144: Where Words Fail - This American Life
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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 #144 | November 5, 1999 144: Where Words Fail 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 144 集 | 1999 年 11 月 5 日 144：无言以对 注意：《美国生活》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 When Mark was 15, his father was shot.
序言 Ira Glass 马克 15 岁时，他的父亲被枪杀。
And he reacted like a 15-year-old.
他的反应就像一个15岁的孩子。
He went up to each of his relatives, to anybody who'd listen actually, and he declared, someday, when he grows up, he would become a pro football player, and he would find the men who shot his father.
他去找他的每一位亲戚，去找任何真正愿意倾听的人，他宣称，有一天，当他长大后，他会成为一名职业足球运动员，他会找到枪杀他父亲的人。
When I look back at that kid, that 15-year-old kid making that promise, it's pathetic in a way.
当我回头看那个孩子，那个 15 岁的孩子做出这样的承诺时，在某种程度上这是可悲的。
Well, it's such a particular vision of what a pro football player is, which is to say, as a kid, you're trying to conjure the notion of somebody who's very powerful, but also pure somehow.
嗯，这是对职业足球运动员的特殊看法，也就是说，作为一个孩子，你试图想象一个非常强大但不知何故也很纯洁的人的概念。
Yes.
是的。
And I remember even then some friends saying, now, Mark, pro football is kind of a lofty goal.
我记得当时就有一些朋友说，马克，现在职业足球是一个崇高的目标。
Just maybe high school football.
也许只是高中橄榄球。
Years later when I reflected back on that, I thought, geez, the kid's dad just was killed.
多年后，当我回想起来时，我想，天啊，这孩子的爸爸就这么被杀了。
Why disabuse him of some vision he's got?
为什么要消除他的某些愿景呢？
Mike's dad was a bar owner in Fresno, California.
迈克的父亲是加利福尼亚州弗雷斯诺的一家酒吧老板。
Two men came into the bar, played a game of pool, ordered two beers, then came into the back room and shot him.
两名男子走进酒吧，打了一场台球，点了两瓶啤酒，然后走进后面的房间，开枪射杀了他。
They didn't take any money.
他们没有拿任何钱。
It was a gangland-style hit.
这是一部黑帮风格的热门作品。
And there was talk that Mark's father must be caught up with organized crime.
有人说马克的父亲肯定卷入了有组织犯罪。
So at 15, Mark started calling around until his mother made him stop.
因此，15 岁时，马克开始四处打电话，直到他的母亲阻止了他。
Seventeen years later, he moved back to Fresno.
十七年后，他搬回弗雷斯诺。
By this time, he was a reporter for the LA Times , and he wanted to write a book investigating his dad's murder.
此时，他是《洛杉矶时报》的记者，他想写一本调查他父亲被谋杀的书。
He was so skittish that he and his wife got their home under assumed names, did not tell people where they lived.
他非常不安，以至于他和妻子以化名居住，没有告诉人们他们住在哪里。
It's hard to make sense of all that, but there was a great deal of paranoia.
很难理解这一切，但确实存在很多偏执。
I didn't want family to really know what I was doing.
我不想让家人真正知道我在做什么。
And I thought that if there was some way to-- if someone got nervous about the questions I was asking, I wanted to make it difficult for them to try to find me.
我想，如果有什么办法——如果有人对我提出的问题感到紧张，我想让他们很难找到我。
And I remember changing my sleep patterns so that I was awake all through the night, and I was guarding the house.
我记得我改变了我的睡眠模式，让我整晚都醒着，我负责看守房子。
I had actually a gun that I had under the couch.
我实际上有一把枪，放在沙发下面。
I was sleeping on the couch.
我睡在沙发上。
In a way, I became very childlike again.
在某种程度上，我又变得很孩子气了。
I really had to become a 15-year-old again in some ways to get at this thing.
在某些方面我真的必须回到 15 岁才能完成这件事。
Like how do you mean?
比如你的意思是？
Mark Arax Well, I think it wasn't terribly adult to try to think that you could come back to your hometown and try to hide your identity.
马克·阿拉克斯（Mark Arax）：好吧，我认为尝试认为你可以回到家乡并试图隐藏你的身份，这并不是很成熟。
I don't think that was really adult.
我不认为那是真正的成年人。
When somebody close to us dies, part of us can remain suspended there at the moment it happened.
当我们身边的人去世时，我们的一部分可能会在事情发生的那一刻保持悬浮状态。
And we stay there.
我们就留在那里。
Part of us stays there, turning the whole thing over and over in our heads.
我们的一部分留在那里，在脑海中一遍又一遍地思考整个事情。
Mark spent three years talking to informants about his father's murder.
马克花了三年时间与线人谈论他父亲的谋杀案。
He went through police files, analyzed phone records, and in the end found credible evidence that his father was murdered, just as he was about to blow the whistle on a drug ring, one with local police on its side, Mark believes.
马克相信，就在他准备揭发一个贩毒团伙时，他查阅了警方档案，分析了电话记录，最终找到了父亲被谋杀的可靠证据。
He wrote his book about it.
他就此写了一本书。
It's called In My Father's Name.
它的名字叫《以我父亲的名义》。
And still that was not enough.
但这还不够。
He's still not at peace.
他还是不安宁。
Have I been liberated by some of those answers?
我是否因其中一些答案而解放了？
I don't know if liberation is the right word.
我不知道解放这个词是否合适。
But why?
但为什么？
What would it take?
需要什么？
Mark Arax I think there's a part of me that wants to sit across from the men who set this whole thing up and talk to them about it.
马克·阿拉克斯（Mark Arax）：我想我内心有一部分想要坐在那些策划这一切的人对面，并与他们谈论这件事。
Yeah, that's right.
是的，没错。
That's what I want them to do.
这就是我希望他们做的。
I have played over that encounter with the killers so many times.
我已经多次回忆起与凶手的遭遇。
And one of things that I would tell them going in is it goes no further than you and me.
我要告诉他们的一件事是，它不会比你和我更远。
This is it.
就是这样。
I want to ask you one question.
我想问你一个问题。
Were you responsible for the murder of my father?
你对我父亲的谋杀负有责任吗？
And so actually, you've actually imagined this over and over to yourself.
事实上，你自己已经一遍又一遍地想象过这一点。
Well, from WBEZ Chicago and Public Radio International, it's This American Life.
嗯，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.
我是艾拉·格拉斯。
Today on our program, people trying to make sense out of things for which they'll never get answers or real peace.
今天在我们的节目中，人们试图弄清楚他们永远无法得到答案或真正平静的事情。
All three stories in our program today are about people facing the idea of death and telling themselves one thing about it or another.
我们今天节目中的所有三个故事都是关于人们面对死亡的想法并告诉自己关于死亡的一件事或另一件事。
And is there anything that can be said?
还有什么可以说的吗？
Is there anything that can comfort us in that situation?
在这种情况下，有什么可以安慰我们吗？
Act One of our program, The Disappearance, trying to comprehend what it means when people are there, alive in your life one day, and the next, gone.
我们节目的第一幕“消失”，试图理解当有人在你的生活中，某一天还活着，但第二天就消失了，这意味着什么。
Act Two, Look for the Union Label.
第二步，寻找联盟标签。
The plot of this story sounds on the surface, I have to say, like the script of the worst sitcom ever made.
我不得不说，这个故事的情节从表面上看就像有史以来最糟糕的情景喜剧的剧本。
A father and daughter sit down together for no real reason, just a whim really, to write his obituary, not really thinking about what it means.
一对父女毫无缘由地坐在一起写他的讣告，并没有真正思考这意味着什么。
And then at some point, someone starts to think about what it means.
然后在某个时刻，有人开始思考这意味着什么。
Act Three, Take My Wife, Please.
第三幕，请带走我的妻子。
Can dwelling morbidly on future disaster striking your own family, can that actually be healthy?
病态地沉迷于未来袭击自己家人的灾难，这真的能健康吗？
One brave man defends the idea.
一位勇敢的人捍卫了这个想法。
Stay with us.
留在我们身边。
Act One, The Disappearance.
第一幕，失踪。
One of the most remarkable books that I've read in a while is by a woman named Genevieve Jurgensen, about her husband Laurent and she lost their two daughters, Elise and Mathilde, at the ages of four and seven.
我最近读过的最引人注目的书之一是一位名叫吉纳维夫·尤尔根森 (Genevieve Jurgensen) 的女士写的，讲述了她的丈夫洛朗 (Laurent) 和她在四岁和七岁时失去了两个女儿埃莉斯 (Elise) 和玛蒂尔德 (Mathilde) 的故事。
The book is a series of letters that she wrote to her friend 12 years after their deaths.
这本书是她在朋友去世 12 年后写给她的一系列信件。
And one of the things that's so remarkable about it is how she still struggles.
其中最引人注目的事情之一就是她仍然在挣扎。
She doesn't want to keep suffering over their deaths, but suffering over them is the last way that she has to love them.
她不想继续为他们的死而受苦，但为他们受苦是她爱他们的最后一种方式。
She's also keenly aware that she wants them to seem, in these letters, to be more than just names.
她还敏锐地意识到，她希望这些信件在这些信件中不仅仅是名字。
When you tell a story about somebody, it's sometimes hard for them to seem more like just a character in a story, and she keeps trying over and over to find ways to make it real, that, in fact, they were alive.
当你讲述一个关于某人的故事时，有时很难让他们看起来更像故事中的一个角色，而她不断地一遍又一遍地尝试寻找方法来使其真实，事实上，他们还活着。
They are more than can be expressed on the page.
它们的内容超出了页面上所能表达的范围。
You never knew our daughters.
你从来不了解我们的女儿。
Neither did you know me as I was when they were alive.
你也不了解他们活着时的我。
I will have to tell you everything.
我必须告诉你一切。
Can one really tell someone about very young children?
一个人真的可以告诉别人关于很小的孩子的事情吗？
I will not even show you photographs of them.
我什至不会给你看他们的照片。
All they show are two little girls, barely distinguishable from each other, just like all the little blond children which people primary school classes in the beaches along the Atlantic coast in the summer.
他们所展示的只是两个小女孩，彼此几乎无法区分，就像夏季大西洋沿岸海滩上小学的所有金发小孩子一样。
On the 29th of April 1980, the official photographer for the school which my daughters attended came to take some class photographs.
1980年4月29日，我女儿就读的学校的官方摄影师来拍摄一些班级照片。
They were both dead the next day.
第二天他们都死了。
Indeed, we did not receive these photographs until several weeks after the news of our solitude.
事实上，直到我们孤独的消息传出几周后，我们才收到这些照片。
Mathilde's class is in uniform, so it is a picture of a little girl in navy blue in a row, stifling her giggles in between her best friends.
玛蒂尔德的班级穿着制服，所以照片上是一个穿着海军蓝色衣服的小女孩排成一排，在她最好的朋友之间忍住咯咯笑。
Elise, who was still in the nursery class, is wearing the dress with the sailor collar that my mother gave her.
还在上幼儿园的伊莉丝穿着妈妈送她的水手领连衣裙。
She's sitting in the first row, looking solemnly at the lens.
她坐在第一排，表情严肃地看着镜头。
I think that in this picture, she's really very like me.
我觉得这张照片里的她真的很像我。
In Mathilde's satchel, I still have her school overall with her name embroidered on it, with its ink stains and biscuit crumbs in the pockets.
在玛蒂尔德的书包里，我还放着她的学校校服，上面绣着她的名字，口袋里还有墨迹和饼干屑。
In her exercise book, in her childish but careful handwriting, she has written the date, which will be the date of her death and the death of her little sister.
在她的练习本上，她用幼稚但仔细的笔迹写下了日期，这将是她和她妹妹的死亡日期。
Wednesday, 30th of April 1980.
1980 年 4 月 30 日，星期三。
What else can I tell you?
我还能告诉你什么？
I would like you to have heard me talking to them just once, even if only on the telephone.
我希望你只听过我和他们交谈过一次，即使只是通过电话。
I feel powerless in trying to make you accept this evidence.
我无力让你接受这个证据。
They were here.
他们就在这里。
I was their mother.
我是他们的母亲。
I went to pick them up at school.
我去学校接他们。
We stopped at the supermarket to buy two cheap waxed coats, one in red, one in blue.
我们在超市停下来买了两件便宜的打蜡外套，一件是红色的，一件是蓝色的。
And I dropped them off with my mother, not before playing a practical joke on her on the landing.
我把它们交给了我的母亲，然后在楼梯平台上对她开了个恶作剧。
I bundled my daughters up in the coats with the hoods up, pulled tightly over their noses and tied under their chins.
我把女儿们裹在外套里，把兜帽拉起来，紧紧地盖住她们的鼻子，绑在她们的下巴下面。
They rang the bell, and I hid, and my mother pretended not to recognize them.
他们按响了门铃，我躲了起来，我妈妈假装不认识他们。
Then I went home because I was a speech therapist at the time, and I had patients waiting.
然后我就回家了，因为我当时是一名言语治疗师，还有病人在等我。
My sister-in-law came, as intended, to pick Mathilde and Elise up to take them to their other grandmother, but they never arrived because they died toward the end of the afternoon about 10 meters from each other on the side of the northern highway.
我的嫂子按计划来接玛蒂尔德和埃莉斯，带她们去见她们的另一位祖母，但她们一直没有到，因为她们在下午快结束时死在北部高速公路边，彼此相距约 10 米。
I'm hesitating about what to write next.
我正在犹豫接下来要写什么。
There is no common ground between before and after.
之前和之后之间没有共同点。
Or at least what they have in common strikes me as just as painful to excavate as the most deeply buried relics of before.
或者至少它们的共同点让我印象深刻，就像挖掘以前埋藏最深的遗迹一样痛苦。
Yes, I'm hesitating.
是的，我正在犹豫。
I'm afraid of failing.
我害怕失败。
I'm afraid that you will believe more readily in their death than in their lives.
我担心你会更相信他们的死而不是他们的生。
A few years ago, I still used to drive out into the countryside and bellow at the top of my lungs: Mathilde!
几年前，我仍然常常开车去乡下大声喊叫：玛蒂尔德！
I was really calling her.
我真的是在给她打电话。
Of course, she did not come.
当然，她没有来。
At least I had spoken her name once more.
至少我再次说出了她的名字。
Sometimes I meet a little girl who has the same name as her, and I speak it.
有时我遇到一个和她同名的小女孩，我就会说这个名字。
I say, hello, Mathilde, goodbye, Mathilde, with a smile.
我微笑着说，你好，玛蒂尔德，再见，玛蒂尔德。
And I think, help.
我想，帮忙吧。
On the eve of that May Day holiday, we were not expecting anyone to call, and the ringing of the telephone awakened no feelings in us.
五一假期前夕，我们没想到会有人打来电话，电话铃声也没有唤醒我们的任何感情。
We lifted the receiver without curiosity.
我们毫无好奇地拿起听筒。
A slight rustling on the line indicated that the call was being made from outside Paris.
电话线上轻微的沙沙声表明电话是从巴黎以外的地方打来的。
My sister?
我的姐妹？
No, I knew she was on her way to Paris.
不，我知道她正在去巴黎的路上。
An unfamiliar man's voice checked that we were indeed the people he was looking for.
一个陌生男人的声音证实我们确实是他要找的人。
Then he told us to hold the line.
然后他告诉我们保持阵线。
The next voice was that of our brother-in-law, Christian, who had left with his wife, their baby, and our two girls.
下一个声音是我们姐夫克里斯蒂安的声音，他带着妻子、孩子和我们的两个女儿离开了。
We asked him how he was.
我们问他怎么样。
He said that he was not good at all, that they had had a very serious car accident.
他说他一点都不好，他们出了一场很严重的车祸。
We said yes, and?
我们说是的，然后呢？
He told us our two little girls were dead.
他告诉我们我们的两个小女孩死了。
We thought he was playing a joke on us and then thought no one would play a joke in such poor taste.
我们以为他是在跟我们开玩笑，后来又觉得没有人会开这么低俗的玩笑。
Laurent said, but Christian, it's not true.
洛朗说，但是克里斯蒂安，这不是真的。
He fell to his knees, calling his children.
他跪倒在地，呼唤着他的孩子们。
I asked for news of the others.
我询问了其他人的消息。
Everyone was fine.
每个人都很好。
Where did we have to go?
我们必须去哪里？
To the hospital at Peronne.
去佩罗尼医院。
I did not know where it was.
我不知道它在哪里。
Christian give us a few directions.
克里斯蒂安给我们一些指示。
Laurent knew.
洛朗知道。
We hung up.
我们挂断了电话。
I immediately felt how impossible it was to raise myself to the scale of this event.
我立即感到自己要达到这样的规模是多么不可能。
The terror mounted in me out of all proportion to my own dimensions.
我心中的恐惧与我自身的规模完全不成比例。
I could not contain it all.
我无法控制这一切。
I was still this little woman in her little apartment next to a little man in the same little apartment.
我仍然是她小公寓里的这个小女人，旁边是同一个小公寓里的一个小男人。
The terror targeted us exclusively.
恐怖分子专门针对我们。
We were its only prey, it's only destination, the terminus.
我们是它唯一的猎物，它唯一的目的地，终点站。
It was a giant, and we were dwarves.
它是巨人，而我们是矮人。
Laurent took me by the wrists and asked me not to scream.
洛朗抓住我的手腕，让我不要尖叫。
He said, "To think we're going to have to get over this." A big part of us has stayed there forever.
他说：“想想我们必须克服这个问题。”我们中的很大一部分人永远留在那里。
I will tell you what happened next, everything you want to know about what happened next.
我会告诉你接下来发生了什么，以及你想知道的关于接下来发生的一切。
But at the moment, I cannot.
但目前，我不能。
Just as then, I am looking for the link between my daughters and that news.
就在那时，我正在寻找我的女儿们和那个新闻之间的联系。
We arrived at the door of the hospital.
我们到达了医院门口。
Jean-Bernard asked where we had to go, and the porter replied, "In surgery." Then I thought that my daughters had been operated on before they died, and everything expanded into infinity again.
让-伯纳德问我们要去哪里，搬运工回答说：“在手术室。”然后我想到我的女儿们在死前已经接受了手术，一切又扩大到无限。
Corridors.
走廊。
It was difficult to walk.
走路很困难。
My sister-in-law at the end of the corridor, arms circling around her, a room.
我的嫂子在走廊的尽头，手臂环绕着她，一个房间。
My brother-in-law, my sister-in-law, a stranger.
我的姐夫，我的嫂子，一个陌生人。
They ask us if we would like to see them, if we wanted to see our daughters.
他们问我们是否想见他们，是否想见我们的女儿。
You would have had to drag me there with a tractor.
你得用拖拉机把我拖到那里。
They ask us if we would like to ring anyone to let them know.
他们问我们是否愿意打电话告诉他们。
I then understand that this horror does not stop at us, that we have to tell my mother.
然后我明白，这种恐怖并不止于我们，我们必须告诉我的母亲。
No, it's the evening.
不，现在是晚上。
She's not expecting any news this evening.
她预计今晚不会有任何消息。
Let her sleep one more time.
让她再睡一会吧。
I was right.
我是对的。
They need the family record book.
他们需要家庭记录簿。
When they ask for it, and I reply, "Yes, we've brought it with us," I feel proud for a moment.
当他们索要时，我回答说：“是的，我们已经把它带来了。”我有一瞬间感到自豪。
We are good parents.
我们是好父母。
We thought of everything.
我们想到了一切。
Aline and Christian are going to spend the night in the hospital near their baby Aude.
艾琳和克里斯蒂安将在他们的宝宝奥德附近的医院过夜。
All three are kept under observation.
三人均处于观察状态。
We are taken back.
我们被带回来了。
In fact, we came for nothing.
事实上，我们是无缘无故而来的。
Right from the first instant, death is this nothing.
从第一刻起，死亡就毫无意义。
Mrs. L suggests that we stay the night at her house.
L 太太建议我们在她家过夜。
I agree readily.
我欣然同意。
She lost a son long ago.
她很久以前就失去了一个儿子。
At the L's house, we eat what we are given, food and sleeping pills.
在L家，我们吃什么就吃什么，食物和安眠药。
It is not so much in words that I'm lacking to tell you all this but in courage.
我之所以向你们讲述这一切，并不是缺乏言语，而是缺乏勇气。
When I realize that I have forgotten something, and I have to retrace my steps, I say to myself: "Is it really worth it?"
当我意识到自己忘记了什么，不得不折返时，我对自己说：“这真的值得吗？”
Before taking the sleeping pill, we thought that over at La Haye, their grandparents were waiting for our daughters.
在服用安眠药之前，我们以为在拉海，他们的祖父母正在等待我们的女儿。
Laurent's parents.
洛朗的父母。
Have I told you that they were attending the coronation of Queen Beatrix of Holland?
我有没有告诉过你他们正在参加荷兰女王贝娅特丽克丝的加冕典礼？
Have I told you that on the 30th of April 1980, this young woman was rising to the throne, and that, ever since, this date has been celebrated there as a joyful anniversary of an event whose secondary effect was the death of the girls?
我有没有告诉过你，1980 年 4 月 30 日，这位年轻女子即将登上王位，从那时起，这个日子就被作为一个令人高兴的周年纪念日来庆祝，而这个事件的次要影响是女孩们的死亡？
That my father-in-law, the French ambassador, and my mother-in-law were attending the festivities?
我的岳父、法国大使和我的岳母都参加了庆祝活动？
That all the embassy staff were busy so we had found no one to go and fetch the girls at the airport?
大使馆的所有工作人员都很忙，所以我们没有人去机场接女孩吗？
That, resigned only at the very last minute, I had canceled the places reserved for them on the Air France flight?
那我在最后一刻才辞职，取消了为他们保留的法航航班座位？
Have I told you that at my mother's house, before they were picked up by their aunt, they had watched the coronation ceremony on television, as I had done out of the corner of my eye at home?
我有没有告诉过你，在我母亲家里，他们在被姨妈接走之前，都在电视上看过加冕仪式，就像我在家里用眼角余光做的那样？
Have I told you that seeing my father-in-law's very characteristic form and gait, I telephoned my mother to ask whether everyone had spotted him, and I can still hear in the background Mathilde's voice full of disappointment: "No, I didn't see him." The very, very last time.
我有没有告诉过你，看到我岳父非常有特色的身材和步态，我打电话给我母亲，询问大家是否发现了他，而我仍然可以听到背景中玛蒂尔德充满失望的声音：“没有，我没有看到他。”非常非常最后一次。
My mother told me that at the time Elise was turned away from the television, absorbed in her drawing, but that that had not stopped her from affirming energetically, "But I did.
我母亲告诉我，当时埃莉斯没有看电视，全神贯注于她的画作，但这并没有阻止她大力肯定，“但我做到了。
I saw him!"
我看见他了！”
Since then I have not called Mathilde nor Elise.
从那以后我就没有给玛蒂尔德和埃莉斯打电话。
Or if I have called my eldest daughter, it was without the hope that she would reply.
或者，如果我给我的大女儿打电话，我也不希望她会回复。
It was to feel the vibration in my larynx of those syllables chosen when I was 25 years old, the arrangement of clear vowels and aquatic consonants, which were to name the first of my children to accompany her all her life, to act as her passport, announce her arrival, to be said with only a hint of shyness, and finally-- in the mouth of the one who would love her-- to betray all the emotions that this girl would one day elicit, that she alone would arouse in one young man, a young man who will never know her, who lives and who does not live to love her.
是为了感受我25岁时所选择的那些音节在我喉部的振动，清晰的元音和水生辅音的排列，这些音节将命名我的第一个陪伴她一生的孩子，作为她的护照，宣布她的到来，带着一丝羞涩说出来，最后——在爱她的人的嘴里——背叛这个女孩有一天会引发的所有情感，只有她一个人才能激起的情感。一个年轻人，一个永远不会认识她的年轻人，他活着或活着不是为了爱她。
After the funeral, I went over to my mother to see my aunt and uncle who would soon be returning to Haute Savoie.
葬礼结束后，我去母亲那里看望即将返回上萨瓦省的姑姑和叔叔。
The concierge came out of her lodge to see me as I went into the building.
当我走进大楼时，礼宾员从她的小屋里出来见我。
Mathilde often used to go over to play with her daughter.
玛蒂尔德经常去和她女儿一起玩。
She said, "You will see.
她说：“你会看到的。
You can get used to anything." It is certainly the most simple, true, brutal, and perceptive thing that anyone said to me at the time.
你可以习惯任何事情。”这无疑是当时任何人对我说的最简单、最真实、最残酷、最有洞察力的话。
You could interpret it either as a message of hope or of crushing contempt for human nature.
你可以将其解读为希望的信息，也可以解读为对人性的极度蔑视。
It is very strange this double rhythm that I have with you.
我和你的双重节奏很奇怪。
I write to you, forcing myself to clarify a period of my life that I've done everything I can to understand but which has always been out of my grasp.
我写信给你，强迫自己澄清我生命中的一段时期，我已尽我所能去理解它，但它始终超出了我的掌握。
It is said that reality outstrips fiction, but this is something else.
都说现实胜于雄辩，但这又是另外一回事了。
The reality remains inaccessible.
现实依然遥不可及。
Since the death of the girls, 12 years and 16 days' time, I have honestly and constantly tried to unveil this reality without success.
自从女孩们去世以来，12年零16天的时间里，我一直诚实地、不断地试图揭露这个现实，但没有成功。
Perhaps I've already told you, sometimes I believe in them alive, my darling children, my darling little girls.
也许我已经告诉过你，有时我相信他们还活着，我亲爱的孩子们，我亲爱的小女孩们。
These words, which are so light and yet so burdensome, cut through me then.
这些话，是那么的轻松，却又是那么的沉重，当时让我心痛不已。
And sometimes I believe in their death, on the edge of the motorway, 10 or so meters from each other, their legs in dungarees, their arms and heads on the side of the motorway.
有时我相信他们的死亡，在高速公路边缘，彼此相距十米左右，他们的腿穿着工装裤，他们的手臂和头在高速公路的一侧。
There's never a link between the two.
两者之间从来没有联系。
The other rhythm constitutes the things I do in my current life, as if nothing had happened.
另一种节奏则是我现在的生活中所做的事情，就好像什么都没发生过一样。
Conversations, laughter, mutual friends, a double rhythm like a double life.
对话、欢笑、共同的朋友，双重的节奏就像双重的生活。
You do not know whether they struggle against each other or enrich each other.
你不知道他们是互相斗争还是互相致富。
Have I already mentioned Yasser Arafat to you?
我已经向你提到过亚西尔·阿拉法特了吗？
This is what made me think of him.
这就是让我想起他的原因。
When Elise was born, I found myself battling with a huge, hungry baby.
当埃莉斯出生时，我发现自己正在与一个巨大而饥饿的婴儿作斗争。
The few odd ounces of milk that I was able to supply in the first 24 hours of her life in hospital were definitely not enough for her, and she screamed constantly.
在她住院的最初24小时里，我能提供的几盎司牛奶对她来说绝对不够，她不断地尖叫。
With Mathilde crying on the telephone because she felt lost without me, I quickly lost my patience.
玛蒂尔德在电话里哭泣，因为没有我她感到失落，我很快就失去了耐心。
I found myself brutally grasping Elise's cradle, which was on casters, and furiously pushing it away from my bed so that it was in danger of banging into the far wall.
我发现自己粗暴地抓住了埃莉斯带有脚轮的摇篮，猛烈地把它从我的床上推开，以免它撞到远处的墙上。
A second of silence, and then the crying started up again.
沉默了一秒，然后哭声又开始了。
On the third day, my mother came to see me.
第三天，妈妈来看我了。
She sat at the end of the bed and chatted.
她坐在床尾聊天。
We were cheerful.
我们很高兴。
We, the adults, were talking to each other, but I was looking at my daughter, who was looking back at me.
我们，大人，正在互相交谈，但我看着我的女儿，她也在看着我。
Drawn by her gaze, I leaned over her and rubbed my nose on hers.
被她的目光所吸引，我靠在她身上，用鼻子蹭着她的鼻子。
She said, "Huh, huh." I stared at my mother to reassure myself that I had not dreamed it.
她说：“呵呵。”我盯着妈妈，让自己确信我没有做梦。
It had quite knocked the breath out of her.
这让她喘不过气来。
I did the same thing again, and Elise replied again.
我又做了同样的事情，艾莉丝又回复了。
Third attempt, third exchange.
第三次尝试，第三次交流。
And that was it.
就是这样。
She was my child, my treasure, my stupefaction.
她是我的孩子，我的宝贝，我的迷惑。
For logistical reasons, it was my mother who came with Mathilde to pick me up from the hospital.
由于后勤原因，是我母亲和玛蒂尔德一起来医院接我。
I went down one of the big staircases.
我走下其中一个大楼梯。
At the end of one of the ground floor corridors, I saw Mathilde in her little green Loden coat.
在一楼走廊的尽头，我看到玛蒂尔德穿着她的绿色洛登呢小外套。
She was watching silently, motionless, her nose pointing up another staircase.
她静静地看着，一动不动，鼻子指向另一个楼梯。
My mother pointed me out to her, and Mathilde started to walk towards me slowly.
我母亲把我指给她看，玛蒂尔德开始慢慢地向我走来。
I handed Elise to my mother so that I could lift Mathilde into her rightful place in my arms.
我把伊莉丝交给了母亲，这样我就可以把玛蒂尔德抱到我怀里的正确位置。
I can still feel to the nearest ounce the pressure of her legs around my waist.
我仍然可以精确地感受到她的双腿对我腰部的压力。
She did not say anything, but she slowly and silently felt my face with their hands like a blind girl.
她没有说什么，只是像一个盲人女孩一样，慢慢地、默默地用手摸着我的脸。
During this rediscovery, this tender and cautious reunion, my mother was smiling and whispering sweet nothings to Elise.
在这次重新发现的过程中，在这次温柔而谨慎的团聚过程中，我的母亲微笑着，对伊莉丝低声说着甜言蜜语。
She had brown hair, olive skin, and huge eyes ringed with black coal and, to confront the October weather, she was wearing a woolen hat which was a bit too big for her, which skewed sideways over her ear.
她有一头棕色的头发，橄榄色的皮肤，一双大眼睛里镶满了黑色的煤炭，为了应对十月的天气，她戴着一顶对她来说太大了的羊毛帽子，帽子从一侧歪到了耳朵上。
"She could be Yasser Arafat's daughter," my mother laughed.
“她可能是亚西尔·阿拉法特的女儿，”我母亲笑着说。
The other day, the radio announced that Yasser Arafat's plane had disappeared in a sandstorm in the Libyan desert.
前几天，电台宣布亚西尔·阿拉法特的飞机在利比亚沙漠的沙尘暴中失踪。
A few hours later, although the members of his entourage were killed or injured, he himself was found alive and grinning.
几个小时后，尽管他的随从死伤惨重，但他本人却被发现还活着，而且还咧着嘴笑。
Every time that a tragic event affects him but spares him-- the murder of an adviser, all sorts of attempts on his life, or an airplane crash-- I feel that hug again.
每当发生一件悲惨事件影响到他却又让他幸免于难时——顾问被谋杀、对他生命的各种尝试，或者飞机失事——我都会再次感受到那个拥抱。
When I think of the life he leads and the life that Elise led, when I think of the life expectancy they each had on that October day when my mother teased me about my daughter, to think that she is dead, and he is here.
当我想到他和埃莉斯过的生活时，当我想到十月的那一天，当我母亲取笑我的女儿时，他们各自的预期寿命，想到她已经死了，而他却在这里。
I've been careful.
我一直很小心。
I've never watched the home movies in which my two daughters appear nor have I listened to their voices on the answering machine tapes that my mother kept.
我从来没有看过我的两个女儿出现的家庭电影，也没有在我母亲保存的答录机磁带上听过她们的声音。
The messages to Granny are at her house, accessible, but I do nothing about it.
给奶奶的信息在她家里，可以访问，但我没有采取任何行动。
How many catastrophes have there been since I began this correspondence with you?
自从我开始和你写这封信以来，已经发生了多少次灾难？
Football stadiums collapse.
足球场倒塌。
Young motor bikers kill each other at the 24-hour race in Le Mans.
年轻的摩托车手在勒芒 24 小时耐力赛中互相残杀。
And here I am with the children and you.
我和孩子们以及你们在一起。
And I tug at my net, which has plunged so deep in water.
我拉动我的网，它已经陷入水中很深了。
Last week, I spent a long time looking at a car exactly like the one in which my daughters fell asleep, from which they were thrown, in which, leaving their parents to go to their grandparents, they left Paris, never to return.
上周，我花了很长时间看着一辆和我女儿们睡着的车一模一样的车，她们被从车里扔了出去，离开了巴黎，去了祖父母那里，再也没有回来。
I was there looking at the back seat, the seat belts that we had not done up, the right-hand window out of which they would have both been thrown.
我在那里看着后座，我们没有系好安全带，还有右边的窗户，他们俩都会被扔出窗外。
The letters on the number plate confirmed that this Renault 5 was from the same year as my sister-in-law's.
车牌上的字母证实了这辆雷诺5与我嫂子的是同一年的。
They're still on the road, those cars.
那些汽车仍然在路上。
When there are none left, I will no longer be able to ask questions of them.
当没有剩下的时候，我就不能再问他们问题了。
Someone will have to keep one somewhere for me.
必须有人在某个地方为我保留一个。
After the impact when my sister-in-law managed to bring her car to a halt, she and her husband turned with relief to smile at the children.
撞击发生后，我的嫂子设法把车停了下来，她和她的丈夫松了一口气，转身对孩子们微笑。
But only their baby was there, sitting in her little seat, stupefied, with some fragments of glass spread over her.
但只有他们的孩子在那里，她坐在她的小座位上，惊呆了，一些玻璃碎片散落在她身上。
Have I already told you that?
我已经告诉过你了吗？
I tell it to myself so many times.
我对自己说过很多次。
When I was near that Renault 5 the other day, I wanted to lie down on the rear seat and wait for the end of time.
那天，当我靠近那辆雷诺5时，我想躺在后座上，等待时间的结束。
In short, back to square one.
简而言之，回到第一个方面。
I have some work to hand in, a lot, but nothing will get done until I've written to you.
我有很多工作要交，但除非我写信给你，否则什么也做不了。
At first it was the other way around.
起初情况恰恰相反。
Everything came before writing these letters.
一切都在写这些信之前发生。
I used to tell myself, why suffer?
我曾经告诉自己，为什么要受苦？
What's the point of this artificial rendezvous with these long-lost children?
与这些失散多年的孩子们进行人工会合有何意义？
I always had something happier to do.
我总是有更快乐的事情去做。
Now, even as I get up, I am carried by the things I want to write to you.
现在，即使我起床，我仍被我想写给你的事情所困扰。
I should have gone to see in that room in the hospital where they put my daughters.
我应该去医院里安置我女儿的那个房间看看。
I knew as soon as they suggested it to me.
他们一向我建议我就知道了。
I knew that by refusing, I was setting a precedent for a future of weakness because I was not worthy of-- I do not know what.
我知道，通过拒绝，我为未来的软弱开了一个先例，因为我不值得——我不知道是什么。
Just not worthy.
只是不值得。
So I did not go to see them dead.
所以我没有去看他们死。
They were there, and Mummy did not come.
他们在那里，妈妈却没有来。
They were only one or two rooms away.
他们之间只有一两个房间的距离。
They remained alone.
他们仍然孤身一人。
Mummy did not cross the doorway.
妈妈没有跨过门口。
I know nothing of their faces as they were at the end.
我对他们最后的表情一无所知。
They had the strength to die, and I could not match their strength.
他们有求死的力量，而我却敌不过他们的力量。
I know nothing of their last great achievement.
我对他们最后的伟大成就一无所知。
Wherever they went, they went alone, together or apart.
无论他们去哪里，他们都是独自一人，或一起或分开。
And I'm inclined to believe it was apart.
我倾向于相信它是分开的。
Ignorant of their own heroism, they went to the places dictated by their violent trajectory at more than 100 kilometers per hour over the safety barrier.
他们不知道自己的英雄主义，以每小时100多公里的速度越过安全屏障，前往暴力轨迹所规定的地方。
I stayed on my chair like a lump.
我像个肿块一样坐在椅子上。
And since then, people have not stopped congratulating me for my courage as a mother.
从那时起，人们就没有停止过祝贺我作为母亲的勇气。
To such an extent that many friends, including you, hesitated before talking to us about the difficulties and hardships they were facing, they did not seem worthy in comparison.
以至于包括您在内的很多朋友在向我们讲述他们所面临的困难和磨难时都犹豫不决，相比之下显得不值得。
Laurent and I sat enthroned on a pedestal, hoisted there by the annihilation of our two little girls.
劳伦特和我坐在一个基座上，我们的两个小女孩被消灭了，基座被升起。
But we still knew what real life was, like a weather map of constantly changing skies, and we needed people to tell us about it, because the air was thin for our two statues.
但我们仍然知道现实生活是什么，就像一张不断变化的天空的天气图，我们需要人们告诉我们，因为对于我们的两座雕像来说，空气很稀薄。
The only stance that I battle against is to threaten suicide, to keep those around you on tenterhooks because you claim you're going to die.
我唯一反对的立场是威胁自杀，让你周围的人因为你声称你会死而提心吊胆。
Watch out, I'm going to kill myself.
小心点，我要自杀了。
My goodness, the living can make a fuss with their moods and their other half running all over the place trying to stop them.
我的天啊，活着的人会情绪激动，另一半却到处跑来阻止。
I'm going to kill myself.
我要自杀了。
Watch out!
当心！
Watch out!
当心！
Oh no, that is not how you do it.
哦，不，你不是这样做的。
I will explain to these maniacs how Mathilde and Elise managed to die.
我将向这些疯子解释玛蒂尔德和埃莉斯是如何死的。
If I can, that is, because they did the whole thing by themselves.
如果可以的话，那是因为他们自己完成了整件事。
And when the adults came to their senses and began to realize that they were no longer in the car, not even under the front seats where they looked once they realized the rear seat was empty, when they had to resign themselves to getting out of the car to look for them, they had to be found wherever they might be.
而当大人们醒悟过来，开始意识到自己已经不在车里了，甚至连前排座位底下也没有了，而他们发现后座是空的时，他们不得不下车去找他们，无论他们在哪里，都必须被发现。
When it was done and they had been found dozens of meters from the car and dozens of meters apart, they had actually already gone without a word to a place that no man can see.
等到发现他们距离车子几十米，相距几十米的时候，他们其实已经二话不说，走到了一个没人能看到的地方。
All of this brings me back to that moment of weakness on my chair when even though two children, my two children, two very young children, had known how to die and were waiting to be presented to me one last time in their truthfulness, I had not even gone those few meters along the corridor that separated them from me.
所有这一切都让我想起坐在椅子上的那一刻的软弱，尽管两个孩子，我的两个孩子，两个非常年幼的孩子，已经知道如何死亡，并等待着最后一次诚实地出现在我面前，但我什至没有沿着将他们与我分开的走廊走那几米。
They had known how to die.
他们知道如何死。
I no longer knew how to walk.
我不再知道如何走路。
There has been nothing glorious about the way I live my life.
我的生活方式没有什么光荣的。
I love the living in all their miasma.
我爱那些充满瘴气的生命。
I love the dead for their temerity.
我爱死者，因为他们的鲁莽。
There is nothing in between.
两者之间没有什么。
Our children now, Elvire and Gauthier, have asked us 100 times whether they would have been born if their sisters had not died.
现在，我们的孩子埃尔维尔和戈蒂尔已经问我们一百次了，如果他们的姐妹没有死的话，他们是否会出生。
I really hope so, but I just cannot say.
我真的希望如此，但我不能说。
The girls' death allowed me to be pregnant again, which I wanted anyway, to have other children, which I wanted anyway.
女孩们的死让我再次怀孕，这也是我想要的，也让我能够生下其他孩子，这也是我想要的。
Even so, at the square with the children, I was not like other mothers.
即便如此，在广场上和孩子们在一起，我还是和其他妈妈不一样。
Sitting on the bench or on the side of the sand pit, I would watch my Elvire making mud pies, and I would let Gauthier suck on his biscuit.
坐在长凳上或沙坑边上，我会看着我的埃尔维尔制作泥馅饼，我会让高蒂尔吮吸他的饼干。
If another woman wanted to talk to me, I had only two options.
如果另一个女人想和我说话，我只有两个选择。
A bright facade, which devastated me-- yes, mine's already three and a half, but she's still frightened of the slide.
明亮的外表让我心碎——是的，我的已经三岁半了，但她仍然害怕滑梯。
I can't believe your little scrap.
我简直不敢相信你的小废话。
He's so brave up at the top of the ladder-- or a truth that was socially unacceptable.
他在阶梯的顶端是如此勇敢——或者说这是社会无法接受的事实。
These are my younger two children.
这是我年幼的两个孩子。
The elder ones died four years ago.
长辈四年前去世了。
I would always be out of place.
我总是格格不入。
The working class, immigrants, the self-taught cranks, the handicapped, the unemployed, and grieving parents are more alike than people think.
工人阶级、移民、自学成才的怪人、残疾人、失业者和悲伤的父母比人们想象的更加相似。
They have at least one thing in common.
他们至少有一个共同点。
They have to make Herculean efforts to hold a normal, banal, bouncy conversation.
他们必须付出巨大的努力才能进行正常的、平庸的、充满活力的谈话。
They can think of only one thing, the moment when they might introduce a sentence about their misfortune.
他们只能想到一件事，那就是他们可以对自己的不幸发表一句话的那一刻。
Thirteen years have passed, and I still cannot last half a day without evoking my daughters.
十三年过去了，我仍然不能半天不想起我的女儿们。
Elvire has received a post card from a friend announcing the death of a classmate.
埃尔维尔收到了一位朋友寄来的明信片，宣布了一名同学的去世。
I was having a siesta.
我正在午睡。
In my drowsy state, I could hear the voice of my 12-year-old daughter talking to her father, respecting her mother's sleep.
在我昏昏欲睡的状态下，我能听到我12岁的女儿和她父亲说话的声音，尊重她母亲的睡眠。
"I'm going to have to tell Gauthier, aren't I?" He was playing with his cousin.
“我得告诉戈蒂尔，不是吗？”他正在和他的表弟一起玩。
Gauthier does not want to hear about anything to do with death, so when Elvire told him, he hid his feelings and hardly broke off from his game.
高蒂尔不想听到任何与死亡有关的事情，所以当埃尔维尔告诉他时，他隐藏了自己的感情，几乎没有停止游戏。
And Elvire was left alone with this news, which she had just learned from one of those holiday cards that should never give you that sort of news.
埃尔维尔独自一人得知了这个消息，她刚刚从一张永远不应该给你带来这种消息的节日贺卡上得知这一消息。
"What's going on?" I asked, pretending to have heard nothing and feeling sure that Elvire would want to tell me everything herself.
“这是怎么回事？”我假装什么都没听到，问道，并确信埃尔维会想亲自告诉我一切。
She joined me on the bed, buried herself against me, sighed, and then cried.
她和我一起躺在床上，埋在我身上，叹了口气，然后哭了。
She had been telling me about this friend's illness since the beginning of the school year.
从学年开始，她就一直告诉我这位朋友的病情。
I knew that Lauren came to school sporadically, that she had changed physically, that her mother, who was always cheerful, came to pick her up from school with her two younger children, asking her whether she had forgotten anything in her locker, as you would to a child who still has 10 or 15 years of school ahead of them.
我知道劳伦偶尔会来学校，她的身体发生了变化，她的母亲总是很高兴，带着两个年幼的孩子来接她放学，问她是否在储物柜里忘记了什么，就像你对一个还有 10 或 15 年学业的孩子一样。
Then that was it.
然后就这样了。
Lauren sank into a coma.
劳伦陷入昏迷。
Elvire had told me about that, too, but now, as she cried, she realized she had never imagined that Lauren would actually die.
埃尔维尔也告诉过我这件事，但现在，当她哭泣时，她意识到她从未想过劳伦真的会死。
And this death, this end to everything, this earthly truth, which meant that the child, who had been told not to forget anything in her locker would not begin the next academic year in three weeks' time.
这个死亡，这个一切的终结，这个尘世的真相，这意味着这个被告知不要忘记储物柜里任何东西的孩子将不会在三周后开始下一个学年。
This was so harsh and so invincible that Elvire had only her tears to link the two realities, that of a life yesterday, which was complete even in a state of coma, and death, which was eternal right from the first moment.
这是如此残酷，如此无敌，艾尔维尔只有泪水才能将两个现实联系起来：昨天的生命，即使在昏迷状态下也是完整的，而死亡，从一开始就是永恒的。
Now, even as she struggled with the sharp pain, she already knew that soon, very soon, this pain would soften.
现在，尽管她在剧烈的疼痛中挣扎，但她已经知道，很快，很快，这种疼痛就会减轻。
And despite her sobs, her shuddering little frame, her puffy red face, she was already missing the purity of this revolt before it had even begun to fade.
尽管她抽泣着，她那颤抖的小身躯，她浮肿的红脸，但她在这种反抗开始消退之前就已经怀念它的纯粹性了。
And she refused to accept that this sorrow would become integrated into her life.
她拒绝接受这种悲伤会融入她的生活。
"When I tell my children about this one day, they won't understand how horrible it was," she told me.
“有一天，当我告诉我的孩子们这件事时，他们不会明白这有多可怕，”她告诉我。
"And then, maybe even tomorrow, there will already be moments when I don't think about it."
“然后，也许甚至明天，我就会有一些时候不去想它了。”
This idea redoubled her anger.
这个念头让她更加愤怒。
Far from hoping to suffer less, she never wanted the freshness of the pain to deaden.
她绝不是希望少受点苦，而是从来不希望新鲜的痛苦消失。
This was the only acceptable response to a disappearance that every part of her refused to accept.
这是对她的每一部分都拒绝接受的失踪的唯一可接受的反应。
As I listened to her, I loved her for having already understood everything.
当我听她说话时，我爱她，因为她已经明白了一切。
And I thought of these letters in which so many years later, I try to discover exactly what has become of all those feelings.
我想起了这些信，多年后，我试图弄清楚所有这些感受到底变成了什么样子。
Genevieve Jurgensen's is book is called The Disappearance.
吉纳维芙·尤尔根森的书名叫《消失》。
It's published by Norton.
它由诺顿出版。
Excerpts were read for our show by actress Felicity Jones.
女演员菲丽希缇·琼斯为我们的节目朗读了节选。
Coming up, death takes a holiday, and while it's gone, can you feel better about tragedy by talking about it in advance?
即将到来的死亡会放假，当它消失的时候，通过提前谈论它，你能对悲剧感觉好点吗？
And if not, what's talking for anyway?
如果不是的话，那还有什么意义呢？
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.
这就是美国生活。
I'm Ira Glass.
我是艾拉·格拉斯。
Each week on our program, of course, we choose a theme and bring you a variety of different stories on that theme.
当然，每周我们的节目都会选择一个主题，并为您带来有关该主题的各种不同故事。
Today's program, telling stories in the face of death.
今天的节目，讲述面对死亡的故事。
In each of our acts today, somebody contemplates the death of a person that he or she is close to and then surrounds that idea of that death with words and stories, even though to some degree, in that situation, words and stories cannot entirely do what we normally want them to do, which is to comfort us, to give order.
在我们今天的每一个行为中，有人都会思考一个他或她所亲近的人的死亡，然后用文字和故事围绕着这个死亡的想法，尽管在某种程度上，在那种情况下，文字和故事不能完全达到我们通常希望它们做的那样，即安慰我们，给我们下命令。
We've arrived at Act Two of our program.
我们已经到了节目的第二幕了。
Act Two, Look for the Union Label.
第二步，寻找联盟标签。
In this act, two people, father and daughter-- we'll hear from them both-- start to compose a story about death before anyone has died.
在这一幕中，父亲和女儿两个人——我们将听到他们俩的消息——在任何人去世之前开始谱写一个关于死亡的故事。
Well, it simply began by sitting in the kitchen of my home, reading the Boston Globe, and I looked out on a beautiful fall day, looking out at a maple tree in front of my yard.
嗯，一切都是从坐在我家的厨房里阅读《波士顿环球报》开始的，在一个美丽的秋日，我向外望去，看着我院子前的一棵枫树。
And suddenly, it occurred to me that I should write my obituary.
突然，我想到我应该写我的讣告。
I'll begin working on it.
我将开始研究它。
No special reason.
没有什么特别的原因。
It must've been probably over the Christmas holidays, probably last year.
大概是在圣诞节假期期间，大概是去年。
And you were visiting your parents' house?
你去你父母家拜访了吗？
Around that time, and I was on the telephone, and I was just looking for a pad of paper to write something down.
大约在那个时候，我正在打电话，我只是想找一张纸来写下一些东西。
And I just noticed on a yellow legal pad that my father had started writing his obituary.
我刚刚注意到在黄色便笺簿上我父亲已经开始写他的讣告了。
But it wasn't labeled obituary at the time.
但当时它并没有被标记为讣告。
No. No. It said born in 1917 to-- Albany, and it just was incredibly straightforward and standard.
不，不，上面写的是 1917 年出生于——奥尔巴尼，这简直是难以置信的简单和标准。
And I just couldn't believe it.
我简直不敢相信。
I didn't actually have an emotional response to the obituary part at all.
事实上，我对讣告部分根本没有任何情感反应。
I was just sort of-- I guess I was amused in a way, because he is such an interesting person, and the writing, it was just the most basic details about his family, and it didn't really say anything about him.
我只是——我想我在某种程度上被逗乐了，因为他是一个如此有趣的人，而写作，只是关于他家庭的最基本的细节，并没有真正谈到他的任何事情。
In other words, he's a more interesting person than the writing itself.
换句话说，他是一个比写作本身更有趣的人。
Right.
正确的。
I don't know.
我不知道。
And I didn't really process the thought.
我并没有真正处理这个想法。
I just went straight to him, and I said, Dad, my God, this is so boring.
我直接去找他，我说，爸爸，天哪，这太无聊了。
I said you've lived a much more interesting life than this.
我说你的生活比这有趣多了。
And he said, well, then help me write it.
他说，好吧，那就帮我写吧。
You're a writer.
你是一名作家。
Help me write it.
帮我写一下。
And all he knew was what the headline should be.
他只知道标题应该是什么。
That was the one very clear thing that he knew.
这是他知道的一件非常清楚的事情。
The headline should be his name.
标题应该是他的名字。
I'm named after him, and it should say Adrian LeBlank comma product of the working class.
我是以他的名字命名的，应该说是阿德里安·勒布朗克（Adrian LeBlank）工人阶级的逗号产物。
That was what he saw.
这就是他所看到的。
Well, to me, that's really important.
嗯，对我来说，这真的很重要。
Because when I say the working class, I'm talking about workers, you know?
因为当我说工人阶级时，我指的是工人，你知道吗？
Yeah.
是的。
Father - Adrian Leblank Throughout my history, from the first factory job, first learning what a union was, and then being a committee man and president of the local unions wherever I worked, and from then on, I gravitate to becoming a full-time field representative.
父亲 - Adrian Leblank 在我的整个人生中，从第一份工厂工作，首先了解什么是工会，然后成为我工作过的地方工会的委员会成员和主席，从那时起，我就倾向于成为一名全职现场代表。
I tend to take positions, you know?
我倾向于采取立场，你知道吗？
I do this every day of my life, and I think that the obituary is like saying there are still union guys around.
我一生中每天都这样做，我认为讣告就像在说周围仍然有工会成员。
You follow?
你跟着吗？
Yeah.
是的。
Father - Adrian Leblank I don't know if that's clear.
父亲 - Adrian Leblank 我不知道这是否清楚。
But that was pretty much it.
但仅此而已。
It's like saying, you know, look, 82 years later, from 16 to 82, there are still guys who are making a pitch.
这就像说，你知道，看，82 年后，从 16 岁到 82 岁，仍然有人在推销。
And so we sit down.
于是我们坐下来。
I'm pretty sure that first day we sat down, I opened my portable computer, and I said OK.
我很确定我们坐下来的第一天，我打开了我的便携式电脑，然后我说“好吧”。
And he said so how do we do this?
他说那我们该怎么做呢？
What do we do?
我们该怎么办？
And I said, well, I just need you to tell me about your life.
我说，好吧，我只需要你告诉我你的生活。
I've actually tried to do this with my dad before, not in the context of the obituary, but in those moments where I felt that I need to learn about my family history.
事实上，我以前曾尝试过和我父亲一起这样做，不是在讣告的背景下，而是在我觉得我需要了解我的家族史的那些时刻。
But he was not very responsive.
但他的反应不是很灵敏。
He would be very vague.
他会说得很含糊。
But for some reason, when he was thinking of his life in terms of an obituary, a lot of details came out that I don't feel I could've-- well, I wasn't able to get when I was trying to just have straight conversations with him about his biography, daughter to father.
但出于某种原因，当他从讣告的角度思考自己的生活时，很多细节出现了，我觉得我无法——好吧，当我试图与他就他的传记（从女儿到父亲）进行直接对话时，我无法理解。
I was wondering if it was an enjoyable process for you talking to your daughter?
我想知道您和女儿交谈的过程是否愉快？
Yes, yes, yes.
是的，是的，是的。
I find her to be a searcher and a prober and with good instincts and caring.
我发现她是一位探索者和探索者，具有良好的直觉和关怀。
So I don't know.
所以我不知道。
It was just interesting, and it came very easily.
这很有趣，而且来得很容易。
I learned so much about him.
我对他了解很多。
Since it was an obituary you were writing, did the two of you talk about his death?
既然是写讣告，你们两个有没有谈论过他的死？
No. That's something that I think is-- I don't know.
不，我认为这是——我不知道。
It's funny.
很有趣。
In preparing for this, several of my friends were asking me about it, and it just shocked me a little bit that they were thinking about it in that way.
在准备这件事的过程中，我的几个朋友向我询问了这个问题，他们以这种方式思考这件事，这让我有点震惊。
And then, of course, I realized it is an obituary.
然后，当然，我意识到这是一篇讣告。
I wonder if he understands it more the other way, that as far as he's concerned, it really is about his death?
不知道他是否有更多的理解，即对他来说，这真的是关于他的死？
I think he must, and I think over the years, he's known how anxious my brother and I have been about him dying.
我认为他一定如此，而且我想多年来，他知道我和我的兄弟对他的死亡有多焦虑。
So I think he often tries in his way to help us cope with it.
所以我认为他经常尝试以他的方式帮助我们应对这个问题。
He doesn't seem nervous or frightened, so I don't know.
他看起来并不紧张或害怕，所以我不知道。
When I leave when I go to visit, I find leaving my parents sometimes quite difficult because they are older, and I'm very busy, and I don't get back as often as I'd like to.
当我离开去看望父母时，我发现有时离开父母很困难，因为他们年纪大了，而我又很忙，而且我不能像我想的那样经常回来。
And I think he knows how hard it is for me to say goodbye.
我想他知道我说再见有多难。
And he'll say I'm always with you, and I'll always be with you, that kind of thing.
他会说我永远和你在一起，我会永远和你在一起，诸如此类的话。
Yeah.
是的。
I wonder if this whole process, you think you're doing it for him in a way, but maybe it's for you.
我想知道这整个过程，你是否认为你在某种程度上是为了他，但也许是为了你自己。
Mm-hm.
嗯嗯。
Ira Glass He's doing this all for you.
艾拉·格拉斯（Ira Glass）：他做这一切都是为了你。
Right.
正确的。
I believe that's very possible.
我相信这是很有可能的。
I think that's very possible, which is probably why he was a good union organizer.
我认为这很有可能，这可能就是为什么他是一名优秀的工会组织者。
Because I'm feeling like I'm helping him do something.
因为我觉得我正在帮助他做某事。
You know, he was good at what he did.
你知道，他很擅长他所做的事情。
Is one of the reasons that you've agreed to talk to your daughter about the obituary and work with her on the obituary is to help her prepare for the thought that you might die?
您同意与女儿谈论讣告并与她一起撰写讣告的原因之一是帮助她为您可能会死的想法做好准备吗？
It could be.
可能是。
I haven't stayed with that thought, but it could very well be, Ira.
我并没有坚持这个想法，但很可能是这样，艾拉。
Maybe you're cluing in.
也许你正在暗示。
I think that thought has crossed my mind, but I haven't stayed with it.
我想这个想法已经闪过我的脑海，但我并没有坚持下去。
Hm.
嗯。
Father - Adrian Leblank I haven't stayed, but you could be partially right.
父亲 - Adrian Leblank 我没有留下来，但你可能是部分正确的。
Is there a way to ever-- I'm not sure I would want it to be easier, but I wonder if it's possible?
有没有办法——我不确定我是否希望它变得更容易，但我想知道这是否可能？
Is it possible to even know what that could be like?
有可能知道那会是什么样子吗？
You're saying that no matter how we try to prepare for the death of somebody so close to us, there really is nothing we can do.
你是说，无论我们如何努力为我们如此亲近的人的死亡做好准备，我们都无能为力。
We can think about it all we want.
我们可以随心所欲地思考。
Yeah, I definitely feel that with it.
是的，我确实有这样的感觉。
I mean, because obviously, I've been working on an obituary, not really thinking at all about my father dying, not thinking that it's about death, just thinking that it's about talking to my father, that I have all the time to sort of figure this out.
我的意思是，因为很明显，我一直在写讣告，根本没有真正考虑过我父亲的去世，没有想到这与死亡有关，只是认为这是关于与我父亲交谈，我有时间来解决这个问题。
I don't know.
我不知道。
It's part of my relationship with him will be what happens when it's over, when he's physically gone.
这是我和他关系的一部分，当一切结束、当他离开时会发生什么。
I mean, my brother-in-law passed away, and he was quite sick before he died, and he was in a coma right up to the moment that he actually did die.
我的意思是，我的姐夫去世了，他死前病得很重，直到他真正死的那一刻，他一直处于昏迷状态。
And there was such a vast difference between him-- even though he wasn't available as the person we'd known, his physical life was so immense.
他之间存在如此巨大的差异——尽管他不像我们所认识的那样，但他的物质生活是如此巨大。
And when it was gone, it was-- the loss of it was just huge, you know?
当它消失时，它的损失是巨大的，你知道吗？
It was huge, and it happened in just a minute.
这是巨大的，而且只发生在一分钟之内。
And I just was so shocked by that because I was so ready for him to die.
我对此感到非常震惊，因为我已经做好了让他死去的准备。
We knew that he was going to die.
我们知道他快要死了。
He wasn't really with us anymore, and it was just-- and I was glad that I was able to at least understand how little I actually knew about it.
他不再真正和我们在一起了，这只是——我很高兴我至少能够理解我实际上对此所知甚少。
So how far are the two of you on the obit?
那么你们两个在讣告上还有多远呢？
Have you finished it?
你完成了吗？
No. No. I haven't actually-- I can't figure out how to write it except in the past tense, and it just seems completely bizarre to speak of him in that way.
不，不，我实际上没有——除了过去时之外，我不知道如何写它，而且以这种方式谈论他似乎很奇怪。
So I understand she hasn't finished writing it.
所以我知道她还没有写完。
Do you feel like she's taking too long getting this done?
你是否觉得她花了太长时间才完成这件事？
Yeah.
是的。
Father - Adrian Leblank No, I didn't feel there was any-- there's no great rush that I know of.
父亲——阿德里安·勒布兰克 不，我不觉得有什么——据我所知，没有什么急事。
Why?
为什么？
Do you have a feeling there should be a timetable?
您觉得应该有一个时间表吗？
No, I don't.
不，我不。
Father - Adrian Leblank Are you rushing the process, Ira?
父亲 - 阿德里安·勒布兰克（Adrian Leblank），艾拉，你是不是太着急了？
No. No, I have no intention to rush the process.
不，不，我无意加速这个过程。
I'm not going anywhere.
我哪儿也不去。
I'm still bowling on Fridays with the senior citizens.
每周五我仍然和老年人一起打保龄球。
Adrian LeBlank and his daughter, also named Adrian LeBlank.
阿德里安·勒布朗和他的女儿，也叫阿德里安·勒布朗。
[MUSIC - "OVER THE RAINBOW" BY JERRY LEE LEWIS]
[音乐 - 杰瑞·李·刘易斯的《彩虹之上》]
Act Three, Take My Wife, Please.
第三幕，请带走我的妻子。
Some of us have tragedy thrust upon us.
我们中的一些人遭遇了悲剧。
Some of us creep up tentatively to the edge of thinking about our worst fears and only allow ourselves a few quick moments to contemplate them before burying all thought of tragedy deep into the backs of our minds again.
我们中的一些人试探性地爬到思考我们最害怕的事情的边缘，只给自己短暂的思考时间，然后将所有悲剧的想法再次深深地埋藏在我们的脑海深处。
And then, some of us choose to think about the worst that can happen-- all the time.
然后，我们中的一些人选择一直思考可能发生的最坏情况。
And is that good for you?
这对你有好处吗？
One of the producers of This American Life, Julie Snyder, has this story about her brother.
《美国生活》的制片人之一朱莉·斯奈德讲述了一个关于她哥哥的故事。
A little over a year ago, I was in the car with my older brother Tom, coming back from a weekend trip to our dad's house.
一年多前，我和哥哥汤姆在车里，周末去爸爸家旅行回来。
And just as we were entering Chicago, he began to tell me about how whenever he says goodbye to someone or hangs up the phone at the end of a conversation, what goes through his head is that might be the last time he'll ever talk to them.
就在我们进入芝加哥时，他开始告诉我，每当他对某人说再见或在谈话结束时挂断电话时，他脑海中浮现的就是这可能是他最后一次与他们交谈。
And that's just the beginning.
而这仅仅是开始。
Then I think about what would happen, what would I do, and what would be the reaction if that particular person died.
然后我思考会发生什么，我会做什么，以及如果那个人死了会有什么反应。
For instance, who would take care of the funeral plans?
例如，谁来负责葬礼计划？
Who would call the cops, I guess would be initially.
我想一开始谁会报警。
Do I touch the body?
我触摸身体吗？
Do I call the cops first?
我要先报警吗？
If there's foul play involved, do I like-- if I was in an apartment, like if it was my wife or something, should I investigate to see if anyone's still around or not?
如果涉及谋杀，我是否喜欢——如果我在公寓里，比如如果是我的妻子或其他什么人，我是否应该调查一下是否有人还在附近？
Would I freak out or would I able to handle seeing the sight of my particular wife or loved one dead or mutilated?
我会惊慌失措，还是能够承受看到我的妻子或所爱之人死亡或残缺不全的景象？
It's at this point that Tom notices the look of horror on my face.
就在这时，汤姆注意到我脸上惊恐的表情。
What, what?
什么，什么？
What are you looking at me like that for?
你这样看着我干什么？
It's just crazy.
这太疯狂了。
I didn't know you had cops involved.
我不知道你有警察参与其中。
Well, yeah, if you're the first one who stumbles on the scene.
好吧，是的，如果你是第一个偶然发现现场的人。
There's no sense in talking about the funeral and your life thereafter if you can't deal with what happens right away.
如果你不能立即处理发生的事情，那么谈论葬礼和此后的生活就没有意义。
Tom has really specific plans for what he'll do when almost every member of our family dies.
汤姆对我们家庭几乎每个成员去世后他要做的事情都有非常具体的计划。
But his most detailed scenario is for his wife Lisa.
但他最详细的场景是为他的妻子丽莎设计的。
What am I going to do to get through the initial day?
我要做什么才能度过第一天？
And what's going to happen to her body?
她的身体会发生什么变化？
Is it going to go to the coroner's office?
是要去验尸官办公室吗？
Will there be an autopsy?
会进行尸检吗？
Probably.
大概。
And what happens when I come home?
当我回家时会发生什么？
Who will I call?
我会给谁打电话？
What will my words be to her parents when I have to explain to them that she's dead?
当我必须向她的父母解释她死了的消息时，我该对他们说什么？
And how am I going to tell them?
我该如何告诉他们呢？
Of course, where do I sleep?
当然，我睡哪儿？
Do I come home and sleep that night?
那天晚上我回家睡觉吗？
How am I going to eat?
我要怎么吃？
OK, am I going to go to work?
好吧，我要去上班吗？
Will I be able in the morning period of the first week to just carve out a couple hours and finish this up?
我能在第一周的早上抽出几个小时来完成这个工作吗？
Will I continue to work?
我会继续工作吗？
Can I just take the time off?
我可以请假吗？
I have a lot of law school debt still.
我还有很多法学院的债务。
But then again, of course, my wife's life is insured through her job, and so I'd have that extra money.
但话又说回来，当然，我妻子的生命是通过她的工作得到保障的，所以我会有额外的钱。
Would I continue to live in the house or not, I think.
我想，我是否会继续住在这个房子里。
Now, she's pregnant, of course, and so that's going to turn-- that's another equation.
当然，现在她怀孕了，所以情况会发生变化——这是另一个等式。
Do you have any idea how long you've kind of been doing this for?
你知道你这样做有多久了吗？
Let's see.
让我们来看看。
I'm 32, so probably 10 years probably.
我32岁了，大概10年吧。
Yeah, I don't know what started me thinking along the lines of people close to me dying, because nobody has, which is kind of peculiar that I would think this way.
是的，我不知道是什么让我开始思考与我亲近的人的死亡，因为没有人经历过，我这样想有点奇怪。
But maybe that's why I think this way, because it hasn't happened to me yet, and I'm just waiting for it to happen.
但也许这就是我这么想的原因，因为它还没有发生在我身上，我只是在等待它发生。
But every time I come home and I see a message on the answering machine, particularly at night, I oftentimes think is this going to be the call with the bad news?
但每次我回到家，看到答录机上有一条消息，尤其是在晚上，我常常想这会是带来坏消息的电话吗？
I just need to stop right here and say that my brother is much more normal than all of this makes him seem.
我只想在这里停下来说，我的兄弟比这一切看起来要正常得多。
He's really smart and funny and sweet.
他真的很聪明、有趣、可爱。
He's a successful attorney, married, and has his first baby on the way.
他是一位成功的律师，已婚，并且即将迎来第一个孩子。
It's just that he worries.
只是他担心而已。
A lot.
很多。
I think it's morbid.
我认为这是病态的。
By definition, it's morbid.
根据定义，这是病态的。
I'm thinking about people's morbidity or mortality.
我正在考虑人们的发病率或死亡率。
But I think it's practical, too.
但我认为这也很实用。
It makes you appreciate the person so much more.
这会让你更加欣赏这个人。
When you play the answering machine and it's just a telemarketer, and you're like, well, my mom must not be dead, because, of course, if that happened, I would get a phone call.
当你玩答录机时，它只是一个电话推销员，你会想，好吧，我妈妈一定没有死，因为，当然，如果发生这种情况，我会接到电话。
It would be on my machine, and I don't have one.
它应该在我的机器上，但我没有。
Ergo my mom, who I love, is still alive.
因此，我所爱的妈妈还活着。
So I think that I don't see any detriment to the way I think and even about things that aren't-- issues I'm not presented with in terms of people dying, because it gives me better appreciation, I think, for life.
所以我认为我的思维方式并没有受到任何损害，甚至对于那些不存在的事情——我没有遇到关于人们死亡的问题，因为我认为这让我更好地欣赏生命。
Do you think this kind of emotionally keeps you closer to our family then?
你认为这种情感上会让你和我们家人更亲近吗？
Yeah, I certainly do, without a doubt, both to my family and to my friends.
是的，毫无疑问，我对我的家人和朋友都是如此。
The only emotions I ever feel when I'm thinking this way is kind of-- and I know you're going to think this is bizarre, is like kind of a satisfaction in knowing that I care so much and that so much-- if this person was to go, how much this person meant to me and how much they helped me in my life and just made my life better.
当我以这种方式思考时，我所感受到的唯一情感是——我知道你会觉得这很奇怪，就像是一种满足感，知道我如此关心我——如果这个人要走了，这个人对我意味着什么，他们在我的生活中帮助了我多少，让我的生活变得更好。
It just gives me a little satisfaction knowing they're not dead.
知道他们没有死，这让我有点满足。
And I've thought oftentimes about delivering eulogies at people's funerals, my mother's, my grandparents.
我经常想到在人们的葬礼上致悼词，包括我母亲、我祖父母的葬礼。
So I've thought about all the good things I would say.
所以我考虑了所有我想说的好话。
My dad's funeral, too.
我父亲的葬礼也是如此。
The things I would say to celebrate their lives and say what they meant to me.
我会说一些话来庆祝他们的生活并表达他们对我的意义。
I asked if he had a eulogy for me.
我问他是否为我写了悼词。
He says it's pretty much the same speech he gave at my wedding.
他说这和他在我婚礼上发表的演讲几乎一样。
I wouldn't characterize it maybe as a rush or a cheap thrill so much as it's just something that you know is going to happen.
我不会将其描述为匆忙或廉价的刺激，因为它只是你知道将会发生的事情。
You're going to die.
你会死的。
Martin's going to die.
马丁快要死了。
Gina's going die.
吉娜快要死了
My wife's going to die.
我的妻子快要死了。
My mom's going to die.
我妈妈快要死了。
I'm not going to be around probably to see all that happen, but certainly, some of them I probably will be.
我可能不会亲眼见证这一切的发生，但当然，我可能会见证其中的一些事情。
And so I think that in the final analysis, I think there's nothing wrong with thinking this way, and I think it's healthy.
所以我认为，归根结底，我认为这样的想法没有错，而且我认为这是健康的。
I know my wife disagrees with me.
我知道我妻子不同意我的看法。
I know she thinks that if I were to tell anybody, which now I am, that I think this way, I'm going to be the first suspect if she's ever murdered and no one knows who did it, particularly when I know who to contact in terms of her life insurance, and I already have everything planned out in terms of how much I'm going to see her parent, where I'm going to move to, et cetera.
我知道她认为，如果我告诉任何人，现在我是这样想的，如果她被谋杀了，我将成为第一个嫌疑人，而且没有人知道是谁干的，特别是当我知道在她的人寿保险方面该联系谁时，而且我已经计划好了一切，比如我要去多少次见她的父母，我要搬到哪里，等等。
But I don't think that that's bad.
但我不认为那是坏事。
I really don't.
我真的不知道。
I'm sure none of my plans will probably happen.
我确信我的计划可能都不会实现。
But just thinking about it I think calms me.
但只要想到这一点，我就觉得自己平静了。
To think about it happening and then have it not happen and being glad that it didn't happen I think takes away the fear of it happening a little bit more for me, just in my own mind, thinking I'm dealing with it.
想想它发生了，然后又让它没有发生，并为它没有发生而感到高兴，我认为这对我来说消除了对它发生的恐惧，就在我自己的脑海里，认为我正在处理它。
OK, that person could die.
好吧，那个人可能会死。
If I get a little mini fear that the person's not there as I'm climbing up the stairs, maybe my wife is dead in bed, but she's not, and, of course, I get the little mini rush that she wasn't.
如果我在爬楼梯的时候有点担心那个人不在身边，也许我的妻子已经死在床上了，但她没有，当然，我会有点担心，但她并没有。
I also get the feeling that-- it helps calm me, and like, well, look, I could have dealt with it had that been the case, which I think is probably foolish, but yeah.
我也有这样的感觉——这有助于让我平静下来，就像，好吧，看，如果是这样的话，我本可以处理它，我认为这可能是愚蠢的，但是是的。
Do you have any plans for people you're not related to?
您对与您无关的人有什么计划吗？
Yeah.
是的。
There's been friends of mine who-- yes.
我有一些朋友——是的。
No, I do.
不，我愿意。
There's been friends of mine, male friends, I have pictured dying, and I think about what type of relationship I would maintain with their wives and their kids.
我有一些朋友，男性朋友，我想象过死亡，我思考我会与他们的妻子和孩子保持什么样的关系。
Would I step in and try and do a lot in terms of like-- I don't know what.
我会介入并尝试做很多事情，比如——我不知道是什么。
Taking these kids to ball games?
带这些孩子去看球赛？
Obviously, I would never take the place of their father.
显然，我永远不会取代他们父亲的位置。
Or would I just pay my respects and let the wives come to me if they needed any help?
或者我会表达我的敬意并让妻子们在需要帮助时来找我吗？
I do think now that my friend's dad died, I thought-- I had pictured his dad dying prior to him dying because he had had a heart attack prior to the heart attack that killed him.
我现在确实认为我朋友的父亲去世了，我想——我在他去世之前就想象过他父亲的死亡，因为在导致他死亡的心脏病发作之前，他曾心脏病发作。
And I thought that my friend would need a lot of support, a lot of attention, but I ended up not doing much.
我以为我的朋友需要很多支持，很多关注，但我最终没有做太多。
A few phone calls-- it's very strange.
打了几个电话——很奇怪。
A few phone calls I made to him initially to talk about it, and then we would continue to talk, and I'd make a point to call him every week.
我最初给他打了几个电话来讨论这件事，然后我们会继续讨论，我会每周都给他打电话。
But I never wanted to talk about the fact that his dad had just died.
但我从来不想谈论他父亲刚刚去世的事实。
I did not want to talk about that with him.
我不想和他谈论这个。
I wanted to ignore it and just get beyond it.
我想忽略它并超越它。
And he would bring it up a few times and bring up a few stories and stuff, but I think-- I remember thinking to myself, this is horrible.
他会多次提起这个问题，并提出一些故事和东西，但我想——我记得我自己心里想，这太可怕了。
I should be able to talk to him about his dad dying, but for whatever reason, it was too difficult.
我应该能够和他谈论他父亲去世的事情，但无论出于何种原因，这都太困难了。
Really?
真的吗？
Tom Snyder Yeah.
汤姆·斯奈德 是的。
I mean, it kind of runs counter to my free-flowing thought process of when people die, I'm going to do this.
我的意思是，这有点违背我的自由思考过程，即当人们死去时，我就会这样做。
I'm not scared to think or, in this case, talk about it.
在这种情况下，我并不害怕思考或谈论它。
But I think I just expected myself to be giving him a little more support.
但我想我只是希望自己能给他多一点支持。
And when you're kind of thinking about these plans like through to the will I move, will I get another job, that kind of stuff, do you then also think about, like, through all the way to the end and then plan for the moment that I think everybody goes through to a certain extent when they're mourning when you have to let go of that person?
当你思考这些计划时，比如我是否会搬家，我会得到另一份工作，诸如此类的事情，你是否也会考虑，比如，一直到最后，然后为我认为每个人在某种程度上哀悼时，当你必须放开那个人时，制定计划？
Do you ever think about that?
你有想过吗？
No. Nope, I don't.
不，不，我不。
I don't.
我不知道。
I don't think about that at all.
我根本不考虑这个。
I think that is a scarier thought to me, honestly, thinking about letting somebody go.
老实说，我认为让某人离开对我来说是一个更可怕的想法。
If I ever got to a point in my life where I just said OK, I'm not going to think about Julie or Lisa or Gina or Martin or my mom anymore because the mourning's over and I just kind of have to go on, that would be [SMACKS LIPS].
如果我生命中某个时刻我只是说“好吧”，我就不会再想起朱莉、丽莎、吉娜、马丁或我妈妈了，因为哀悼结束了，我必须继续下去，那就是[咂嘴]。
So no, I would hope that would never happen to me.
所以不，我希望这永远不会发生在我身上。
Julie Snyder.
朱莉·斯奈德。
Credits Ira Glass Well, our program was produced today by Alex Blumberg and myself with Susan Burton, Blue Chevigny, Nancy Updike and Julie Snyder.
图片来源：Ira Glass 嗯，今天我们的节目由 Alex Blumberg 和我本人以及 Susan Burton、Blue Chevigny、Nancy Updike 和 Julie Snyder 共同制作。
Contributing editors Paul Tough, Jack Hitt, Margy Rocklin, Elise Spiegel and Consigliere Sarah Vowell.
特约编辑 Paul Tough、Jack Hitt、Margy Rocklin、Elise Spiegel 和 Consigliere Sarah Vowell。
Production out from Todd Bachmann and Starlee Kine.
托德·巴赫曼 (Todd Bachmann) 和斯塔莉·凯恩 (Starlee Kine) 制作。
[ACKNOWLEDGMENTS] If you would like to buy a cassette of this or any of our programs, call us here at WBEZ in Chicago, (312) 832-3380.
[鸣谢] 如果您想购买本节目或我们任何节目的磁带，请致电芝加哥 WBEZ，电话 (312) 832-3380。
Or you know you can listen to most of our programs for free on the internet at our website www.thisamericanlife.org.
或者您知道您可以在我们的网站 www.thisamericanlife.org 上免费收听我们的大部分节目。
Thanks to Elizabeth Meister who runs the site.
感谢运营该网站的伊丽莎白·梅斯特 (Elizabeth Meister)。
This American Life is distributed by Public Radio International.
《美国生活》由国际公共广播电台发行。
[FUNDING CREDITS] WBEZ management oversight by Torey Malatia, who has this response to every show: "My god, this is so boring!"
[资金来源] WBEZ 管理由 Torey Malatia 负责监督，他对每场演出都有这样的反应：“天哪，这太无聊了！”
I'm Ira Glass.
我是艾拉·格拉斯。
Back next week with my stories of This American Life.
下周我将带着我的《美国生活》的故事回来。
"I'm still bowling on Fridays with the senior citizens."
“周五我仍然和老年人一起打保龄球。”
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。