Iused to find notes left in the collection basket, beautiful notes about my homilies1. The person who penned the notes would add reflections to my thoughts and would always include some quotes from poets he or she had read and remembered and loved. The notes fascinated2 me. Here was someone immersed in a search for truth and beauty. Words had been treasured, words that were beautiful.
It was a long time before I met the author of the notes.
One Sunday morning, I was told that someone was waiting for me in the office. The young person who answered the door said that it was“the woman who said she left all the notes.” When I saw her I was shocked, since I immediately recognized her from church but had no idea that it was she who wrote the notes. She was sitting in a chair in the office with her hands folded in her lap. Her head was bowed and when she raised it to look at me, she could barely smile without pain. Her face was disfigured3, and the skin so tight from surgical procedures4 that smiling or laughing was very difficult for her. She had suffered terribly from treatment to remove the growths5 that had so marred6 her face.
We chatted for a while that Sunday morning and agreed to meet for lunch later that week.
As it turned out we went to lunch several times, and she always wore a hat during the meal. I think that treatments of some sort had caused a lot of her hair to fall out. We shared things about our lives. I told her about my schooling and growing up. She told me that she had worked for years for an insurance company. She never mentioned her family, and I did not ask.
We spoke of authors we both had read, and it was easy to tell that books are a great love of hers.
I have thought about her often over the years and how she struggled in a society that places an incredible premium on7 looks, class, wealth and all the other fineries8 of life. She suffered from a disfigurement that cannot be made to look attractive. I know that her condition hurt her deeply.
Would her life have been different had she been pretty? Chances are it would have. And yet there were a sensitivity and a beauty to her that had nothing to do with looks. She was one to be listened to, whose words were so easy to take to heart. Her words came from a wounded but loving heart, very much like all hearts, but she had more of a need to be aware of it, to live with it and learn from it. She possessed a sense of beauty. Her only fear in life was the loss of a friend.
How long does it take most of us to reach that level of human growth, if we ever get there? We get so consumed and diminished9, worrying about all the things that need improving, we can easily forget to cherish those things that last. Friendship, so rare and so good, just needs our care—maybe even the simple gesture of writing a little note now and then, or the dropping of some beautiful words in a basket, in the hope that such beauty will be shared and taken to heart.
The truth of her life was a desire to see beyond the surface for a glimpse of what it is that matters. She found beauty and grace and they befriended her, and showed her what is real.
过去，我常常在教堂的募捐篮里面发现一些优美的留言，有些涉及我的布道。写这些留言的人不仅对我的一些观点加以评论，同时还会引用一些他/她曾经读过的，令他/她难忘又喜爱的诗人的话。我被这些便条迷住了。其中就有一个执着于追寻真与美的人。其话语，字字珠玑，优美动人。
过了很久我才见到这些便条的作者。
一个星期天早上，我被告知有人正在办公室等我。帮我开门的年轻人说“是个女人，所有便条都是她放的。”看见她我大吃一惊，我一眼就认出她来做过礼拜，只是我一直不知道那些留言是她写的。她坐在办公室的一把椅子上，两手相扣放在膝上，低垂着头。当她抬起头看我的时候，微笑起来却十分费劲。那是一张破了相的脸，外科手术使她的面部绷得紧紧的，微笑或大笑对她来说非常困难。为了祛除脸上碍眼的肉瘤，她接受了手术治疗，这令她吃尽苦头。
那天早上我们聊了一会，并决定那个星期再找个时间共进午餐。
后来我们不止吃了一顿，而是好几顿。每次吃饭的时候她都戴着帽子。我想可能是由于她接受的某种治疗使她掉了不少头发。我们分享各自生活中的点点滴滴。我跟她讲我的学校和成长经历。她告诉我她曾在一家保险公司工作多年。她从来没提及自己的家庭，我也没有问。
我们谈到大家都读过的作家，不难发现她非常喜欢看书。
这些年我经常想起她，在这个重视外表、地位和财富等虚名浮利的社会中她是如何挣扎过来的？毁掉的容颜使她不再迷人。我知道这深深地刺痛了她。
如果她变得漂亮，她的生活会不会有所不同呢？很有可能。不过她有种与外表完全无关的灵气和美。她的话轻而易举地征服了人心，她正是我们要聆听的声音。她的话语出于一颗受伤却充满爱的心，就像所有人的心一样，只不过她比别人更清楚自己的心灵，用心去体会心声并从中有所领悟。她拥有一种美感。她生命里惟一的恐惧就是失去朋友。
我们中的大多数人即便可能，要花多久才能步入这种成熟的境界？我们老觉得身心疲惫，怀才不遇，只为眼前的不足忧心忡忡，却轻易忘了珍视那些历久常新的东西。友谊珍贵而美好，只需我们用心呵护——也许只是简简单单的手势就已足够，譬如不时地写几句话给朋友，或者往篮子里投些优美动人的字条，以期大家都能分享、记住这美妙的瞬间。
她生命的真谛就是要透过事物的表面一睹其真正的本质。她发现了美和优雅，而美和优雅也待她如友，把生命的真谛呈现给了她。
1. homily n. 布道；说教
2. fascinate v. 使…着迷
3. disfigure v. 损伤外貌
disfigurement n. 毁容
4. surgical procedure 手术过程
5. growth n. 瘤，癌
6. mar v. 弄坏；损坏
7. place a premium on sb./sth. 重视
8. finery n. 华丽的装饰，此指社会上的虚名浮利
9. diminish v. 贬低