104: Music Lessons - This American Life
You are using an outdated browser.
您正在使用过时的浏览器。
Please upgrade your browser or activate Google Chrome Frame to improve your experience.
请升级您的浏览器或激活 Google Chrome 浏览器内嵌框架以改善您的体验。
Sign up for a free Life Partners trial, and you can watch the video “A Night of Stories and Improv.”
注册免费试用《Life Partners》,您可以观看视频“故事与即兴表演之夜”。
00:00 00:00 Transcript Share This American Life Life Partners How to Listen Episodes Recommended About Overview Staff Announcements Fellowships Jobs Music Make Radio On The Road FAQ Submissions Merch Contact Us Our Other Shows Merch Follow Us Life Partners Subscribe to our newsletter Full episode Toggle Audio and Transcript Sync Transcript | Episode #104 | April 26, 2013 104: Music Lessons Note: This American Life is produced for the ear and designed to be heard.
00:00 00:00 文字记录 分享此 美国生活 生活伙伴 如何收听 剧集 推荐 关于 概述 员工公告 奖学金 工作 音乐 在路上制作电台 常见问题解答 提交 商品 联系我们 我们的其他节目 商品 关注我们 生活伙伴 订阅我们的时事通讯 整集 切换音频和文字记录同步 文字记录 | 内容第 104 集 | 2013 年 4 月 26 日 104:音乐课程 注:《This American Life》是为耳朵而制作的,旨在让人们听到。
If you are able, we strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which includes emotion and emphasis that's not on the page.
如果可以的话,我们强烈建议您收听音频,其中包括页面上没有的情感和重点。
Transcripts are generated using a combination of speech recognition software and human transcribers, and may contain errors.
文字记录是使用语音识别软件和人工转录员结合生成的,可能包含错误。
Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print.
请在印刷版引用前检查相应的音频。
Prologue Ira Glass Here's my seventh grade teacher's sad fate-- he trained as a classical musician, loved music, truly loved it.
序言 艾拉·格拉斯 这是我七年级老师的悲惨命运——他受过古典音乐家训练,热爱音乐,真正热爱它。
And then every working day, he surrounded himself with 13-year-olds who massacred the living guts out of it.
然后每个工作日,他周围都是 13 岁的孩子,他们屠杀了他的内脏。
Could not play it and did not care.
玩不了也不在乎。
It made him the angriest teacher I ever saw.
这使他成为我见过的最愤怒的老师。
He yelled all the time.
他一直大喊大叫。
This is what happens if you believe that music means something, is important, and you're surrounded all day long with 13- and 14-year-olds who demonstrate through their actions that maybe it's not.
如果你相信音乐有意义、很重要,而你整天都被 13 岁和 14 岁的孩子包围,他们通过自己的行为证明音乐可能并非如此,就会发生这种情况。
I told Durrell Daniels about him and Durrell understood immediately.
我向达雷尔·丹尼尔斯讲述了他的事,达雷尔立即明白了。
Durrell was once paid to teach band, but he had to quit because he looked at the facts at hand and came to the simple conclusion--
达雷尔曾经受雇教乐队,但他不得不辞职,因为他看了手头的事实,得出了一个简单的结论——
I got out of band teaching because I noticed that all the band teachers I knew had went a little crazy.
我退出了乐队教学,因为我注意到我认识的所有乐队老师都有点疯狂。
I mean, no disrespect intended, but you don't find too many, like, totally sane band teachers who have taught band for a long time.
我的意思是,无意冒犯,但你不会发现太多像完全理智的、长期教授乐队的乐队老师。
And I sort of saw myself going on the edge.
我似乎看到自己正走向边缘。
And I said, well, no. I don't want to be whistling to myself at a wall, looking at apples that are not there, or something like that.
我说,好吧,不。我不想对着墙对着自己吹口哨,看着不存在的苹果,或者类似的东西。
Because it's sort of like-- no instrument sounds good when it's not played well.
因为这有点像——如果演奏得不好,任何乐器都听起来不好。
Trumpet was a pain.
小号是一种痛苦。
Saxophone was a pain.
萨克斯管很痛苦。
Clarinet was hell.
单簧管简直就是地狱。
And another thing.
还有一件事。
The kids, when they get a trumpet, there's a difference between a kid singing and a kid getting a trumpet.
孩子们,当他们得到小号时,唱歌的孩子和得到小号的孩子之间是有区别的。
You might can't sing, and you might be a little shy.
你可能不会唱歌,而且可能有点害羞。
No kid's going to be shy about blowing that horn no matter how bad they sound.
没有一个孩子会羞于吹响喇叭,无论喇叭听起来多么糟糕。
As a professional musician, Durrell played jazz and funk and soul, keyboards and vocals.
作为一名专业音乐家,达雷尔演奏爵士乐、放克乐、灵魂乐、键盘乐和声乐。
He's toured Asia and Brazil and Canada.
他曾游览过亚洲、巴西和加拿大。
He's done gigs in Paris.
他在巴黎做过演出。
But four years ago, with kids to support of his own, he returned to a music job in the Chicago Public Schools in an elementary school.
但四年前,由于要养活自己的孩子,他回到芝加哥公立学校的一所小学从事音乐工作。
And we get these little records, Barney records.
我们得到了这些小记录,巴尼记录。
And we get up and do a little Barney dance.
我们起身跳了一段巴尼舞。
I'm like, this sucks.
我想,这很糟糕。
[LAUGHTER] Ira Glass And you had already, at that point, you had toured.
[笑声] Ira Glass 那时你已经巡演过了。
God, there should be a name for this, like for that moment.
天啊,这应该有一个名字,就像那一刻一样。
Misery.
苦难。
That's the name.
就是这个名字。
Ira Glass Well, from WBEZ Chicago and Public Radio International, it's This American Life.
Ira Glass 好吧,来自芝加哥 WBEZ 和国际公共广播电台,这就是《美国生活》。
I'm Ira Glass, coming to you today from the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, California, thanks to public radio station KQED in San Francisco.
我是艾拉·格拉斯 (Ira Glass),感谢旧金山公共广播电台 KQED,今天从加利福尼亚州旧金山耶尔巴布埃纳艺术中心来到你们这里。
Today on our program, Music Lessons.
今天我们的节目是音乐课。
What's frustrating about them, what's miraculous about them.
他们有什么令人沮丧的,他们有什么神奇的。
Act One, Papa Was not a Rolling Stone.
第一幕,爸爸不是滚石。
David Sedaris tells what happens when a parent does not play an instrument and insists that his children take lessons.
大卫·塞达里斯 (David Sedaris) 讲述了当父母不弹奏乐器并坚持让孩子上课时会发生什么。
Act Two.
第二幕。
Toccata and Fugue in Me, a Minor.
《我,小调》中的托卡塔与赋格。
Sarah Vowell recalls all the things that she learned in music class that had nothing to do with music.
莎拉·沃威尔回忆起她在音乐课上学到的所有与音乐无关的东西。
Act Three, Knockin' on Heaven's Door, in which Annie Lamott provides some much needed spiritual uplift to our program with an example of what we can learn from music now, all of us.
第三幕,敲响天堂之门,其中安妮·拉莫特为我们的节目提供了一些急需的精神提升,并举例说明了我们现在可以从音乐中学到什么,我们所有人。
Stay with us.
留在我们身边。
[APPLAUSE] So imagine that you're an adult and you decide you want to express yourself through music.
[掌声]想象一下,你是一个成年人,你决定通过音乐来表达自己。
And the medium that you have to express yourself is 13- and 14- and 15-year-old kids.
你必须表达自己的媒介是 13 岁、14 岁和 15 岁的孩子。
That is a very imprecise medium in which to apply your art.
这是一种非常不精确的艺术应用媒介。
This week was especially hard on Durrell.
这周对达雷尔来说尤其艰难。
He had to get one group of kids rehearsed to sing at one graduation ceremony and another group ready for another graduation ceremony and then there were some recitals to do.
他必须让一组孩子在一次毕业典礼上排练唱歌,让另一组孩子为另一次毕业典礼做好准备,然后还要进行一些独奏会。
And then the gospel choir, who usually is pride and joy kids, sort of fell apart on him.
然后福音唱诗班,通常都是骄傲和快乐的孩子,对他来说有点崩溃了。
They were singing badly.
他们唱得不好。
They were arguing with him.
他们正在和他争论。
He sat them down.
他让他们坐下。
He told them he was probably going to have to cancel their last concert of the year.
他告诉他们,他可能不得不取消今年的最后一场音乐会。
But he would decide about it after one last rehearsal.
但他会在最后一次排练后做出决定。
My kids-- I was like, look, I'm tired.
我的孩子们——我当时想,看,我累了。
I'm tired.
我累了。
I've been working this stuff for you guys.
我一直在为你们做这些事情。
And look, I can't sit here and argue with all you almost-grown kids all day long.
听着,我不能整天坐在这里和你们这些快长大的孩子争论。
[KIDS REHEARSING] All right.
[孩子们排练] 好吧。
Come on.
快点。
Let's get together.
让我们聚在一起吧。
After school Tuesday, the gospel choir gathered in Lindblom's Auditorium, 22 girls and three boys, one boy who never seemed to sing at all.
周二放学后,福音唱诗班聚集在林德布洛姆礼堂,由 22 名女孩和 3 名男孩组成,其中一名男孩似乎从不唱歌。
All right, you guys.
好吧,你们。
Let's get into sections.
让我们进入各个部分。
Everybody was on their best behavior.
每个人都表现得最好。
They wanted to show Mr. Daniels that they could do the concert.
他们想向丹尼尔斯先生表明他们可以举办这场音乐会。
And they began their practice the way that they always do, with a prayer.
他们以一贯的方式开始练习,即祈祷。
Father God, right now in the name of Jesus, God, we come thanking you, O God.
天父上帝,现在奉耶稣上帝的名,我们来感谢你,上帝啊。
We want to thank you for gathering us here, O God.
上帝啊,我们要感谢你把我们聚集在这里。
We come against every spirit that's trying to hinder this choir right now in the name of Jesus.
我们现在正以耶稣的名义对抗一切试图阻碍这个唱诗班的精神。
And then from the moment that they started to sing, they just soared.
从他们开始唱歌的那一刻起,他们就飙升了。
They were great.
他们很棒。
[SINGING] Clap your hands.
[唱歌]拍拍手。
Durrell Daniels One, two, three, four!
达雷尔·丹尼尔斯 一、二、三、四!
Hey!
嘿!
Ira Glass Teaching music is like any teaching, except that when you fail, it is loud.
艾拉·格拉斯 (Ira Glass) 教学音乐就像任何教学一样,只不过当你失败时,声音会很大。
And failure is so easy.
而失败是那么容易。
Every note is a chance to mess up.
每个音符都有可能造成混乱。
After three songs, Mr. Daniels told the chorus that he would not cancel the concert.
三首歌结束后,丹尼尔斯先生告诉合唱团他不会取消音乐会。
Now he just had to get through two graduations, their concert, and a couple of recitals, and he could have the summer to promote his new CD, which, like any real professional musician, he asked me to mention here on the radio.
现在他只需要完成两次毕业典礼、他们的音乐会和几场独奏会,他就可以用夏天来宣传他的新 CD,就像任何真正的专业音乐家一样,他让我在广播中提到它。
Act One, Papa Was not a Rolling Stone.
第一幕,爸爸不是滚石。
Children are asked to live the unlived lives of their parents nowhere more than music lessons.
孩子们被要求过上父母没有过的生活,无非是上音乐课。
There the eager music students and then there are the reluctant music students.
有热切的音乐学生,也有不情愿的音乐学生。
This is the story of somebody in the second group.
这是第二组中某人的故事。
Please welcome writer David Sedaris.
欢迎作家大卫·塞达里斯。
[APPLAUSE] David Sedaris My father loves jazz and has a substantial collection of records and reel-to-reel tapes he used to listen to after returning home from work each evening.
[掌声] David Sedaris 我父亲热爱爵士乐,收藏了大量唱片和磁带,他每天晚上下班回家后都会听。
He might have entered the house in a foul mood, but once he had his Dexter Gordon and a vodka martini, everything was beautiful, baby.
他可能心情不好地进了屋子,但一旦他喝了德克斯特·戈登和伏特加马提尼,一切都很美好,宝贝。
Just beautiful.
就是很漂亮。
The moment the needle hit that record, he loosened his tie and became something other than a mechanical engineer with a pocket full of IBM pencils embossed with the word "think."
当指针触及唱片的那一刻,他松开了领带,不再是一个口袋里装满印有“思考”字样的 IBM 铅笔的机械工程师。
"Man, oh, man.
“伙计,哦,伙计。
Will you get a load of the chops on this guy?
你愿意对这个家伙大加赞赏吗?
I saw him once at the Blue Note, and I mean to tell you that he blew me right out of my chair.
我在 Blue Note 见过他一次,我的意思是告诉你,他把我从椅子上震了起来。
You could take a hatchet and cut the man's lips right off his face, and still he would have played better than anyone else out there.
你可以拿一把斧头,把他脸上的嘴唇砍下来,但他仍然会比其他人打得更好。
That's how good he was!"
原来他这么好啊!”
[LAUGHTER] I'd nod my head, envisioning a pair of lips lying forsaken on the floor of some dressing room.
[笑声]我会点头,想象着一双嘴唇被遗弃在更衣室的地板上。
The trick was to back slowly towards the hallway, escaping into the kitchen before my father could yell, "hey, get back here!
诀窍是慢慢地退回走廊,在我父亲大喊之前逃进厨房,“嘿,回到这里!
Where do you think you're going?
你认为你要去哪里?
Sit down for a minute and listen.
坐下来听一分钟。
I mean, really listen."
我的意思是,认真听。”
How could you prove you were listening?
你怎么能证明你在听呢?
It was as if he expected us to change color like the fuzz-colored ceramic rabbit our neighbor used to predict the weather.
就好像他期望我们改变颜色,就像我们的邻居用来预测天气的绒毛色陶瓷兔子一样。
I often thought that my father might have been a musician himself had he not been born to immigrant parents who considered even wax-tipped shoelaces to be an extravagance.
我经常想,如果我的父亲不是出生在移民父母那里,他自己可能也会成为一名音乐家,他们认为即使是蜡头鞋带也是一种奢侈。
They listened only to Greek music, an oxymoron as far as the rest of the world was concerned.
他们只听希腊音乐,这对世界其他地方来说是矛盾的。
[LAUGHTER] Jazz was, in a sense, my father's own personal discovery.
[笑声] 从某种意义上说,爵士乐是我父亲个人的发现。
Denounced and forbidden by his parents, he hid his 78s and secretly drove into New York City, where he'd sit alive and enraptured at the feet of his heroes.
在父母的谴责和禁止下,他藏起了自己的 78 辆汽车,偷偷开车前往纽约市,在那里,他活着,欣喜若狂地坐在英雄的脚下。
The move to North Carolina was difficult, and he felt cut off with nothing but the Country and Top 40 radio stations Raleigh had to offer in the mid to late 1960s.
搬到北卡罗来纳州的过程很艰难,除了 20 世纪 60 年代中后期罗利提供的乡村电台和 40 强广播电台外,他感到与世隔绝。
Limited to his record collection, it became his dream that his children might fill the void by someday forming a jazz combo.
由于他的唱片收藏有限,他的梦想是他的孩子们有一天可以通过组建爵士组合来填补空白。
[LAUGHTER] His plan took shape shortly after escorting my sisters Lisa, Gretchen, and I to the local state university to see Dave Brubeck, who was currently touring with his sons.
[笑声] 在护送我的姐妹丽莎、格雷琴和我去当地州立大学看戴夫·布鲁贝克(Dave Brubeck)后不久,他的计划就成形了,戴夫·布鲁贝克目前正在和他的儿子们一起巡演。
The audience roared when Dave Brubeck stepped forth from behind the curtain, and I sat back, pretending those applauds were for me.
当戴夫·布鲁贝克(Dave Brubeck)从幕布后面走出来时,观众们爆发出热烈的掌声,我坐回原处,假装这些掌声是为我而来。
A person had to do something while standing before a crowd of 600 people.
一个人必须站在六百人面前做某事。
And with this in mind, I'd been secretly working up a little routine.
考虑到这一点,我一直在秘密地进行一些例行公事。
The act consisted of me dressed in a nice shirt and tie and performing a medley of commercial jingles in the voice of Billie Holiday.
这个表演包括我穿着漂亮的衬衫和领带,用比莉·哈乐黛的声音表演一首商业广告歌曲。
[LAUGHTER] For my Raleigh show, I'd probably open with the number used to promote our town's oldest shopping center.
[笑声] 对于我的罗利演出,我可能会以用于宣传我们镇上最古老的购物中心的号码开始。
A quick nod to my accompanist and I'd begin with, [SINGING] "the excitement of Cameron Village will carry you a-way."
快速向我的伴奏者点点头,然后我会开始,[唱歌]“卡梅伦村的兴奋会让你兴奋不已。”
[LAUGHTER] [APPLAUSE] The beauty of my rendition was that it captured both the joy and the sorrow of a visit to Ellisburg's or JCPenney's.
[笑声][掌声]我的表演的美妙之处在于它捕捉到了参观埃利斯堡或杰西潘尼的欢乐和悲伤。
This would be followed by such sure-fire hits as the theme for Winston cigarettes and the catchy new Coke commercial.
接下来是温斯顿香烟的主题和引人注目的新可口可乐广告。
[SINGING] "I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony.
[歌唱]“我想教世界完美和谐地歌唱。
I'd like to buy the world a Coke and keep it company."
我想给全世界买一瓶可乐并陪伴它。”
[APPLAUSE] I was lost in my fantasy, ignoring Dave Brubeck and coming up for air only when my father elbowed my ribs to say, "are you listening to this?
[掌声]我沉浸在自己的幻想中,无视戴夫·布鲁贝克,直到我父亲用肘部肘击我的肋骨说:“你在听这个吗?
These cats are burnin' the paint right off the walls!" Driving home from the concert that night, he had drummed his fingers against the steering wheel, saying, "did you hear that?
这些猫正在烧掉墙上的油漆!”那天晚上听完演唱会开车回家时,他用手指敲打着方向盘,说道:“你听到了吗?
The guy just gets better every day!
这家伙一天天变得更好!
There he was with his kids, the whole lot of them, jamming up a storm.
他和他的孩子们,他们所有人,都在那里,掀起了一场风暴。
What I wouldn't give for a family like that.
为了这样的家庭我不会付出什么。
You guys should think about putting an act together."
你们应该考虑一起表演。”
The following afternoon, he bought a baby grand piano.
第二天下午,他买了一架小型三角钢琴。
It sat neglected until my father signed Gretchen up for a series of lessons.
它一直被忽视,直到我父亲为格雷琴报名参加一系列课程。
Lisa was assigned the flute.
丽莎被分配吹长笛。
And I returned home from a scout meeting one evening to find my instrument leaning against the aquarium in my bedroom.
一天晚上,我参加完童子军会议回到家,发现我的乐器靠在卧室的水族箱上。
"So there she is," my father said.
“所以她就在那里,”我父亲说。
"Here's that guitar you always wanted." Surely he had me confused with someone else.
“这是你一直想要的吉他。”他肯定把我和其他人搞混了。
While I had regularly petitioned for a brand-name vacuum cleaner, I had never said anything about wanting a guitar.
虽然我经常请求购买一台名牌吸尘器,但我从未说过想要一把吉他。
[LAUGHTER] Nothing about it appealed to me.
[笑声] 没有什么吸引我的。
I had my room arranged just so, and it didn't fit in at all with the nautical theme.
我的房间就这么布置的,与航海主题完全不相符。
[LAUGHTER] I stuffed it into my closet and there it remained until he signed me up for private lessons.
[笑声]我把它塞进我的衣柜里,直到他给我报名参加私人课程为止。
"But I'm sick!" I yelled, watching him pull out of the parking lot.
“可我病了!”我喊道,看着他把车开出停车场。
"I don't want to play an instrument.
“我不想演奏乐器。
Don't you know anything?" I lugged my guitar into the music shop, where the manager led me to my teacher, a temperamental midget named Mr. Mancini.
难道你什么都不知道吗?”我拖着吉他走进音乐商店,经理带我去见我的老师,一个脾气暴躁的侏儒,名叫曼奇尼先生。
[LAUGHTER] A fastidious dresser stuck in a small town, Mr. Mancini wore clothing I recognized from the young boys department at Hudson Belk's.
[笑声] 曼奇尼先生是一位生活在小镇上的挑剔着装者,他穿的衣服是我从哈德森·贝尔克 (Hudson Belk) 男童部门认出的。
Some nights he favored button-up shirts with clip-on ties, while other evenings I arrived to find him dressed in flared slacks and a snug turtleneck sweater, a swag of love beads hanging from his neck.
有些晚上,他喜欢穿带夹式领带的纽扣衬衫,而另一些晚上,我到达时发现他穿着喇叭裤和舒适的高领毛衣,脖子上挂着一串爱心珠子。
His arms were manly and covered in coarse dark hair, but his voice was high and strange, as if it had been recorded and played back at a higher speed.
他的手臂很有男子气概,长满了粗糙的黑毛,但他的声音很高而且很奇怪,好像是用更高的速度录制和播放的。
My fascination was both evident and unwelcome.
我的迷恋既明显又不受欢迎。
He didn't ask my name, just lit a cigarette and squinted against the smoke.
他没有问我的名字,只是点燃了一根香烟,眯着眼睛迎着烟雾。
Like my father, Mr. Mancini assumed that anyone could play guitar.
像我父亲一样,曼奇尼先生认为任何人都可以弹吉他。
He had picked it up during a single summer spent in what he called "Hot-lanta, G-A." "Now that," he said, "is one classy city.
他在他所谓的“热兰塔,G-A”度过的一个夏天里学会了这本书。 “现在,”他说,“是一座优雅的城市。
You know what I mean?
你知道我的意思吗?
The girls down on Peachtree are running wild 24 hours a day."
桃树镇的女孩们一天 24 小时都在疯狂奔跑。”
"That's great," I said.
“那太好了,”我说。
He seemed to know that I was nothing special but just a type, another boy whose father had his head in the clouds.
他似乎知道我没什么特别的,只是一种类型,另一个父亲对我的头脑浮想联翩的男孩。
"Let me show you what this instrument's all about." He climbed into his chair and began playing "Light My Fire." The current Top 40 version was performed by Jose Feliciano, a blind man whose plaintive voice served the lyric much better than Jim Morrison, who sang the song in what I considered to be a bossy and conceited tone of voice.
“让我向你展示一下这个乐器的全部功能。”他爬进椅子,开始演奏“点燃我的火”。目前的 Top 40 版本是由何塞·费里西亚诺 (Jose Feliciano) 演唱的,他是一位盲人,他悲伤的声音比吉姆·莫里森 (Jim Morrison) 更适合歌词,而吉姆·莫里森的演唱风格在我看来是一种专横而自负的语气。
[LAUGHTER] The was Jose Feliciano, Jim Morrison, and then there was Mr. Mancini, who played beautifully but sang "Light My Fire" as if he were a Webelos Scout searching for a match.
[笑声] 是何塞·费里西亚诺、吉姆·莫里森,然后是曼奇尼先生,他演奏得很漂亮,但唱着“点燃我的火”,就好像他是一名正在寻找比赛的韦伯洛斯球探一样。
[LAUGHTER] He finished his opening number, nodded his head in acknowledgement of my applause, and moved on, performing his own unique an unsettling versions of "The Girl From Ipanema" and "Little Green Apples," while I sat in my seat, a fault smile stretched so tight I lost all feeling in my jaw.
[笑声]他完成了他的开场曲,点头表示对我的掌声表示感谢,然后继续表演他自己独特的令人不安的版本“来自伊帕内玛的女孩”和“小青苹果”,而我坐在座位上,错误的微笑绷得很紧,我的下巴失去了所有知觉。
My fingernails had grown a good three inches by the time he hit his final note and called me close to point out a few simple chords.
当他敲出最后一个音符并叫我过来指点几个简单的和弦时,我的指甲已经长了三英寸。
Before leaving, he gave me some purple, mimeographed handouts which we both knew were useless.
离开之前,他给了我一些紫色的油印讲义,我们都知道这些讲义毫无用处。
Back at the house, my mother had my dinner warming in the oven.
回到家,妈妈把我的晚餐放在烤箱里加热。
From the living room, I could hear the aimless whisper of Lisa's flute, which sounded much like the wind whipping through an empty Pepsi can.
从客厅里,我可以听到丽莎漫无目的的笛声,听起来很像风吹过空百事可乐罐的声音。
[LAUGHTER] Down in the basement, Gretchen was either practicing piano or the cat was chasing a moth across the keys.
[笑声] 在地下室,格雷琴要么在练习钢琴,要么猫在琴键上追飞蛾。
I was at the mall with my mother, afternoon, when I spotted Mr. Mancini reaching up to order a hamburger at Scotty's Chuckwagon, an open-air fast food restaurant located a few doors down from the music shop.
下午,我和母亲在商场里,发现曼奇尼先生正伸手去 Scotty's Chuckwagon 点一个汉堡,这是一家露天快餐店,距离音乐商店只有几扇门。
He was standing on his tiptoes, and even then his head failed to reach the counter.
他踮起脚尖,头也没有够到柜台。
Once he'd gotten his food, he carried his tray towards a vacant table facing the escalator.
拿到食物后,他端着托盘走向自动扶梯对面的一张空桌子。
The passing adults shifted their gaze or smiled politely while their children were decidedly more overt.
路过的成年人会转移目光或礼貌地微笑,而他们的孩子则明显更加明显。
Toddlers ambled up on their chubby, bowed legs, embracing my teacher with their ketchup-smeared fingers.
蹒跚学步的孩子们迈着胖乎乎的、弓形的腿慢慢走来,用涂着番茄酱的手指拥抱我的老师。
It suddenly became clear that Mr. Mancini hated children.
曼奇尼先生讨厌孩子的事实突然变得很明显。
The only thing worse were the adolescents, the boys my age who sat at the surrounding tables poking fun and regurgitating their Scotty fries in laughter.
唯一更糟糕的是那些青少年,那些和我同龄的男孩,他们坐在周围的桌子旁取笑,笑着吐出薯条。
Watching this scene from a distance, my first thought was hey, that's my midget.
远远地看着这一幕,我的第一个想法是,嘿,那是我的侏儒。
Hands off!
把手拿开!
The man was my discovery, not theirs.
这个人是我的发现,不是他们的。
I'd always thought of him as a pocket Playboy, but watching him dip his hamburger into a puddle of mayonnaise, I broadened my view and saw him as a vulnerable loner, an outsider who scoffed not only at Raleigh but at the entire state of North Carolina.
我一直认为他是一个袖珍花花公子,但看着他将汉堡浸入一滩蛋黄酱中,我拓宽了视野,发现他是一个脆弱的孤独者,一个不仅嘲笑罗利而且嘲笑整个北卡罗来纳州的局外人。
It was a persona I'd thought of adopting myself.
这是我想采用的一个角色。
Looking at it this way, it seemed that Mr. Mancini and I actually had quite a bit in common.
这样看来,我和曼奇尼先生其实还是有不少共同点的。
We were both men trapped in boys' bodies.
我们都是被困在男孩身体里的男人。
There was no reason I shouldn't address him not as a teacher but as an artistic brother.
我没有理由不称呼他为一位艺术兄弟而不是一位老师。
If things worked out the way I hoped, maybe I could even use him as my accompanist.
如果事情按照我希望的方式进行,也许我什至可以让他作为我的伴奏者。
The following evening, I showed up for my lesson.
第二天晚上,我来上课了。
And this time, when asked if I'd practiced, I told the truth, saying in a matter-of-fact tone of voice that no, I had not touched the thing since the last session.
而这一次,当问到我是否练习过时,我说了实话,用一种就事论事的语气说没有,自从上次练习以来我就没有碰过这个东西。
I told him that I had absolutely no interest in mastering the guitar.
我告诉他我对掌握吉他完全没有兴趣。
What I really wanted to do was sing in the voice of Billie Holiday, mainly commercials, but not for any banks or car dealerships, because those are usually choral arrangements.
我真正想做的是用比莉·哈乐黛的声音唱歌,主要是广告,但不是为任何银行或汽车经销商,因为这些通常是合唱安排。
The color ebbed from my teacher's face.
老师的脸色渐渐褪去。
I told him I'd been working up an act and could use a little accompaniment.
我告诉他我正在准备一个表演,需要一点伴奏。
Did he know the jingle for the new Sara Lee campaign?
他知道莎拉·李 (Sara Lee) 新竞选活动的广告歌曲吗?
[LAUGHTER] He acted as though I had instructed him to do something unspeakable perverse.
[笑声]他的表现就好像我指示他做一些难以言喻的反常事情一样。
"You want me to what?" I was certain he was lying when he told me he didn't know the tune.
“你要我做什么?”当他告诉我他不懂曲调时,我确信他在撒谎。
Doublemint gum, Ritz crackers, the themes for Alka-Seltzer and Kenmore appliances, he claimed ignorant on all counts.
他声称对绿薄荷口香糖、丽兹饼干、Alka-Seltzer 和 Kenmore 电器的主题一无所知。
I knew that it was queer to sing in front of someone, but seeing as he'd been doing it for weeks, I started in on an a cappella version of the latest Oscar Mayer commercial hoping he might join in once the spirit moved him.
我知道在别人面前唱歌是很奇怪的,但鉴于他已经这么做了好几个星期,我开始为奥斯卡·梅耶最新的广告做无伴奏合唱版本,希望一旦精神感动他,他也能加入。
With a total disregard for his company, I sang the same way I did at home when alone in my bedroom.
我完全不顾他的陪伴,像在家一样独自在卧室里唱歌。
My eyes shut tight and my hands moving in a useless and crippled fashion.
我的眼睛紧闭,双手徒劳而残废地移动。
[SINGING] "My bologna has a first name.
[歌唱]“我的博洛尼亚有一个名字。
It's O-S-C-A-R.
这是 O-S-C-A-R。
My bologna has a second name.
我的博洛尼亚有第二个名字。
It's M-A-Y-E-R.
这是 M-A-Y-E-R。
Oh, I love to eat it every day.
呵呵,我每天都喜欢吃。
And if you ask me why, I'll say that Oscar Mayer has a way with B-O-L-O-G-N-A."
如果你问我为什么,我会说奥斯卡·梅耶尔对 B-O-L-O-G-N-A 很有一套。”
[APPLAUSE] I reached the end of the tune, thinking he might take this as an opportunity to applaud or maybe even apologize for underestimating me.
[掌声]我唱到了曲子的结尾,以为他可能会以此为契机鼓掌,甚至可能为低估我而道歉。
But instead, he held up his hand, saying, "hey guy, I'm not into that scene.
但相反,他举起手说:“嘿伙计,我不喜欢那个场景。
There were plenty of screwballs like you back in Atlanta.
在亚特兰大有很多像你这样的怪人。
And I don't know, I guess it's your thing, or whatever, but you can definitely count me out."
我不知道,我猜这是你的事,或者其他什么,但你绝对可以把我排除在外。”
My father was disappointed when I told him I wouldn't be returning for any more lessons.
当我告诉父亲我不会再回来上课时,他很失望。
Luckily my sisters were as fed up as I was, and we approached him together, saying that the Sedaris trio had officially dismantled.
幸运的是,我的姐妹们和我一样受够了,我们一起找到他,说塞达里斯三人组已经正式解散了。
He offered to find us better teachers, adding in that if we were unhappy with our instruments, we could always trade them in for something livelier.
他主动提出为我们寻找更好的老师,并补充说,如果我们对我们的乐器不满意,我们可以随时将它们换成更活泼的东西。
"The trumpet or saxophone or hey, how about the vibes?" He reached for a Lionel Hampton album, saying, "let me play you a little something I think you're going to love."
“小号或萨克斯管,或者嘿,共鸣怎么样?”他伸手去拿一张莱昂内尔·汉普顿的专辑,说道:“让我给你弹一首我认为你会喜欢的曲子。”
We told him, no Dad, don't bother.
我们告诉他,不,爸爸,别打扰。
But still, he readied the stereo, holding the record to the light and examining it for dust.
但他仍然准备好音响,将唱片放在灯光下检查是否有灰尘。
"I'm telling you that this record is going to change your life.
“我告诉你,这张唱片将改变你的生活。
And if it doesn't, I'll give each one of you $5.
如果没有,我就给你们每人 5 美元。
How do you like that?"
你觉得怎么样?”
It was a tough call.
这是一个艰难的决定。
Five dollars for listening to a Lionel Hampton album.
听莱昂内尔·汉普顿的专辑五美元。
Yet we knew that there were certainly strings attached.
但我们知道这肯定是有附加条件的。
We looked at each other, my sisters and I.
我和我的姐妹们互相看着对方。
And then we left the room, failing to respond as he yelled, "hey, where do you think you're going?
然后我们离开了房间,没有回应他大喊:“嘿,你认为你要去哪里?
Get back in here and listen!" We joined our mother at the TV and never looked back.
快回到这里听吧!”我们和母亲一起看电视,再也没有回头。
The music was his great fantasy, not ours.
音乐是他伟大的幻想,而不是我们的。
That night, as was his habit, our father fell asleep in front of the stereo, the record making its pointless, silent rounds as he laid back against the sofa cushions dreaming.
那天晚上,按照他的习惯,我们的父亲在音响前睡着了,当他靠在沙发垫上做梦时,唱片毫无意义地安静地循环着。
Thank you.
谢谢。
[APPLAUSE] Ira Glass David Sedaris is the author of several books.
[掌声] Ira Glass David Sedaris 是多本书的作者。
His book of stories, Naked , just came out in paperback.
他的故事书《裸体》刚刚出版了平装本。
Coming up, Sarah Vowell marches, Anne Lamott prays.
莎拉·沃威尔 (Sarah Vowell) 上台游行,安妮·拉莫特 (Anne Lamott) 祈祷。
That's in a minute from Public Radio International when our program continues.
一分钟后,国际公共广播电台将继续我们的节目。
It's This American Life , I'm Ira Glass.
这就是美国生活,我是艾拉·格拉斯。
Each week on our program, of course, we choose a theme, invite a variety of different writers and performers to tackle that theme.
当然,每周我们的节目都会选择一个主题,邀请各种不同的作家和表演者来解决该主题。
Today we come to you from the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, California.
今天我们从加利福尼亚州旧金山的耶尔巴布埃纳艺术中心来到您身边。
[APPLAUSE] Today's program, Music Lessons.
[掌声]今天的节目是音乐课。
What makes them so great, what makes them so terrible, what we really, really, really learn from them.
是什么让他们如此伟大,是什么让他们如此可怕,我们真的、真的、真的从他们身上学到了什么。
We have arrived at Act Two of our program.
我们已经进入了计划的第二幕。
Act Two, Toccata and Fugue in Me, a Minor.
第二幕《我,小调的托卡塔与赋格》。
As a teenager growing up in Montana, Sarah Vowell was not casual about music lessons.
作为在蒙大拿州长大的青少年,莎拉·沃威尔对音乐课并不随意。
She was not reluctant about music lessons.
她并不排斥音乐课。
Music became her life.
音乐成了她的生命。
She was in marching band, band 1, symphony band, jazz band, pep band, orchestra, and the Bozeman Recorder Ensemble.
她曾在军乐队、第一乐队、交响乐队、爵士乐队、鼓舞乐队、管弦乐队和博兹曼竖笛乐团中服役。
She's now a music writer and one of our contributing editors at This American Life .
她现在是一名音乐作家,也是《This American Life》的特约编辑之一。
Please welcome her.
请欢迎她。
[APPLAUSE] Sarah Vowell It was autumn in America, a fine, hot, Indian Summer day.
[掌声]莎拉·沃威尔 那是美国的秋天,一个晴朗、炎热的小阳春日。
Pretty high school girls sat on bleachers with the sun shining on their pretty hair, watching handsome high school boys play football.
漂亮的高中女生坐在看台上,阳光照耀着她们漂亮的头发,看着帅气的高中男生踢足球。
And then it was halftime, which is where I came in.
然后到了中场休息,我就进来了。
I was standing in line in my silver spats down past the end zone waiting to go on.
我站在终点区的银牌里排队等待继续前进。
I was in 11th grade.
我当时11年级。
I was in marching band.
我在军乐队里。
I had a foot-tall, fake fur, black hat with the vaguely-processed-food-named shako strapped under my chin that not only prevented me from breathing, it prevented me from balancing, so that even though my job was to march around as some kind of sick metaphor for teenage military precision, I moved through time and space with the grace and confidence of a puppy walking on a beach ball.
我戴着一顶一英尺高的假毛皮黑色帽子,下巴下绑着一个名为“shako”的模糊加工食品,它不仅让我无法呼吸,还让我无法保持平衡,因此,尽管我的工作是四处走动,就像青少年军事精确度的某种病态隐喻,但我却像一只在沙滩球上行走的小狗一样优雅和自信地穿越时空。
[LAUGHTER] Because of my double shortage of strength and coordination, I barely passed gym.
[笑声] 由于我的力量和协调性双重不足,我勉强通过了健身房。
But somehow I was supposed to lift a baritone horn that measured twice my body weight, blow into it while reading microscopic sheet music, step in a straight line while remembering left foot on beats one and three, right foot on beats two and four, and maneuver myself into cute, visual formations like the trio of stick figures when we played the theme from My Three Sons.
但不知何故,我应该举起一个两倍于我体重的男中音喇叭,一边读微观乐谱,一边向它吹气,一边走直线,一边记住左脚在第一和第三节拍,右脚在第二和第四节拍,并把自己摆成可爱的视觉形态,就像我们演奏《我的三个儿子》主题曲时的三个简笔画一样。
[LAUGHTER] And then, halfway through the halftime program, I had to break formation, drop my baritone horn on the field, and sprint to the 50-yard line, a long haul, with everyone in the band, everyone in the bleachers, everyone on the sidelines watching and waiting, silent and still.
[笑声]然后,在中场休息节目进行到一半时,我不得不打破队形,把我的男中音号放在场上,然后冲刺到50码线,这是一段漫长的距离,乐队中的每个人,看台上的每个人,场边的每个人都在观看和等待,一言不发。
And then I picked up my mallets.
然后我拿起我的木槌。
This is what they had been waiting for, a xylophone solo on a little Latin-flavored number called, "Tico-Tico."
这就是他们一直在等待的,一段名为“Tico-Tico”的拉丁风味小曲上的木琴独奏。
[LAUGHTER] My polo-shirt-clad nemesis, Andy Heap, stood up in the stands screaming, "Vowell, Vowell, woo, woo!" as the laughter of his friends-- at me-- drowned out the horn section.
[笑声] 我的对手安迪·希普 (Andy Heap) 穿着马球衫站在看台上尖叫着,“沃威尔,沃威尔,呜,呜!”他朋友们对我的笑声淹没了喇叭部分。
This was the same Andy Heap, I might add, who earlier in the week in music history class had delivered an oral report on Tchaikovsky's mistress and referred to her as Mimi throughout, even though her name was Nadia.
我想补充一下,这就是安迪·希普,他在本周早些时候的音乐历史课上对柴可夫斯基的情妇做了口头报告,并在整个过程中称她为咪咪,尽管她的名字是纳迪亚。
Andy Heap was apparently smart enough to publicly humiliate me during "Tico-Tico," he just wasn't smart enough to know that the abbreviation M-M-E-period stands not for Mimi but the title "Madame."
安迪·希普(Andy Heap)显然很聪明,在“Tico-Tico”期间公开羞辱了我,他只是不够聪明,不知道缩写 M-M-E-period 代表的不是咪咪,而是头衔“女士”。
[LAUGHTER] [APPLAUSE] Anyway, I only had a second to stick out my tongue at Andy when I finished because I had to let go of the mallets, rush over to my baritone-- again the freeze-framed spectators, the loneliness of the long distance runner, --and I'm back in formation with the low brass for the finale.
[笑声][掌声]无论如何,当我结束时,我只有一秒钟的时间向安迪伸出舌头,因为我必须放开木槌,冲向我的男中音——再次是定格的观众,长跑运动员的孤独,——然后我又回到了压轴的低铜管队形。
And I was getting academic credit for this.
我因此获得了学术学分。
I was getting graded to wear that uniform, to play those songs.
我被要求穿上那套制服,演奏那些歌曲。
Which begs the question, what exactly was I supposed to be learning?
这就引出了一个问题,我到底应该学习什么?
What was marching band supposed to teach me?
军乐队应该教我什么?
And marching is not a particularly applicable skill in later life.
而且行军并不是一项在以后的生活中特别适用的技能。
And ditto all the other handy things music classes taught me-- the E-flat minor scale, the alternate fingering for D-sharp.
音乐课上教给我的所有其他方便的东西也是如此——降E小调音阶、升D调的交替指法。
Here, then, some of the lessons, actually useful ones, I accidentally learned while pursuing music.
那么,这里有一些课程,实际上是有用的,是我在追求音乐时无意中学到的。
Accidental lesson number one-- Marxism for 10th graders.
偶然的第一课——十年级学生的马克思主义。
Once a week, the best band kids played with the orchestra.
每周一次,最好的乐队孩子们都会与管弦乐队一起演奏。
I played the bass drum in orchestra, which meant that I never got to play.
我在管弦乐队中演奏低音鼓,这意味着我从来没有机会演奏。
My participation ratio was something like 75 measures of rest per one big bass wallop, which gave me plenty of time to contemplate the class warfare of the situation.
我的参与比例大约是每击打一次低音重击就有 75 次休息,这给了我足够的时间来思考这种情况的阶级斗争。
And here's what I figured out.
这就是我的想法。
Orchestra kids wore tuxedos.
乐团的孩子们穿着燕尾服。
Band kids wore tuxedo t-shirts.
乐队孩子们穿着燕尾服 T 恤。
And the orchestra kids, with their brown woolens and Teutonic last names had the well-scrubbed, dark blond aura of a Hitler youth brigade.
管弦乐队的孩子们穿着棕色羊毛衣服,有着日耳曼姓氏,有着希特勒青年旅干净整洁的深金发光环。
These were the sons and daughters of Humanities professors.
这些是人文学科教授的儿女。
They took German.
他们学了德语。
They actually played soccer.
他们实际上踢了足球。
Dumping the fluorescent t-shirts of the band kids into the orchestra each week must have looked like tossing a handful of Skittles into a bowl of Swiss chocolates.
每周把乐队孩子们的荧光 T 恤扔进管弦乐队,看起来肯定就像把一把彩虹糖扔进一碗瑞士巧克力里。
[LAUGHTER] But nothing brings kids together like hate.
[笑声] 但没有什么比仇恨更能让孩子们走到一起了。
And the one thing the band kids and the orchestra kids had in common was a unified disgust for the chorus kids, who were to us merely drama geeks with access to four-part harmony.
乐队的孩子们和管弦乐队的孩子们有一个共同点,那就是对合唱团的孩子们都有一种共同的厌恶,他们对我们来说只是能够接触到四声部和声的戏剧极客。
[LAUGHTER] A shy violin player wasn't likely to haunt the halls between classes playing "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" any more than a band kid would blare "Land of a Thousand Dances" on his tuba more than three inches outside the band room door.
[笑声]一个害羞的小提琴手不可能在课间在大厅里演奏“Eine Kleine Nachtmusik”,就像一个乐队的孩子不会在乐队房间门外三英寸多的地方用大号吹奏“千舞之国”一样。
But that didn't stop the choir girls from making everyone temporarily forget their locker combinations thanks to an impromptu, uncalled-for burst of "Brigadoon."
但这并没有阻止唱诗班女孩们因为即兴的、毫无必要的“Brigadoon”爆发而让每个人暂时忘记了她们的储物柜密码。
[LAUGHTER] Accidental discovery number two.
[笑声]第二个意外发现。
Where's Walter?
沃尔特在哪里?
My junior high had an electronic music lab.
我的初中有一个电子音乐实验室。
We made tape loops and learned words like quadraphonic.
我们制作了磁带循环并学习了诸如“quadraphonic”之类的单词。
In my spare time, you know just for fun, I checked out all the books on electronic music from the library.
在我的业余时间,你知道只是为了好玩,我从图书馆查阅了所有关于电子音乐的书籍。
My favorite records for a while there were Walter Carlos' concept album "Switched-On Bach" and its sequel, "The Well-Tempered Synthesizer," which offered what I thought were hilariously witty covers of Bach classics performed on-- get this-- a Moog synthesizer.
我有一段时间最喜欢的唱片是 Walter Carlos 的概念专辑《Switched-On Bach》及其续集《The Well-Tempered Synthesizer》,其中提供了我认为在 Moog 合成器上演奏的巴赫经典作品的滑稽诙谐的翻唱。
In my readings on electronic music, something puzzled me.
在我阅读电子音乐时,有些事情让我困惑。
Every time I'd look into Walter Carlos, the information would just stop and someone named Wendy Carlos would turn up.
每次我调查沃尔特·卡洛斯时,信息都会停止,一个名叫温迪·卡洛斯的人就会出现。
I got to school early one morning to ask my electronic music teacher what happened to Walter, and was Wendy Walter's wife or daughter?
一天早上我很早就到学校问我的电子音乐老师沃尔特出了什么事,温迪沃尔特是妻子还是女儿?
And my teacher kind of didn't answer for a long time.
我的老师很长一段时间没有回答。
And then he blurted out, "uh, Wendy is Walter." What did he mean?
然后他脱口而出:“呃,温迪就是沃尔特。”他是什么意思?
[LAUGHTER] "Uh, Walter-- Walter had a sex change operation and changed his name to Wendy."
[笑声]“呃,沃尔特——沃尔特做了变性手术,并把名字改成了温迪。”
"What's a sex change operation?"
“什么是变性手术?”
[LAUGHTER] Now, I know it's hard to capture now, here, in San Francisco--
[笑声] 现在,我知道现在很难捕捉到,在旧金山——
[LAUGHTER] --what a shock this was.
[笑声]——这真是令人震惊。
I knew absolutely nothing about sex.
我对性一无所知。
We didn't talk about sex in my house and Sex Ed wasn't scheduled until spring.
我们不在家里谈论性,性教育直到春天才安排。
I was a wholesome, small town, Christian kid engaged in wholesome, small town, Christian pursuits.
我是一个健康的小镇基督徒孩子,从事健康的小镇基督教活动。
And suddenly, bam, I'm standing at the corner of Sodom and Gomorrah and where's my street map?
突然,砰,我站在所多玛和蛾摩拉的拐角处,我的街道地图在哪里?
[LAUGHTER] That Walter Carlos.
[笑声]那个沃尔特·卡洛斯。
I hadn't even recovered from the shock that Bach could be messed with.
我什至还没有从巴赫可能被搞乱的震惊中恢复过来。
[LAUGHTER] Number three, biology as destiny.
[笑声] 第三,生物学是命运。
In seventh grade, I started band.
七年级时,我开始乐队。
I wanted to play the drums.
我想打鼓。
My parents, who lived with me, as was the custom in Montana, did not want me to play the drums.
按照蒙大拿州的习俗,我的父母和我住在一起,他们不想让我打鼓。
[LAUGHTER] So I picked the next loudest instrument, the trumpet.
[笑声] 所以我选择了下一个最响亮的乐器,小号。
How I loved my trumpet, the feel of it in my hands, its very volume and shine.
我多么喜欢我的小号,喜欢它在我手里的感觉,喜欢它的音量和光泽。
You know what I especially loved?
你知道我特别喜欢什么吗?
The spit valve.
吐水阀。
In eighth grade, a teacher told me about this good old trumpet player I might like, so I went out and bought one of his records.
八年级时,一位老师告诉我我可能会喜欢这位优秀的老小号手,所以我出去买了一张他的唱片。
And every night for over a year I went to sleep listening to it, the same songs over and over, trying to figure out why Louis Armstrong was so funny, so moving, so good.
一年多来,我每天晚上都听着它入睡,一遍又一遍地听着同样的歌曲,试图弄清楚为什么路易斯·阿姆斯特朗如此有趣、如此感人、如此美妙。
And I got caught up in this superstar talent of his right around the time I was beginning to suspect that I didn't have it, talent, I mean.
当我开始怀疑我没有这种超级巨星天赋时,我就被他的超级明星天赋所吸引。我是说,天赋。
And there was another problem too, which I discovered about three years into my trumpet career.
还有另一个问题,是我在小号生涯大约三年后发现的。
I found out the reason I was getting a shoddy tone and I had trouble hitting the high notes was because of the shape of my jaw.
我发现我的音调很差并且很难唱出高音,这是因为我的下巴形状。
The shape of my jaw.
我下巴的形状。
I felt the world was more or less over.
我觉得世界或多或少已经结束了。
I was outraged that a person's fate could depend on something as arbitrary as the angles of her teeth.
我很愤怒,一个人的命运竟然取决于牙齿角度这样任意的东西。
And not only that, I had to switch to a brass instrument with a bigger mouthpiece, the baritone horn.
不仅如此,我还必须改用带有更大吹口的铜管乐器,即男中音号。
The baritone horn.
男中音号。
Like, trumpets are played by Miles Davis and baritones are played by-- nobody.
就像,小号是由迈尔斯·戴维斯演奏的,而男中音则是由——没有人演奏的。
[LAUGHTER] Lesson number four, when doves cry.
[笑声] 第四课,鸽子哭泣。
From the time I was 12 until I finished high school at 18, my poor parents' calendar was blackened by an ambitious roster of concerts and recitals averaging at least one per month.
从我 12 岁到 18 岁高中毕业,我可怜的父母的日历被平均每月至少一场的雄心勃勃的音乐会和独奏会弄得一团糟。
They were always so gushy in their support it never dawned on me that they might have preferred to avoid junior high school gymnasium performances of the theme from Rocky .
他们总是热情洋溢地表示支持,我从来没有意识到他们可能宁愿避免在初中体育馆表演《洛基》主题曲。
They acted as though their world revolved around my sister and me, and that's what we believed.
他们的表现就好像他们的世界围着我和姐姐转,这就是我们所相信的。
But I remember one night after an eighth grade band concert, I caught a glimpse of pencil marks on my father's rolled up program.
但我记得八年级乐队音乐会结束后的一天晚上,我瞥见父亲卷起的节目单上有铅笔痕迹。
He told me that he checked each movement of each piece off as they ended.
他告诉我,他在每首曲子结束时检查了每一个动作。
[LAUGHTER] Obviously because he was counting the seconds until he could go home.
[笑声]显然是因为他在数着几秒才能回家。
And at the time, I took it badly.
当时,我对此感到很糟糕。
I was offended that he had so little regard for the seriousness of our interpretation of "What Do You Do with a Drunken Sailor?" But now I see those pathetic little check marks as heart-shaped symbols of his love.
我很生气,因为他根本不考虑我们对“你对醉酒的水手做什么?”的解释的严肃性。但现在我把那些可悲的小复选标记视为他的爱的心形象征。
Everyone says that love requires the utmost honesty, but that's not entirely true.
大家都说爱情需要最大程度的诚实,但这并不完全正确。
Once I knew that my father was suffering for my sake, really suffering, I learned that love, especially the parental kind, requires the heartwarming sacrifice that can only accompany fake enthusiasm.
一旦我知道父亲为了我而受苦,真正的受苦,我就知道爱,尤其是父母的爱,需要温暖的牺牲,而这种牺牲只能伴随着虚假的热情。
[LAUGHTER] Number five, birth of cool.
[笑声]第五,酷的诞生。
So I was doomed at the trumpet, acceptable at the baritone, shaky on this xylophone, and putrid on the piano.
所以我注定会在小号上失败,在男中音上还可以,在木琴上颤抖,在钢琴上腐烂。
But there is one instrument for which I had an innate knack, an instrument I could play with some semblance of grace.
但有一种乐器是我与生俱来的天赋,一种我可以优雅地演奏的乐器。
It was, unfortunately, an instrument which was already on its way out during the lifetime of J.S.
不幸的是,这种乐器在 J.S. 还在世时就已经被淘汰了。
Bach-- the recorder.
巴赫——竖笛。
I taught myself to play it when I was 11, and by 14, I was perhaps the youngest member of the American Recorder Society, reading their journal, The American Recorder , and practicing the Elizabethan and Baroque music I special ordered with my babysitting money.
我在 11 岁时自学弹奏,到 14 岁时,我可能是美国竖笛协会最年轻的成员,阅读他们的期刊《美国竖笛》,并练习我用保姆钱特别订购的伊丽莎白时代和巴洛克音乐。
I found out about an amateur ensemble that met once a week in my town playing mostly Elizabethan standards like "It Was a Lover and His Lass" at a tempo marked on the metronome as "Post Office slow." The members of the Bozeman Recorder Ensemble, as we were called, included a retired high school music teacher, two math professors, and a number of housewives, one of whom had a daughter in my grade.
我发现有一个业余乐团每周在我的镇上聚会一次,演奏的大多是伊丽莎白时代的标准音乐,比如《这是一个情人和他的姑娘》,其节奏在节拍器上标记为“邮局慢速”。我们被称为博兹曼竖笛乐团,成员包括一位退休的高中音乐老师、两位数学教授和一些家庭主妇,其中一个家庭主妇有一个和我同年级的女儿。
I was the only member under the age of 40, and most of them would have been eligible for the senior citizen discount at the music store.
我是唯一一个40岁以下的会员,他们中的大多数人都有资格享受音乐商店的老年人折扣。
I played with them for a couple of years until my pals Margaret and Leota and I broke off to form our own trio.
我和他们一起演奏了几年,直到我和我的朋友玛格丽特和莱奥塔分手,组建了我们自己的三人组。
[LAUGHTER] The three of us just plain liked each other, liked playing.
[笑声] 我们三个人只是单纯地喜欢彼此,喜欢玩耍。
At school, in all those hours of actual classes with actual teachers, music felt more like a job.
在学校里,在与真正的老师一起上课的所有时间里,音乐感觉更像是一份工作。
Playing with Leota and Margaret was the first time, the only time, I actually enjoyed playing music.
与莱奥塔和玛格丽特一起演奏是我第一次、也是唯一一次真正喜欢演奏音乐。
And here's a little Elizabethan song we used to do called "Willow, Willow," which-- this is actually my first public performance since the Reagan administration.
这是我们曾经唱过的一首伊丽莎白时代的小歌曲,名为“Willow,Willow”,这实际上是我自里根政府以来第一次公开表演。
[LAUGHTER] Which I was kind of looking forward to.
[笑声] 我有点期待。
And on my way here, I was walking down Market, and there was this guy on the street playing the recorder.
在我来这里的路上,我沿着市场走,看到街上有一个人在吹竖笛。
And I kind of got a glimpse of what that looks like.
我大概瞥见了那是什么样子。
[LAUGHTER] I'm a little less sure.
[笑声]我有点不太确定。
So this is "Willow, Willow" from a manuscript in the British museum.
这是大英博物馆手稿中的《柳树,柳树》。
Now, imagine playing that on the street with your two friends who happen to be older than your parents.
现在,想象一下你和两个比你父母年长的朋友在街上玩这个游戏。
And you look up from your music stand and notice one of your schoolmates staring on in horror-- Andy Heap, for instance.
你从乐谱架上抬起头,发现你的一位同学惊恐地盯着你——比如安迪·希普。
But you know what?
但你知道吗?
You don't care.
你不在乎。
You might even smile at him.
你甚至可能对他微笑。
And this is the most important lesson of marching band, of public displays of recorder-- to withstand embarrassment.
这是行进乐队、公开展示竖笛的最重要的教训——承受尴尬。
Maybe even seek it out.
也许甚至会去寻找它。
To take nerdiness to its most dizzying, "Willow, Willow," "Tico-Tico" extremes--
把书呆子气发挥到最令人眼花缭乱的程度,“Willow,Willow”,“Tico-Tico”极端——
[LAUGHTER] --and stand before my peers with my head held high, to stick out my tongue at the Andy Heaps of the world, run back to the baritone horn of life, and blow mighty and proud.
[笑声]——站在我的同龄人面前,昂首挺胸,向世界上的安迪堆伸出舌头,跑回生命的男中音号角,吹响强大而自豪的号角。
[APPLAUSE] (HOST) SARAH VOWELL: Thank you.
[掌声](主持人)莎拉·沃威尔:谢谢。
Sarah Vowell is the music columnist for the online magazine Salon and the author of Radio On .
莎拉·沃威尔 (Sarah Vowell) 是在线杂志《沙龙》的音乐专栏作家,也是《Radio On》的作者。
[MUSIC - CHILDREN FROM THE SAN FRANCISCO UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT]
[音乐 - 来自旧金山联合学区的孩子们]
Act Three, Knockin' on Heaven's Door.
第三幕,敲响天堂之门。
In this act, we turn from formal music lessons to what it is that music can actually teach us today now, outside the classroom.
在这一行动中,我们从正式的音乐课程转向今天在课堂之外音乐实际上可以教给我们什么。
Anne Lamott is the only writer in our show today who actually lives in the San Francisco area.
安妮·拉莫特是我们今天节目中唯一一位真正住在旧金山地区的作家。
The author of many books, please welcome her.
许多书籍的作者,欢迎她。
[APPLAUSE] Anne Lamott Thank you.
[掌声] 安妮·拉莫特 谢谢。
So there I was on a plane returning home from St. Louis.
我当时正乘坐从圣路易斯回家的飞机。
Or rather, there I was in a plane on the runway at the airport in St. Louis, with, I think, the not unreasonable expectation that we would be in the air soon as our flight had already been delayed two hours.
或者更确切地说,我坐在圣路易斯机场跑道上的一架飞机上,我认为,我们的航班已经延误了两个小时,所以我们很快就会升空。
I was anxious to get home, as I had not seen Sam in several days.
我很想回家,因为我已经好几天没见到萨姆了。
But all things considered, I thought I was coping quite well, especially because I am a skeptical and terrified flier.
但考虑到所有事情,我认为我应对得很好,特别是因为我是一名持怀疑态度和害怕的飞行员。
In between devouring Hershey's chocolates and $13 worth of trashy magazines, I had spent the two hours of the delay trying to be helpful to the other stranded passengers.
在狼吞虎咽的好时巧克力和价值 13 美元的垃圾杂志之间,我花了两个小时的时间试图帮助其他滞留的乘客。
I distributed all my magazines and most of my chocolates, I got an old man some water, I flirted with babies, I mingled, I schmoozed, I was Geoffrey Rush in Shine.
我分发了我所有的杂志和大部分巧克力,我给老人喝了一些水,我和婴儿调情,我交往,我闲聊,我是《Shine》中的杰弗里·拉什。
[LAUGHTER] I had seen what may have been a miracle at my church recently.
[笑声] 最近我在我的教堂看到了可能是奇迹的事情。
I had been feeling ever since that I was supposed to walk through life with a deeper faith, a deeper sense of assurance that if I took care of God's children for God, He would take care of me.
从那时起,我就一直觉得我应该带着更深的信仰和更深的确信来度过一生,如果我为神照顾神的儿女,他也会照顾我。
My only hope was that nothing else go wrong, that once we were on board, everything runs smoothly.
我唯一的希望是不要出任何问题,一旦我们上船,一切都会顺利进行。
My idea of everything running smoothly on an airplane is that once it is in the air, A, I not die in a slow-motion fiery crash or get stabbed to death by terrorists.
我对飞机上一切顺利运行的想法是,一旦飞机在空中,A,我就不会死于慢动作的猛烈撞击,也不会被恐怖分子刺死。
And that B, none of the other passengers try to talk to me.
还有那个B,其他乘客都没有试图和我说话。
[LAUGHTER] We finally got to board.
[笑声]我们终于登机了。
I was in row 38 between a woman slightly older than I with limited language skills and a man my own age who was reading a book by a famous right-wing Christian novelist about the apocalypse.
我坐在第 38 排,中间是一位比我年龄稍大、语言能力有限的女士和一位与我同龄的男士,后者正在读一位著名右翼基督教小说家写的关于世界末日的书。
A newspaper had asked me to review it when it first came out because this author and I are both Christians, although, as I pointed out in my review, he's one of those right-wing Christians who think that Jesus is coming back sometime next Tuesday right after lunch, and I am one of those left-wing Christians who think that perhaps the author is just spiritualizing his hysteria.
一家报纸在它第一次出版时要求我评论它,因为我和作者都是基督徒,尽管,正如我在评论中指出的那样,他是那些认为耶稣下周二午饭后某个时候回来的右翼基督徒之一,而我是那些认为作者可能只是在精神化他的歇斯底里的左翼基督徒之一。
[LAUGHTER] Also, I suggested in my review that he has the tendency to be a little rigid.
[笑声] 另外,我在评论中指出他有有点僵化的倾向。
"How is it?" I ask, pointing jovially to his book, partly to be friendly and partly to gauge where he stood politically.
“如何?”我高兴地指着他的书问道,部分是出于友好,部分是为了衡量他的政治立场。
"This is one of the best books I've ever read," he replied.
“这是我读过的最好的书之一,”他回答道。
"You should read it." I nodded.
“你应该读一下。”我点点头。
I remember saying in the review that it was hardcore, right-wing paranoid, anti-semitic, homophobic, misogynistic propaganda.
我记得在评论中说过,这是铁杆、右翼偏执、反犹太、仇视同性恋、厌恶女性的宣传。
[LAUGHTER] Not to put too fine a point on it.
[笑声]不要过分强调这一点。
[LAUGHTER] He smiled and went back to reading.
[笑声]他微笑着继续看书。
I couldn't begin to guess what country the woman was from, although I think it's possible that she had one Latvian parent and one Korean.
我无法开始猜测这个女人来自哪个国家,尽管我认为她的父母可能是一位拉脱维亚人和一位韩国人。
She sounded a little Latka, the Andy Kaufman character on Taxi , except when things began to fall apart, when she sounded just like the space men in Mars Attacks!
她听起来有点像《出租车》中安迪·考夫曼的角色拉特卡,除非事情开始分崩离析,当她听起来就像《火星袭击》中的太空人一样!
"Ack!
“嗯!
Ack!
确认!
Ack!," she'd cry.
啊!”她会哭起来。
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
但我有点超前了。
As we sat there on the runway, the man reading the book about the apocalypse commented on the small gold cross I wear on a necklace.
当我们坐在伸展台上时,读一本关于世界末日的书的男人评论了我戴在项链上的小金十字架。
"Are you born again?" He asked as we taxied down the runway.
“你重生了吗?”当我们沿着跑道滑行时,他问道。
He was rather prim and tense, maybe a little like David Eisenhower with a spastic colon.
他相当拘谨和紧张,也许有点像结肠痉挛的大卫·艾森豪威尔。
[LAUGHTER] I did not know how to answer for a moment.
[笑声] 我一时不知道如何回答。
"Yes," I said, finally, "I am." My friends like to tell each other that I am not really a born-again Christian.
“是的,”我最后说道,“我是。”我的朋友们喜欢互相告诉对方,我并不是真正的重生基督徒。
They think of me more along the lines of that old Jonathan Miller routine when he said, "I'm not really a Jew.
他们更多地按照乔纳森·米勒的老套路来看待我,当时他说:“我并不是真正的犹太人。
I'm Jew-ish."
我是犹太人。”
[LAUGHTER] They think I'm Christian-ish.
[笑声]他们认为我是基督徒。
But I'm not.
但我不是。
I'm just a bad Christian.
我只是一个坏基督徒。
A bad born-again Christian.
一个糟糕的重生基督徒。
And certainly, like the apostle Peter, I am capable of denying it, of presenting myself as a sort of leftist, liberation theology enthusiast, and maybe sort of vaguely Jesus-y bon vivant.
当然,就像使徒彼得一样,我有能力否认这一点,将自己呈现为一种左派、解放神学狂热分子,也许还有某种隐约的耶稣式的享乐主义者。
[LAUGHTER] But it's not true.
[笑声]但这不是真的。
And I believe when you get on a plane, if you start lying, you are screwed unto the very Lord.
我相信,当你登上飞机时,如果你开始撒谎,你就被主迷住了。
[LAUGHTER] So I told the truth, that I'm a believer, a convert.
[笑声] 所以我说了实话,我是一个信徒,一个皈依者。
I'm probably about three months away from slapping an aluminum Jesus fish on the back of my car.
大约三个月后,我就会在我的车后座上放一条铝制耶稣鱼。
Although I first want to see if the application or Stickum in any way interferes with my lease agreement.
尽管我首先想看看应用程序或 Stickum 是否以任何方式干扰我的租赁协议。
[LAUGHTER] I just love the guy.
[笑声]我就是喜欢这个家伙。
I just love Jesus.
我只爱耶稣。
It's that simple.
就是这么简单。
Anyway, as the plane taxied out to the runway, the man on my right began telling me about how he and his wife were home schooling their children.
不管怎样,当飞机滑行到跑道时,我右边的那个男人开始告诉我他和他的妻子如何在家教育孩子。
And he described with enormous acrimony the radical, free-for-all, feminist, artsy-feely philosophy of his county school system.
他以极大的尖刻描述了他县学校系统的激进、自由、女权主义、艺术感的哲学。
And I knew instantly that this description was an act of aggression against me, that he was telepathic onto me, could see that I am the enemy, that I will be on the same curling team in Heaven as Tom Hayden and Vanessa Redgrave.
我立即知道这种描述是对我的攻击行为,他对我有心灵感应,可以看出我是敌人,我将在天堂与汤姆·海登和凡妮莎·雷德格雷夫同属冰壶队。
[LAUGHTER] But suddenly the plane braked to a stop.
[笑声] 但飞机突然刹车停了下来。
We all looked around for a moment, and then the captain came on the PA system and announced calmly that two passengers wanted to get off the plane right then and there.
我们都环顾四周,然后机长通过广播系统平静地宣布,有两名乘客想立即下飞机。
We were headed back to the gate.
我们原路返回大门。
"What?" we all cried.
“什么?”我们都哭了。
The good news was that this was only going to take a minute or so, since in the past two hours we'd only gotten about 500 feet.
好消息是这只需要一分钟左右,因为在过去的两个小时里我们只到达了大约 500 英尺。
The bad news was that FAA regulations dictated that all of the stowed luggage had to be gone over by security to make sure these people had not accidentally left behind their pipe bombs.
坏消息是,美国联邦航空局的规定规定,所有存放的行李都必须由安检人员检查,以确保这些人没有意外留下管状炸弹。
The Latvian woman stared at me quizzically.
拉脱维亚女人疑惑地看着我。
I explained very slowly and very loudly what was going on.
我非常缓慢而大声地解释发生了什么事。
She gaped at me for a moment.
她目瞪口呆地看着我一会儿。
"Ack," she whispered.
“嗯,”她低声说道。
[LAUGHTER] Eventually, the three of us in row 38 began to read.
[笑声] 最终,我们第 38 排的三个人开始阅读。
And an hour later, the plane finally took off again.
一个小时后,飞机终于再次起飞。
We, the citizens of row 38, all ordered sodas.
我们38排的市民都点了汽水。
The Latvian woman put on a Walkman and began to listen with her eyes closed.
拉脱维亚妇女戴上随身听,开始闭着眼睛听。
The Christian man read his book about the apocalypse.
基督徒读了他关于世界末日的书。
I read The New Yorker .
我读过《纽约客》。
Then the seat belt sign came on and the pilot came back on over the PA system.
然后安全带信号亮起,飞行员通过广播系统重新接通。
"I'm afraid we're about to hit some really heavy turbulence," he said.
“我担心我们即将遭遇一些非常严重的湍流,”他说。
"Please return to your seats."
“请回到座位上。”
A moment later the plane began bouncing around so hard that we had to hold on to our drinks.
过了一会儿,飞机开始剧烈颠簸,我们不得不拿着饮料。
"Ack!
“嗯!
Ack!
确认!
Ack!" said the Latvian, grabbing for her Sprite.
嗯!”拉脱维亚人一边说,一边抓起她的雪碧。
"Everyone take your seat!" the pilot literally barked over the PA system.
“大家就座吧!”飞行员对着广播系统大声咆哮。
"We are in for some rough going." My heart bounced around like a jumping bean.
“我们正面临一些困难。”我的心像一颗跳动的豆子一样跳来跳去。
The plane rose and fell and shook, and the pilot came back on and said sternly, like an angry dad, "flight attendants, sit down now!"
飞机起起落落,晃动起来,飞行员回来后像一位愤怒的父亲一样严厉地说:“空乘人员,现在坐下!”
[LAUGHTER] And the plane hit those waves and currents of air on the choppy sea of sky, and we bounced and moaned and gasped.
[笑声]飞机撞上了波涛汹涌的天空海洋上的波浪和气流,我们弹跳起来,呻吟着,喘着粗气。
"Whoa," we all said, as one, like we were on a roller coaster ride.
“哇哦,”我们都说,就像坐过山车一样。
We're going down, I thought.
我们要下去了,我想。
I know a basic tenet of the Christian faith is that death is really just a major change of address--
我知道基督教信仰的一个基本信条是死亡实际上只是地址的重大改变——
[LAUGHTER] --but I had to close my eyes to squinch back tears of terror and loss.
[笑声]——但我不得不闭上眼睛,忍住恐惧和失落的泪水。
Oh my god, I thought.
天哪,我想。
Oh my god.
我的天啊。
I'll never see Sam again.
我再也见不到萨姆了。
This will kill me a second time.
这会杀了我第二次。
The plane bucked and shook without stopping, and the Christian read calmly, stoically, rather pleased with himself it seemed to my tiny, hysterical self.
飞机不停地颠簸摇晃,基督徒平静地、坚忍地读着,在我歇斯底里的小我看来,他似乎对自己相当满意。
The Latvian closed her eyes and turned up her Walkman.
拉脱维亚人闭上眼睛,打开随身听。
I could hear it playing softly.
我能听到它轻柔地演奏。
And I, praying for another miracle, thought about the one I had just seen.
我一边祈祷着另一个奇迹,一边想着我刚刚看到的奇迹。
It took place at my church, where one of our newer members, a man named Ken, is dying of AIDS, disintegrating before our very eyes.
事情发生在我的教堂,我们的一位新成员,名叫肯,正在死于艾滋病,在我们眼前崩溃。
He came in a year ago with a Jewish woman who comes every week to be with us, although she does not believe in Jesus.
一年前,他和一位犹太妇女一起来,尽管她不相信耶稣,但她每周都会来和我们在一起。
Shortly after the man with AIDS started coming, his partner died of the disease.
在这名艾滋病患者到来后不久,他的伴侣也死于这种疾病。
A few weeks later, he said that right then and there, in the hole in his heart that Brandon's death left, Jesus slid in and had been there ever since.
几周后,他说,就在那时,在布兰登的死在他心中留下的洞里,耶稣滑了进去,从那时起就一直在那里。
This man has a totally lopsided face, ravaged, emaciated.
这个男人有一张完全不平衡的脸,饱受蹂躏,憔悴不堪。
And when he smiles, he's radiant.
当他微笑时,他容光焕发。
He looks like God's crazy nephew Phil.
他看起来就像上帝疯狂的侄子菲尔。
[LAUGHTER] He said that he would gladly pay any price for what he has now, which is Jesus and us.
[笑声]他说他愿意为他现在所拥有的,即耶稣和我们,付出任何代价。
There's a woman in the choir named Renola, a beautiful black woman who is smart and jovial and sweet and as devout as can be but who has also been a little standoffish towards Ken, if you ask me.
唱诗班里有一位名叫雷诺拉(Renola)的美丽黑人女性,她聪明、快乐、甜美、虔诚,但如果你问我的话,她对肯也有点冷漠。
She's always looked at him with confusion, when she looks at him at all, in his goofy, ravaged joy.
当她看着他时,她总是带着困惑地看着他,在他愚蠢的、被破坏的快乐中。
Or she looks at him sideways.
或者她斜眼看着他。
She was raised by Baptists in the Midwest who must have thought that his way of life, that he, was an abomination.
她是由中西部的浸信会教徒抚养长大的,他们一定认为他的生活方式是令人憎恶的。
Maybe it was hard for her to break through this.
也许她很难突破这一点。
Maybe on the most visceral level, she was a little afraid of catching the disease.
或许从内心深处来说,她有点害怕染上这种病。
I'm not sure.
我不知道。
But anyway, Kenny has come to church almost every week for the last year and won almost everyone else over.
但无论如何,肯尼去年几乎每周都去教堂,几乎赢得了其他所有人的支持。
He missed a couple of Sundays a while ago because he was too weak to come.
前段时间他缺席了几个周日,因为他太虚弱了,无法来。
And then a month ago, he came back, weighing almost no pounds, his face even more lopsided, as if he's had a stroke.
然后一个月前,他回来了,体重几乎没有磅数,脸更歪了,就像中风了一样。
But during the Prayers of the People, he talked joyously of his life and his decline, of how safe and happy he feels these days.
但在人民祈祷期间,他愉快地谈论了自己的生活和衰落,以及这些天他感到多么安全和幸福。
So on this one particular Sunday, for the first hymn, the so-called morning hymn, we sang "Jacob's Ladder," which goes "every rung goes higher, higher." But Kenny couldn't stand.
因此,在这个特别的周日,第一首赞美诗,即所谓的早晨赞美诗,我们唱了“雅各的天梯”,其中唱的是“每一级都越来越高,越来越高”。但肯尼无法忍受。
But he sang away, sitting down, with a hymnal in his lap.
但他坐下来唱了起来,膝上放着一本赞美诗集。
And then when it came time for the second hymn, the fellowship hymn, we sang "His Eye is on the Sparrow." I noticed that Ken still couldn't stand up to sing.
然后,当第二首赞美诗,即团契赞美诗的时候,我们唱了“他的眼睛在麻雀上”。我注意到肯仍然无法站起来唱歌。
The pianist was playing and the whole congregation had risen.
钢琴家正在演奏,全体会众都起立了。
And only Ken remained seated, holding the hymnal in his lap.
只有肯还坐在座位上,膝上抱着赞美诗集。
And Renola watched him rather skeptically for a moment.
雷诺拉怀疑地看了他一会儿。
And then her face began to melt and contort like his.
然后她的脸开始像他的一样融化和扭曲。
And she went to his side and bent down to lift him up, lifted up this white rag doll, this scarecrow.
她走到他身边,弯下腰把他抱起来,举起这个白色的布娃娃,这个稻草人。
She held him next to her and he was draped over and against her like a child.
她把他抱在身边,他像个孩子一样依偎在她身上。
And they sang.
他们唱歌。
And it pierced me.
它刺痛了我。
I can't imagine anything else but music that could have brought about this alchemy.
除了音乐之外,我无法想象还有什么可以带来这种炼金术。
How is it that you have a chord here and then another chord there and then your heart breaks open?
为什么你这里有一个和弦,那里有另一个和弦,然后你的心就碎了?
I don't know the answer.
我不知道答案。
Maybe it's that music is about as physical as it gets.
也许音乐是最具有物理性的。
Your essential rhythm is your heartbeat.
你的基本节奏是你的心跳。
Your essential sound, the breath.
你最重要的声音,呼吸。
We're walking temples of noise.
我们正在喧闹的寺庙中行走。
And when you add the human heart to this mix, it somehow lets us meet on a bridge we couldn't get to any other way.
当你将人心添加到这个组合中时,它以某种方式让我们在一座我们无法通过任何其他方式到达的桥上相遇。
Back on board, little by little, the plane grew steadier.
回到飞机上,飞机渐渐稳定下来。
And the pilot came back on to say that everything was OK.
飞行员回来说一切正常。
I was so excited that we were not going to crash and that I might actually get to see Sam again that I started feeling mingle-y.
我非常兴奋,因为我们不会坠机,而且我可能真的能再次见到萨姆,所以我开始感觉很融洽。
I suddenly wanted to be new best friends with a Christian man.
我突然想和一个基督徒成为新的最好的朋友。
But just when I opened my mouth, the pilot came back on the PA system and asked if there was a doctor on board.
但就在我张开嘴的时候,飞行员又打开广播系统询问机上是否有医生。
The woman behind us who turned out to be a nurse got up and went back to investigate.
我们后面的那位女士原来是一名护士,起身回去查看。
The Christian man prayed.
基督徒男子祷告了。
I tried to rubberneck but I couldn't see a thing.
我试着扭动脖子,但什么也看不见。
[LAUGHTER] I went back to thinking about Ken in my church, and how on that Sunday Ken, of whom Renola had been so skeptical, was trying to sing.
[笑声] 我回想起教堂里的肯,以及雷诺拉一直持怀疑态度的那个周日,肯是如何尝试唱歌的。
But then he and Renola both began to cry.
但随后他和雷诺拉都哭了起来。
Tears were pouring down their faces, and their noses were running like rivers.
泪水从他们的脸上流下来,他们的鼻子像河水一样流淌。
But as she held him up, she suddenly lay her black, weeping face against his feverish white face, put hers right up against his, and let all those spooky fluids mingle with her.
但当她抱起他时,她突然把她哭泣的黑色脸贴在他发烧而苍白的脸上,把她的脸贴在他的脸上,让所有那些怪异的液体与她混合在一起。
He looked like a child in her arms who was singing because tiny children just sing all the time because they haven't made all the separations between speech and music.
他看起来就像她怀里的一个正在唱歌的孩子,因为小孩子一直在唱歌,因为他们还没有完全区分言语和音乐。
So he sang and she held him up.
于是他唱歌了,她把他抱了起来。
And she sang and he held her up.
她唱歌,他抱起她。
When the nurse sitting beside us returned to row 39, it was with the news that a woman in the back was having a heart attack.
当坐在我们旁边的护士回到39排时,传来了后排一位女士心脏病发作的消息。
A heart attack.
心脏病发作。
I ask you.
我问你。
But there were doctors on hand and the nurse thought the woman was going to be OK.
但现场有医生,护士认为这名妇女不会有事。
"Good lord," said the Christian man.
“上帝啊,”基督徒男子说道。
We looked at each other and sighed.
我们互相看了一眼,叹了口气。
We shook our heads and continued to look at each other.
我们摇摇头,继续互相看着对方。
"God," I said, "I just hope the snakes don't get out of the cargo hold."
“天哪,”我说,“我只是希望蛇不要逃出货舱。”
[LAUGHTER] The prim, apocalyptic Christian man smiled.
[笑声] 这位拘谨的、世界末日般的基督徒微笑着。
Then he laughed out loud.
然后他大声笑了起来。
The Latvian woman started laughing then, although she still had her Walkman on.
这位拉脱维亚女士随即开始大笑,尽管她还戴着随身听。
And while I hate to look like I'm enjoying my own jokes too much, I started laughing too.
虽然我讨厌看起来太喜欢自己的笑话,但我也开始笑了。
The three of us sat there in hysterics.
我们三个人歇斯底里地坐在那里。
And when we were done, the man reached over and patted the back of my hand, smiling gently.
当我们完成后,那个男人伸手拍了拍我的手背,温柔地微笑着。
The Latvian woman leaned in close to me, into my Soviet air space, and--
拉脱维亚女人靠近我,进入了我的苏联领空,然后——
[LAUGHTER] --she beamed.
[笑声]——她微笑着。
I leaned forward so that our foreheads touched for just a second.
我向前倾身,让我们的额头接触了一会儿。
I thought, I do not know if what happened at church was an honest-to-God little miracle.
我想,我不知道教堂里发生的事情是否是一个诚实的小奇迹。
And I don't know if there has been another one here, the smallest possible sort.
我不知道这里是否还有另一种,尽可能最小的一种。
But now I felt like I was sitting with my cousins on a plane eight miles up, a plane that was going to make it home.
但现在我感觉自己正和我的表兄弟坐在一架距八英里高的飞机上,一架即将回家的飞机。
And it made me so happy that I suddenly thought, this is plenty of miracle for me to rest in now.
这让我非常高兴,我突然想到,这对我来说真是一个可以休息的奇迹。
[SINGING "HIS EYE IS ON THE SPARROW"]
[唱“他的眼睛在麻雀上”]
Anne Lamott is the author of Bird by Bird, Operating Instructions, and most recently, Crooked Little Heart.
安妮·拉莫特 (Anne Lamott) 是《Bird by Bird》、《Operating instructions》和最近出版的《Crooked Little Heart》的作者。
Singing from Renola Garrison and the pianist is Anne Jefferson, both of them from Anne's church.
雷诺拉·加里森 (Renola Garrison) 演唱,钢琴家安妮·杰斐逊 (Anne Jefferson),两人都来自安妮教堂。
Our program was produced today by Julie Snyder and myself, with Alix Spiegel and Nancy Updike.
今天我们的节目由朱莉·斯奈德和我本人以及阿利克斯·斯皮格尔和南希·厄普代克制作。
Senior editor Paul Tough.
高级编辑保罗·托夫。
Contributing editors Jack Hitt, Margy Rochlin, and Consigliere Sarah Vowell.
特约编辑 Jack Hitt、Margy Rochlin 和 Consigliere Sarah Vowell。
Engineering by Joe Hunter.
乔·亨特的工程。
[ACKNOWLEDGMENTS] Our show was produced for the stage by Kate Boyd and the Solo Mio Festival.
[鸣谢] 我们的节目由 Kate Boyd 和 Solo Mio Festival 为舞台制作。
Addition music by David Riera.
大卫·里拉 (David Riera) 的附加音乐。
WBEZ management oversight by Torey Malatia.
WBEZ 管理由 Torey Malatia 监督。
I'm Ira Glass.
我是艾拉·格拉斯。
It has been such a thrill being here.
来到这里真是太激动了。
Back next week with more stores of This American Life.
下周将有更多“This American Life”商店回归。
[APPLAUSE] Today's program was first broadcast in 1998.
[鼓掌]今天的节目是1998年首播的。
This American Life was distributed by Public Radio International.
《美国生活》由国际公共广播电台发行。
[FUNDING CREDITS] Announcer PRI.
[资金来源] 播音员 PRI。
Public Radio International.
国际公共广播电台。
This American Life is produced in collaboration with WBEZ Chicago and delivered to stations by PRX The Public Radio Exchange.
《This American Life》与 WBEZ Chicago 合作制作,并由 PRX 公共广播电台传送到各电台。