In the morning there was hope. It sat like a fleeting gleam of light in my mother’s smooth black hair that I never dared touch; it lay on my tongue with the sugar and the lukewarm oatmeal I was slowly eating while I looked at my mother’s slender, folded hands that lay motionless on the newspaper, on top of the reports of Spanish flu and the Treaty of Versailles. My father had left for work and my brother was in school. So my mother was alone, even though I was there, and if I was absolutely still and didn’t say a word, the remote calm in her inscrutable heart would last until the morning had grown old and she had to go out to do the shopping in Istedgade like ordinary housewives.早上有希望。它像一道稍纵即逝的光芒，照在我母亲光滑的黑发上，我从来不敢碰它；它躺在我的舌头上，我正慢慢地吃着糖和温热的燕麦片，我看着母亲在报纸上一动不动地折叠着的纤细的手，还有西班牙流感和凡尔赛条约的报道。我父亲去上班了，我弟弟在上学。因此，尽管我在那里，但我母亲还是一个人，如果我一动不动，一句话也不说，她那神秘莫测的内心深处那份遥远的平静会一直持续到早晨，她不得不像普通家庭主妇一样出门去伊斯特加德购物。