英語(yǔ)短文：追憶點(diǎn)滴父愛

　　Occasionally, without warning, the drunken wreckage of my father would wash up on our doorstep, late at night, stammering, laughing, reeking of booze. Bang! Bang! Bang! Beating on the door, pleading to my mother to open it.
　　有時(shí)候，在毫無(wú)預(yù)兆的情況下，父親會(huì)半夜醉醺醺地出現(xiàn)在我們家門口，結(jié)結(jié)巴巴地講著酒話，時(shí)而大笑幾聲，滿嘴酒氣。砰！砰！砰！大力敲著門，懇求母親為他開門。

　　He was on his way home from drinking, gambling, or some combination thereof, squandering money that we could have used and wasting time that we desperately needed.
　　他要么剛剛喝完酒回來(lái)，或賭了幾把，要么兩者皆有。他揮霍著我們本可以用于日常開銷的血汗錢，還浪費(fèi)了我們迫切需要的時(shí)間——和父親在一起的時(shí)間。

　　It was the late-1970s. My parents were separated. My mother was now raising a gaggle of boys on her own. She was a newly minted schoolteacher. He was a juke-joint musician-turned-construction worker.
　　那是20世紀(jì)70年代末。我的父母離婚了。那時(shí)，母親獨(dú)自一人撫養(yǎng)著我們幾個(gè)兒子。她是一位新上任的老師。父親原本是一名鄉(xiāng)間酒館的駐場(chǎng)樂(lè)師，后來(lái)成了建筑工人。

　　He spouted off about what he planned to do for us, buy for us. In fact, he had no intention of doing anything. The one man who was supposed to be genetically programmed to love us, in fact, lacked the understanding of what it truly meant to love a child—or to hurt one.
　　他喋喋不休地說(shuō)自己計(jì)劃為我們做什么、買什么。事實(shí)上，他根本不打算做任何事情。一個(gè)在血緣關(guān)系上本應(yīng)該愛我們的人，實(shí)際上并不懂得對(duì)孩子而言什么才是真正的愛，也不知道什么是傷害。

　　To him, this was a harmless game that kept us excited and begging. In fact, it was a cruel, corrosive deception that subtly and unfairly shifted the onus of his lack of emotional and financial investment from him to us. I lost faith in his words and in him. I wanted to stop caring, but I couldn’t.
　　對(duì)他來(lái)說(shuō)，這是一種并無(wú)惡意的游戲，它讓我們時(shí)而興奮，時(shí)而覺得像在乞討。但這實(shí)際上是一種侵蝕性的殘酷欺騙，它巧妙卻又不公平地將他對(duì)我們?nèi)狈Ω星楹臀镔|(zhì)投入這一責(zé)任轉(zhuǎn)移到我們身上。我不相信他的話，對(duì)他完全不信任。我想不去在乎他，但我做不到。

　　Maybe it was his own complicated relationship to his father and his father’s family that rendered him cold. Maybe it was the pain and guilt associated with a life of misfortune. Who knows. Whatever it was, it stole him from us, and particularly from me.
　　也許是他與自己的父親及其復(fù)雜的家庭關(guān)系，使他變得冷酷。也許是他生活的不幸所造成的痛苦和內(nèi)疚使然。誰(shuí)知道呢。不管是什么，反正它把他從我們這里偷走了，特別是從我這里。

　　While my brothers talked ad nauseam about breaking and fixing things, I spent many of my evenings reading and wondering. My favorite books were a set of encyclopedias given by my uncle. They allowed me to explore the world beyond my world, to travel without leaving, to dream dreams greater than my life would otherwise have supported.
　　當(dāng)我的兄弟們沒完沒了地談?wù)撛鯓硬鸾馄茐脑僦匦迻|西時(shí)，我卻在許許多多個(gè)晚上潛心閱讀和思考。我最喜歡的書是我叔叔給的一套百科全書。這些書讓我探索超越我成長(zhǎng)天地以外的大世界，足不出戶隨心旅行，做那些遠(yuǎn)非我生活所能承載的美夢(mèng)。

　　But losing myself in my own mind also meant that I was completely lost to my father.
　　但沉醉在自我意識(shí)里，也意味著在父親眼中我變得完全陌生了。

　　He could relate to my brothers’ tactile approaches to the world but not to my cerebral one. Not understanding me, he simply ignored me—not just emotionally, but physically as well. Never once did he hug me, never once a pat on the back or a hand on the shoulder or a tousling of the hair.
　　他能明白我兄弟們那種打打鬧鬧闖世界的方式，卻從不懂我心田開智慧的那一套。他不理解我，就干脆無(wú)視我——不僅情感關(guān)懷欠奉，對(duì)我根本視若無(wú)睹。他從來(lái)沒有擁抱過(guò)我，從沒拍過(guò)我的后背，也不會(huì)搭我的肩膀或撥弄一下我的頭發(fā)。

　　My best memories of him were from his episodic attempts at engagement.
　　他留給我的最美好回憶是他時(shí)不時(shí)地嘗試和我們接觸。

　　During the longest of these episodes, once every month or two, he would come pick us up and drive us down the interstate to Trucker’s Paradise, a seedy, smoke-filled, truck stop with gas pumps, a convenience store, a small dining area and a game room through a door in the back.
　　這些插曲中持續(xù)時(shí)間最長(zhǎng)的是，每隔一兩個(gè)月，他會(huì)來(lái)接我們，沿著州際公路驅(qū)車把我們帶到卡車司機(jī)樂(lè)園。這是一個(gè)破爛、煙霧繚繞的載貨汽車停車場(chǎng)，有加油站、一家便利店、一個(gè)小小的用餐區(qū)，還有穿過(guò)背后一扇門即可到達(dá)的一間游戲室。

　　My dad gave each of us a handful of quarters, and we played until they were gone. He sat up front in the dining area, drinking coffee and being particular about the restaurant’s measly offerings.
　　父親給我們每個(gè)人一把硬幣，我們一直玩到輸光硬幣才停下來(lái)。他就坐在用餐區(qū)前面，一邊喝咖啡，一邊挑剔著餐廳里食物的份量太少。

　　I loved these days. To me, Trucker’s Paradise was paradise. The quarters and the games were fun but easily forgotten. It was the presence of my father that was most treasured. But, of course, these trips were short-lived. And so it was. Every so often he would make some sort of effort, but every time it wouldn’t last.
　　我喜歡那些日子。對(duì)我來(lái)說(shuō)，卡車司機(jī)樂(lè)園的確是一個(gè)天堂。硬幣和游戲充滿了樂(lè)趣，只是容易被遺忘。最寶貴的是父親能來(lái)。但是，當(dāng)然了，好景不長(zhǎng)。事實(shí)的確如此。時(shí)而，他會(huì)努力擠出時(shí)間，但每次都不會(huì)持續(xù)很長(zhǎng)時(shí)間。

　　It wasn’t until I was much older that I would find something that I would be able to cling to as evidence of my father’s love.
　　直到年齡漸長(zhǎng)，我才找到一些可以體現(xiàn)其父愛的證據(jù)。

　　When the Commodore 64 personal computer debuted, I convinced myself that I had to have it even though its price was out of my mother’s range. So I decided to earn the money myself. I mowed every yard I could find that summer for a few dollars each, yet it still wasn’t enough. So my dad agreed to help me raise the rest of the money by driving me to one of the watermelon farms south of town, loading up his truck with wholesale melons and driving me around to sell them.
　　當(dāng)Commodore 64型個(gè)人電腦上市時(shí)，我下定決心要買一臺(tái)，即使它的價(jià)格超出了我母親的支付能力。于是我決定自己賺錢。那年夏天，我給能找到的每一個(gè)庭院割草，每家賺幾美元，但錢還是不夠。于是父親答應(yīng)幫我去籌集剩下的錢。他驅(qū)車帶我去鎮(zhèn)上南面的一家西瓜農(nóng)場(chǎng)，把批發(fā)買來(lái)的西瓜裝上卡車，帶著我去附近的地方把西瓜賣出去。

　　He came for me before daybreak. We made small talk, but it didn’t matter. The fact that he was talking to me was all that mattered. I was a teenager by then, but this was the first time that I had ever spent time alone with him. He laughed and repeatedly introduced me as “my boy,” a phrase he relayed with a palpable sense of pride. It was one of the best days of my life.
　　天亮前，他來(lái)接我。我們閑聊了一會(huì)兒，但這不是重點(diǎn)。重要的是他和我聊天。那時(shí)我已是一個(gè)青少年，但那卻是我第一次與他獨(dú)處。他笑著，并多次在向別人介紹 “這是我的兒子，”這樣四個(gè)字，被他用一種明顯的自豪語(yǔ)氣傳達(dá)著。那是我生命中最美好的時(shí)光。

　　Although he had never told me that he loved me, I would cling to that day as the greatest evidence of that fact. He had never intended me any wrong. He just didn’t know how to love me right. He wasn’t a mean man.
　　雖然他從未說(shuō)過(guò)他愛我，但我會(huì)認(rèn)定，那天是他愛我這一事實(shí)成立的最大證據(jù)。他從沒想過(guò)對(duì)我造成任何傷害。他只是不知道用什么方式來(lái)愛我。他并不是一個(gè)壞心腸的人。

　　So I took these random episodes and clung to them like a thing most precious, squirreling them away for the long stretches of coldness when a warm memory would prove most useful.
　　所以我拾起這些偶然出現(xiàn)的片段，并堅(jiān)持認(rèn)為它們是最珍貴的東西。我將它們珍藏著，在冷漠的記憶長(zhǎng)河中，這些溫暖的片段最為窩心。

　　It just goes to show that no matter how estranged the father, no matter how deep the damage, no matter how shattered the bond, there is still time, still space, still a need for even the smallest bit of evidence of a father’s love.
　　我的經(jīng)歷只是表明：不管父親曾經(jīng)與你如何疏遠(yuǎn)，無(wú)論他對(duì)你造成了多深的傷害，無(wú)論你們之間的紐帶是如何破裂的，你仍有時(shí)間、有空間，并且有必要去找尋哪怕是能證明父愛的最小的證據(jù)。

　　“My boy.”
　　（正如）“我的兒子。”

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