新视野大学英语 读写教程第二册 unit4-c

Section C

My First Day Abroad

It was my first day. I had come the night before, a black and cold night before — as it was expected to be in the middle of January, though I didn't know that at the time — and I could not see anything clearly on the way from the airport, even though there were lights everywhere. As we drove along, someone would single out to me a famous building, an important street, a park, a bridge that when built was thought to be a landmark¹. In a daydream² I used to have, all these places were points of happiness to me; all these places were lifeboats to my small drowning soul. I would imagine myself entering and leaving them, and just that — entering and leaving over and over again — would see me through a bad feeling I did not have a name for. I only knew it felt a little like sadness but heavier than that. Now that I saw these places, they looked ordinary, dirty, worn down by so many people entering and leaving them in real life, and it occurred to me that I could not be the only person in the world for whom they were an item of imagination. It was not my first struggle with the disappointment of reality and it would not be my last. The underclothes that I wore were all new, bought for my journey, and as I sat in the car, moving this way and that to get a good view of the sights before me, I was reminded of how uncomfortable the new can make you feel.
I got into an elevator (电梯), something I had never done before, and then I was in an apartment and seated at a table, eating food just taken from a refrigerator. In the place I had just come from, I always lived in a house, and my house did not have a refrigerator in it. Everything I was experiencing — the ride in the elevator, being in an apartment, eating day-old food that had been stored in a refrigerator — was such a good idea that I could imagine I would grow used to it and like it very much. But at first, it was all so new that I had to smile with my mouth turned down at the corners. I slept deeply that night, but it wasn't because I was happy and comfortable — quite the opposite; it was because I didn't want to take in anything else.
That morning, the morning of my first day, the morning that followed my first night, was a sunny morning. It was not the sort of bright yellow sun making everything lift up at the edges, almost in fear, that I was used to, but a pale yellow sun, as if the sun had grown weak from trying too hard to shine; but still it was sunny. That was nice and made me miss my home less. And so, seeing the sun, I got up and put on a dress, a gay³ dress made out of bright-colored cloth — the same sort of dress that I would wear if I were at home and starting out for a day in the country. It was all wrong. The sun was shining but the air was cold. It was the middle of January, after all. But I did not know that the sun could shine and the air remain cold; no one had ever told me. What a feeling that was! How can I explain? Something I had always known — the way I knew my skin was the brown color of a nut rubbed repeatedly⁴ with a soft cloth, or the way I knew my own name — something I took completely for granted⁵, "the sun is shining, the air is warm" — was not so. I was no longer in a tropical⁶ area. This realization⁷ now entered my life like a flow of water dividing previously⁸ dry and solid ground, creating two banks, one of which was my past — so familiar and predictable that even my unhappiness then made me happy now just to think of it; the other my future, an empty gray page, a cloudy sea image on which rain was falling and no boats were in sight. I was no longer in a tropical area and I felt cold inside and out, the first time such a feeling had come over me.
Words: 747

1 landmark   

n.陆标，划时代的事，地界标

参考例句：

• The Russian Revolution represents a landmark in world history.俄国革命是世界历史上的一个里程碑。
• The tower was once a landmark for ships.这座塔曾是船只的陆标。

2 daydream   

v.做白日梦，幻想

参考例句：

• Boys and girls daydream about what they want to be.孩子们遐想着他们将来要干什么。
• He drifted off into another daydream.他飘飘然又做了一个白日梦。

3 gay   

adj.同性恋的；色彩鲜艳的；n.(男)同性恋者

参考例句：

• I don't know he was a gay person.我不知道他是同性恋者。
• Spring comes round to the earth again and everything looks fresh and gay.春回大地，万象更新。

4 repeatedly   

adv.重复地，再三地

参考例句：

• The loudspeakers blared the speech repeatedly.扬声器里反复大声地播送那篇演讲。
• He repeatedly beat his foot upon the floor.他反复用脚敲着地板。

5 granted   

conj.假定，就算v.（退一步）承认( grant的过去式和过去分词 )；（尤指正式地或法律上）同意；准许；让渡

参考例句：

• The president granted a general amnesty for all political prisoners. 总统大赦了所有的政治犯。
• She feared she would not be granted re-entry into Britain. 她担心不会获准再次踏足英伦。

6 tropical   

adj.热带的，热带的，炎热的

参考例句：

• You must grow these tropical flowers in a glasshouse.你必须把这些热带花卉种在温室里。
• This disease is widespread in tropical areas.这种疾病在热带地区蔓延很广。

7 realization   

n.实现；认识到，深刻了解

参考例句：

• We shall gladly lend every effort in our power toward its realization.我们将乐意为它的实现而竭尽全力。
• He came to the realization that he would never make a good teacher.他逐渐认识到自己永远不会成为好老师。

8 previously   

adv.以前，先前（地）

参考例句：

• The bicycle tyre blew out at a previously damaged point.自行车胎在以前损坏过的地方又爆开了。
• Let me digress for a moment and explain what had happened previously.让我岔开一会儿，解释原先发生了什么。