mark on your curb says that you will feed people. That's why you get so many visitors."
After the man left, I turned to my mother and said, "Do you want me to wash that mark off the curb?"
She replied with words that I will remember for the rest of my life. "No, Son, leave it there. These are good people. They are just like us, but they're down on their luck. We should help them."

Ross Perot
Industrialist

My mother's birthday, Christmas, is symbolic of her human warmth, her giving nature, her noble character, and her high Christian values. She and my father instilled those values in all their children from the earliest age, and she lived to make life better not only for her family, but for everyone she knew, particularly those less fortunate than she.
I recall vividly one incident in my childhood that had a lasting impact on me. Every Sunday after dinner, my parents would pack food, clothing, and books in our car and would drive, with their children, to an orphanage just outside our hometown. One Sunday I saw my mother packing a favorite cap of mine, and I protested. She calmly explained that I had several other caps and could easily get new ones, whereas the orphan who would receive this cap had none at all. She assured me that I would derive a special feeling of happiness when I saw the smile on the boy's face as he put the cap on his head. That lesson made a deep impression on me, and the truth of her words has certainly stood the test of time as other incidents in my life have validated her words. I consider the wonderful parents that God gave me my greatest blessing, for they both believed it was always more blessed to give than to receive.
Michael E. DeBakey, M.D.
Professor
(545 words)

New Words

Jewish
a. of the Jews 猶太人的

proverb
n. 諺語，語言

emotion
n. strong feeling of any kind 激情；情感

theme
n. the main subject or idea of a talk, book, movie, etc. （談話、書、電影等的）題目，主題

following
a. 下列的，下述的

account
n. 理由，根據；賬目