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College
sweethearts
1
I
smile at my two lovely daughters and they seem so
much more mature than
we, their parents, when we were col ege
sweethearts.
Linda, who's 21, had
a
boyfriend in her freshman
year she thought she would
marry, but
they're not
together
anymore. Melissa, who's 19, hasn't had a
steady boyfriend yet. My
daughters wonder when they wil meet
great love. They think
their father and I had a classic fairy-
tale romance
heading for marriage
from
the outset. Perhaps,
they're right but it didn't seem
so at
the time. In a way,
love
just happens when you least expect it. Who would
have thought
that
Butch and I would end up getting married to each
other? He became my
boyfriend because of my shal ow agenda:
I wanted a
cute boyfriend!
2
We met through my col ege
roommate at the university
cafeteria.
That fateful
night, I was
merely curious, but for him I think it
was love at first sight.
have beautiful eyes
He kept
staring at me al
night long.
I real y wasn't that interested for two
reasons. First, he looked
like
he was a real y wild
boy, maybe even dangerous. Second,
although he was
very cute, he seemed a little
weird.
3
Riding
on his bicycle, he'd ride past my dorm as if
to be surprised
to see me. I liked the attention but
was cautious about his
wild, dynamic personality. He had a
charming way with
words
which
would charm any girl.
Fear came over me when I started
to fal
in love. His
exciting
resist. What was it that
attracted me? I always had an excel ent
reputation. My
concentration
was
solely on my studies to
get superior grades. But for
what? Col
ege is supposed
to be a time
of great learning and also some fun. I
had nearly achieved a great
education, and graduation was just one
semester away.
But I hadn't had
any
fun; my life was stale
with no component of fun! I
needed a
just
any had to be cute. My
goal that semester became:
Be ambitious and grab the cutest
boyfriend I can find.
4
I worried what he'd think of me. True,
we lived in a
time when a dramatic
shift
in sexual attitudes
was taking place, but I was a
traditional girl who wasn't
ready for the new ways that seemed
common on campus.
Butch
looked superb! I was not immune to his
personality,
but I was scared.
The
night when he announced
to the world that I was his
girlfriend,
I went along
with him. And then I
suddenly thought:
How
did that happen?
going to marry you one day and I wil be
a lawyer. You wil see.
5
I was laughing inside and said to
myself,
He's a
rebel without a good future. He's my
boyfriend because I hate my boring
student life. I just want to have
fun.
*
6
S
ure enough, the fol owing
month, I found out he had failed al his
courses. Consequently, he was going to
be expel ed from the university.
To
my disgust, he
seemed resigned to his fate. I knew there was
hope, so I
led
him to the col ege secretary for
reconsideration.
*
7
from UPenn and proceed to the Col ege
of Law,
appeal
on
his behalf, which was approved. Butch was granted
reconsideration.
And,
once we became steadies, he coordinated
his studies and social life,
passing
al of his
classes. He eventual y studied law.
8
Despite Butch's somewhat
wild character, at his core, he is always a
perfect
gentleman
and deserves a lot of credit for , he'd sometimes
take
the liberty of
displaying his love by planting a kiss on my lips
right
in front of my
astonished friends who watched and
disapproved. But the truth is we had
a
pure and
responsible relationship for seven ful years.
Sitting by the
palm trees,
hand in hand, we would listen to
romantic songs, watch the sunset,
and weave dreams of being together with
children of our own, forever.
9
Two years passed in a
blur. One day, Butch took me by surprise
as
he knelt down and
proposed marriage holding a dozen red roses! Fil
ed
with
deep
emotion, I confessed my love for him,
my
brain woke up
from fantasy land. I cried out,
too
young to tie
the knot. We haven't even graduated from col ege
yet!
real y
loved
him but was pessimistic about our chances for
success.
10
We
married five years later.
11
Our faithful journey of love and
learning took us down rocky roads
of
hardship and
on smooth easy-going highways. It is a long,
romantic,
sometimes crazy,
love story that sums up a 29-year long honeymoon
together
*as a
couple who are stil madly in love with each other.
Our
love commenced with a
casual attraction but bloomed into a mature love
and
rich
life.
Language Points:
1 I smile at my two lovely daughters
and they seem so much more mature
than
we,
their parents, when we
were college sweethearts. (Para. 1)
Meaning beyond words:
Married to her col ege sweetheart, the author now
is happy with
her
family and two grown daughters.
Note:
College
sweethearts
refer to someone with whom
one is in love and
by whom
one
is loved at col ege;
sweetheart is
equivalent to
lover
,
darling
,
beloved
,
or
dear
. For
example:
*Wel
done, sweetheart, we are all so proud of you.
做得好，宝贝，我
们以你为荣。
*My husband is the greatest guy in the
world; he was my col ege
sweetheart.
我丈夫是世
界上最棒的，大学时他就是我的恋人。
He tries to locate his former
sweetheart Melina from whom he has heard
nothing for a very
*long time.
他在努力寻找他以前的恋人梅利娜，
他已经很久没有她的消息了。
2 Linda, who’s
21, had a boyfriend in her
freshman
year she thought
she would
marry, but they’re not together
anymore. Melissa, who’s 19, hasn’t
had
a steady
boyfriend yet. My
daughters wonder when they will meet “The One”,
their great
love.(Para. 1)
Meaning beyond words:
Her
two daughters are at the age of just dating,
but they seem
to
be very mature wondering when they will meet their
true love.
3 They think
their father and I had a classic fairy tale
romance
heading for marriage
from the outset. (Para. 1)
Meaning beyond words:
Her
daughters cons
ider their parents’
marriage a
typical
conventional romance because they think
it aimed at marriage from the
very
beginning.
Usage
note:
classic, classical
1 classic
用作形容词表示“经典的；精彩的；一流的”。例如：
*Death on the Nile is one of the
classic works of Agatha Christie.
《尼罗河上的惨案》是阿
加莎
?
克里斯蒂的经典作品之一。
*
口语中也会用到
classic
这个词。当你看到一场精彩的演出时，就可以说
“That’s
classic!”来
表达赞美。
classic
用作形容词也表示“典型的；标准的”。例如：
*London is the classic example of the
scattered city.
伦敦是标准分散型
的城市。
*This statement was a classic il
ustration of British politeness.
这
项陈述是对英国礼貌的一
个典型说明。
classic
也可用作名词，表示“文学名着；经典作品；杰作”。例如：
*We have al the standard classics of
Hayao Miyazaki at home.
我们家
有
宫崎骏的所有的
经典作品。
2
classical
不能用作名词，只能用作形容词，表示“古典的；经典的”。例<
/p>
如：
*I spend a lot
of time reading and listening to classical music.
我
花了很多时间阅读和聆听
古典音乐。
*Classical
music is music written by composers such as Mozart
and
Beethoven.
像莫扎特
和贝多芬所创作的音乐称为古典音乐。
*
莫扎特和贝多芬所创作的音乐属于古典音乐
(classi
cal music),
但这些古典音
乐经久不衰，
有永久的意义和价值，所以这些音乐也可称为经典的音乐（
classi
c music
）。反
之，在前面
<
/p>
有一例中说可口可乐瓶子的设计是精彩的，一流的，所以是经典（
classic
）之
作，但很明显
可口可乐瓶子的设计不是古典的
（<
/p>
classical
）设计。所以，经典的（
classic
）
作品不一定
<
/p>
就是古典的（
classical
）作品
。
Note:
Classic
fairy-tale romance is used to describe a romance
blessed
with unusual
happiness. Colloquially, a fairy tale
can also refer to any story
extremely
unlikely to be
true.
4 Perhaps,
they’re right but it didn’t seem so at the time.
(Para. 1)
Meaning:
My
daughters’ perception may be right, yet our
romance back
then was
actually
not like what they
have assumed.
5 In a way,
love just happens when you least expect it. Who
would have
thought
that Butch and I would end up getting
married to each other? He became
my
boyfriend
because of my shallow agenda: I wanted a cute
boyfriend!
(Para. 1)
Meaning:
Love
comes your way when you don’t real y expect it. No
one
thought that
Butch and I would finally get married.
He became my boyfriend simply
because I
would
like to fulfil my
shallow wish: to have an attractive boyfriend in
col
ege.
Meaning
beyond words:
Here is the suspense of
the story
–
the author
gives a broad
hint that she wil tell us how she and
her husband got married at last.
6 We met through my college roommate at
the university cafeteria. That
fateful
night, I
was merely curious, but for him I think it was
love at first
sight. (Para.
2)
Meaning:
At
the school dining hal that important night, we
were
introduced to each
other
through my roommate. I
met Butch just out of curiosity, but he seemed
to fal in love with
me as soon as he saw me.
7 “You have beautiful eyes,” he said as
he gazed at my face.
(Para.
2)
Meaning beyond words:
The
author was obviously attractive to Butch
since he tried to
please her by praising her
eyes.
8 He kept staring at me all night
long. (Para. 2)
Note:
Both
gaze
at
and
stare at
mean “looking at something
fixed
ly for
a long
time
because of being
attracted, surprised, or thinking, etc.”.
Stare at
usually
has the additional
meaning
of “with eyes widely open”. Also, it usually
implies “with
great attention”;
gaze
at
usually
implies “in a dreamy and unaware state of
mind”.
9 I really wasn’t
that interested for two reasons. First, he looked
like he was a really
wild boy, maybe even dangerous. Second,
although he was very cute, he
seemed
a
little weird. (Para.
2)
Meaning beyond
words:
She wasn’t interested
in him because she got the
impression
that
he was wild and strange, which il ustrates that
she didn’t know
much about him at
the
beginning. Therefore,
it’s not true that their romance was heading for
marriage from the
start.
10 Riding
on his bicycle, he’d ride past my dorm as if “by
accident”
and pretend to
be surprised to see me. I liked the
attention but was cautious about
his
wild,
dynamic personality.
(Para. 3)
Meaning beyond
words:
She understood his little trick:
trying to see
her by
manufacturing excuses. Though she was
happy to be the focus of his
attention,
she was
also very alert to
his wild and dynamic personality.
11 He had a charming way with words
which would charm any girl. (Para.
3)
Meaning:
He knew how to
please and attract girls because what he said
was always
pleasant to their ears.
12 Fear came over me when I started to
fall in love. His exciting “bad
boy
image”
was just too tempting
to resist. What was it that attracted me?(Para.
3)
Meaning:
I was in an
awkward position: I started to fal in love with
him, but I was also
afraid of that. His bad boy image was
too attractive to resist, but at
the
same time it was
somewhat
fearful. So, what exactly was it in him that
attracted me?
Note:
Tempting
is a present
participle of the verb
tempt
, used as an
adjective to describe
the effect that something has on
someone’s feelings. For example, if
you
find something
tempting/char
ming/disgusting/frightening, it means it
tempts/charms/disgusts/frightens
you. In English there are a group of
words describing an effect that
something has on your
feelings and ideas. For
example:
*a tempting job
offer
一个诱人的工作机会
an alarming increase in racial
hostility
种族仇视的惊人增长