quietaxe的博客

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It was hard to believe that Samuel was finishing up first grade in one more day. It seemed that he was born only yesterday.

Hannah, my colleague, came to inform me that I got a phone call. “I think it was your father.” She said. Maybe he wanted to remind me about something. Or, more likely, something went wrong at home. People say “no news is good news.” Last time, when he called me up unexpectedly, there was smoke in the kitchen oven. What could be wrong this time? I hasted my steps toward the phone in the other end of the room.

“Does Samuel have some arrangement this afternoon?” My father said from the other end of the phone. It was a kind of controlled calm. “He did not come down from the bus.”

“WHAT?” I nearly collapsed.

“Last time he went to some club after school, so I thought there was something again. The other Moms were also surprised but they saw that I was calm, so they did not offer help.”

“No, there is nothing today.” Last time, I forgot to inform grandpa about an after school program Samuel was signed up to. But where could he be this time? I was trying hard to think fast. “I will call school first and let you know if he got on the bus at all.”

I run back to my desk to look for the phone number.

“What happened?” Hannah asked. Her son was four years younger than Samuel and she always said that she would learn from me what her future would be.

“Samuel did not get down the school bus.” I answered without stopping, running faster toward the phone again, the number in hand.

Luckily, some one picked up the phone from the elementary school.

“Who is Samuel’s teacher? Mrs. C.? I will see if she is still here.” The lady was very calm. With several hundred kids in hand, many things could happen. This was a job I could not take; no matter how much I love kids.

After “ten thousand minutes” in Samuel’s term, Mrs. C’s voice came from the other end. “I am absolute sure that I put him on the bus. I will call the transportation company and they will page the bus drive. He is on bus 18, right?” Mrs. C was always right to the point.

She continued, “It is more likely that he fell asleep in the bus. Believe me, it happened before. It is hard to believe that they can fall asleep in such a short ride with so many kids on board, but they do. I will know what happened as soon as they reached the bus driver. Then I will call you. Is this your phone number?”

Spelling out the phone number, I calmed down a little bit. Samuel knows the area very well, and he has good sense of direction, even if he got down at the next bus stop, surely he would find way home. Before I hung up with Mrs. C, a red light started to blink on the phone. Could it be a phone call from home? I immediately dialed back.

“Samuel is back. He was busy talking and when he realized that the bus already left the stop. As soon as the bus driver saw him in the back seat, he sent him back. ” My father said with great relief, I could almost see the big smile on his face. My father did not even wait to check who was calling! In the background, I could hear the boys giggling.

I collapsed to a chair. My legs were already soft. Galena came up. Her daughter graduated from college last year. “The first time this kind of things happened I almost had a heart attack. They went to a park when she was in second grade. The park was very close to her friend’s home, so the two girls went there without telling anyone. The teacher thought they were lost, together with some policemen; they searched every corner of the park. For the whole afternoon, nobody knew where they were…..”

My heart felt weak too. This was past.

吃饱喝足之后, 捧着圆鼓鼓的小肚子愁眉苦脸的说, “妈妈, 我腰疼. “

“那里疼?” 妈妈愣住了.

“这里.” 拍拍小肚子.

“肚子疼, 不算病..” 妈妈一边念叨, 一边揉揉, 也就好了.

过了两天, 又捧着肚子来了. “妈妈, 我脖子疼.”

妈妈正切着菠萝, 小家伙忙忙的跑过来, 飞起两根眉毛, “我要吃这个萝菠!”

“罗卜? 妈妈切的是菠萝.”

“就是这个.” 一脸不高兴.

This Family Medical Guide was bought soon after Samuel was born. Blessed by God, we seldom had to use it. Only recently, some strange small red bumps appeared on Jedi’s skin, so this book was dig out from the book shelf.

Of course, Samuel’s little nose was there when we were comparing the pictures of various skin lesions with Jedi’s red bumps. As soon as we concluded that it was nothing to worry, Samuel carried the book away.

In the next few days, Samuel explored the pictures in the book. He showed us different ways the eyes would look when something went wrong. Few days later, he flipped away from the pictures. In the evening, he left his teacher a note read, “I just want to make sure that you know melanoma is a form of skin cancer.” His mother, of course, was amused; she could barely spell the long “melanoma” herself! “Do you know how to pronounce this word?” She asked little Sam. “No, but I know it is a form of skin cancer.” The boy protested.

Well, it is better that he is reading a book than, say, playing computer games, some advised the worried mother. Thinking that they have already discovered www.pbskids.com, the mother did not bother him too much, even though the first thing he did in the morning was reading the brick book.

All the reading benefited him a lot. When a red spot appeared on the side of his lip, he started to self diagnose. “It sure looks like a cold sore, but it is not really sore. What is Herpes anyway?” Samuel asked his mother. Things do not stop there either. A few days later, the boy started to advise his father, “Dad, you need to exercise. You have high risk of heart attack!”

This happened when Samuel was in first grade.

世上不如意十之八九, 有几个故事要写, 却没时间.  终于坐下来, 又想不起来.

妈妈早上要去数老鼠, 两兄弟都号称要去, 却没人动弹. 妈妈说, 再给你们一分钟, 没准备好我可不等了!

忽然身后有人冲过来, 了不得, 斋斋闷着头, 竖着两个看不见的犄角已经撞上来了!

晚上, 两人准备刷牙, 斋斋要踩在椅子上. 妈问如果将椅子搬掉呢? 小家伙嘟起嘴, 尽量竖起眉毛, 仍旧短粗胖的手指一指大头,

“我就用我的大牛头把你撞倒!”

“我跑掉呢?”

“我就用我的大牛蹄子…” 举起一只小肉爪, “把你按住!”

斋斋和雅爱妹妹一起上学, 路上要走很久. 下面是一小段对话, 都正好跟他们的长辈有关. 可见小孩子说话不全是前言不答后语.

斋斋: “我的力气很大, 我姥爷的力气更大更大; 嗯-, 我的头最--硬!”

雅爱妹妹: “我自己刷牙, 要不刷干净, 就象奶奶一样, 都掉光. 她期太多糖了.”

斋斋已经4 岁了. 短胖的身材有点抽长, 不再象个Baby. 早上, 妈妈摸着他圆滚滚的胳膊说, “长结实了, 不能再说肥嘟嘟了, 可是也不能说瘦嘟嘟.” 斋斋头一偏, 皱着眉头认真的说, “只能说是长大了.”

斋斋理直气壮的问姥爷, “勒爷, 你的头发怎么白了?” 姥爷说, “我年纪大了呀.” 又照着他的口气问, “你的头发怎么不白?” “我还年青呀.”