The Notebook 精彩片段：
Kayaks and Forgotten Dreams
Allie woke early the next morning, forced by the incessant chirping of starlings, and rubbed her eyes, feeling the stiffness in her body. She hadnt slept well, waking after every dream, and she remembered seeing the hands of the clock in different positions during the night, as if verifying the passage of time.
Shed slept in the soft shirt hed given her, and she smelled him once again while thinking about the evening theyd spent together. The easy laughter and conversation came back to her, and she especially remembered the way hed talked about her painting.
It was so unexpected, yet uplifting, and as the words began to replay in her mind, she realized how sorry she would have been had she decided not to see him again.
She looked out the window and watched the chattering birds search for food in early light. Noah, she knew, had always been a morning person who greeted dawn in his own way. She knew he liked to kayak or canoe, and she remembered the one morning shed spent with him in his canoe, watching the sun come up. Shed had to sneak out her window to do it because her parents wouldnt allow it, but she hadnt been caught and she remembered how Noah had slipped his arm around her and pulled her close as dawn began to unfold. "Look there," hed whispered, and shed watched her first sunrise with her head on his shoulder, wondering if anything could be better than what was happening at that moment.
And as she got out of bed to take her bath, feeling the cold floor beneath her feet, she wondered if hed been on the water this morning watching another day begin, thinking somehow he probably had.
She was right.
Noah was up before the sun and dressed quickly, same jeans as last night, undershirt, clean flannel shirt, blue jacket, and boots. He brushed his teeth before going downstairs, drank a quick glass of milk, and grabbed two biscuits on the way out the door. After Clem greeted him with a couple of sloppy licks, he walked to the dock where his kayak was stored. He liked to let the river work its magic, loosening up his muscles, warming his body, clearing his mind.
The old kayak, well used and river stained, hung on two rusty hooks attached to his dock just above the waterline to keep off the barnacles. He lifted it free from the hooks and set it at his feet, inspected it quickly, then took it to the bank. In a couple of seasoned moves long since mastered by habit, he had it in the water working its way upstream with himself as the pilot and engine.
The air was cool on his skin, almost crisp, and the sky was a haze of different colors: black directly above him like a mountain peak, then blues of infinite range, becoming lighter until it met the horizon, where gray took its place. He took a few deep breaths, smelling pine trees and brackish water, and began to reflect. This had been part of what hed missed most when he had lived up north. Because of the long hours at work, there had been little time to spend on the water. Camping, hiking, paddling on rivers, dating, working ... something had had to go. For the most part hed been able to explore New Jerseys countryside on foot whenever hed had extra time, but in fourteen years he hadnt canoed or kayaked once. It had been one of the first things hed done when he returned.
Theres something special, almost mystical, about spending dawn on the water, he thought to himself, and he did it almost every day now.
Sunny and clear or cold and bitter, it never mattered as he paddled in rhythm to music in his head, working above water the color of iron. He saw a family of turtles resting on a partially submerged log and watched as a heron broke for flight, skimming just above the water before vanishing into the silver twilight that preceded sunrise.
He paddled out to the middle of the creek, where he watched the orange glow begin to stretch across the water. He stopped paddling hard, giving just enough effort to keep him in place, staring until light began to break through the trees. He always liked to pause at daybreak - there was a moment when the view was spectacular, as if the world were being born again. Afterward he began to paddle hard, working off the tension, preparing for the day.
While he did that, questions danced in his mind like water drops in a frying pan. He wondered about Lon and what type of man he was, wondered about their relationship. Most of all, though, he wondered about Allie and why she had come.
By the time he reached home, he felt renewed. Checking his watch, he was surprised to find that it had taken two hours. Time always played tricks out there, though, and hed stopped questioning it months ago.