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Last week I sent a tuner over to my parents' apartment and had the piano reconditioned, for purely sentimental reasons. My mother had died a few months before and I had been getting things in order for my father, a little bit at a time. I put the jewelry in special silk pouches. The sweaters she had knitted in yellow, pink bright orange-all the colors I hated-I put those in mothproof boxes. I found some old chinese silk dresses, the kind with little slits up the sides. I rubbed the old silk against my skin, and then wrapped them in tissue and decided to take them home with me.
上周，出于懷舊，我請了一位調琴師去父母家。母親已于幾個月前去世，我一直在為父親整理東西，一次整理一點兒。把珠寶放進特制的絲袋里，把她編織的彩色毛衣，黃的、粉的、亮橙的，這都是我最不喜歡的顏色，全都放進防蛀箱里。我還找到一些兩側開小衩的舊絲綢旗袍。我先將這些舊絲綢放在皮膚上輕輕地摩擦，然后用包裝紙包好，要把它們帶回我家。
After I had the piano tuned, I opened the lid and touched the keys. It sounded even richer that I remembered. Really, it was a very good piano. Inside the bench were the same exercise notes with handwritten scales, the same sedcondhand music books with their covers held together with yellow tape.
鋼琴調好后，我打開琴蓋，輕觸琴鍵。琴聲聽起來比我記憶中的圓潤。真的，這是一架很好的鋼琴。琴凳里放著的還是那些東西：手寫的音階練習曲，一些封皮用黃色膠條粘在一起的二手琴譜。
I opened up the Schumann book to the dark little piecce I had played at the recital. It was on the left-hand page, "Pleading Child" It looked more difficult than I remembered. I played a few bars, surprised at how easily the notes came back to me.
我打開舒曼的樂譜，找到了當年我演奏的那段傷感樂曲《祈求的孩子》。它在左半頁。它可比我記憶中的還要難。彈了幾節，我就驚奇地發現那些音符竟那么輕松地再現。
And for the first time, or so it seemed, I noticed the piece on the right-hand side, It was called "Perfectly Contented" I tried to play this one as well. It had a lighter melody but with the same flowing rhythm and turned out to be quite easy. "Pleading Child" was shorter but slower; "Perfectly Contented" was longer but faster. And after I had played them both a few times, I realized they were two halves of the same song.
我第一次，或感覺好像是第一次，注意到右邊的樂曲標題是《心滿意足》。我也試著彈這首曲子。它的曲調比較輕松，但節奏同樣流暢，不是很難。《祈求的孩子》較短、較慢，而《心滿意足》更長、更快一些。在我彈了幾遍后，我意識到，原來這兩個曲子是同一首歌的兩個組成部分。
