數字戀愛時代 分手後照片短信刪不刪
After the split, you're left with an abandoned attic's worth of stuff: on your phone and hard drive, in your inbox. It's stuff that used to matter, and still does. It's stuff that hurts. It's stuff you loved. What do you do with it?
分手後，你身邊多了一堆幾乎能丟棄到閣樓的東西：手機上、電腦上、郵箱裏，到處都是它們的身影。它們曾經是對你而言很重要的東西，現在依舊是。它們是能勾起你眼淚的東西，也是你曾愛過的東西。你該拿它們怎麼辦？
It's impossible to plow through a committed relationship in an industrialized nation without piling up an abundant digital record. You'll have chat transcripts, tagged photos on Facebook, beautiful photos from a DSLR, email letters, Skype call screenshots, texts—so, so many texts. Your first instinct will be to throw it all away。
在這個發達的工業化國家，一段認真的感情結束後必然會留下大量的數字記錄。你們的聊天記錄、Facebook上標着名字的合影、數碼相機裏的美麗合照、郵件往來、Skype網絡電話的截圖、手機短信……大量的手機短信。你的第一想法肯定是把它們全扔光、刪光吧。
That's not a reflex to be ashamed of—just like you wouldn't want to stare at a framed photo of your ex while you're hurting, you don't want to look at hundreds of messages and JPEGs detailing that person either. We're all hypersensitive when it happens, and we're living in an age of hyper-info. There are more grains of salt to catch in your heart wound than ever before. This isn't easy—but let's try。
有這種想法不必羞愧。當你正在傷心的時候，不想看到那個前任的照片；抑或是不想看到跟ta之間的數百條短信、各種親密照一樣，這些都可以理解。分手後我們都會變得極度敏感，尤其身處這個充斥着過度信息的時代。對於我們來講，心上的傷口會被灑更多的鹽巴。這不是件容易事兒。但是讓我們來試着應對吧。
Wait
等待
Wait a month. Wait longer. Wait until you can look at his or her Facebook profile without feeling something bad in your chest, or the urge to throw your laptop. No good decision, in this century or any other, has ever been made in the fresh wake of a breakup. Please, please don't throw your laptop。
等一個月，或更久。直到你可以坦然直視ta的Facebook主頁而不會感到陣陣心痛，或有種直接想扔了筆記本的衝動。從古到今，沒有什麼正確的決定是在剛分手的時候做出的。請千萬遏制住那種衝動，別扔了筆記本。
Photos
照片
Don't delete these. Really, don't. You'll regret it if you do. Not because maybe someday you'll get back together and be so glad you kept it all. You probably won't. But these pictures aren't just small monuments to a failed romance, they're high-resolution instants from your life, recorded forever, unfading. It's not just your ex's smile that you miss and wish you could have back, it's the way you were at a particular moment a shutter snapped and a digital sensor touched light. It's your dog, your apartment, your haircut, your vacation, your job, your old bike—everything that was you for that moment, regardless of who you were dating and who you loved. This is matter you'll want years and decades from now—don't be rash and trash it。
別刪了它們。真的別這樣做，否則你會後悔的。並不是說以後你們還有複合的可能，到時候你就會慶幸沒有刪了它們，因爲你們很可能不會複合了；而是因爲這些照片不僅是一段失敗戀情的紀念，同時也是你人生某些時刻的縮影和記錄，它們是永久的不可磨滅的記憶。它們對你來講，不僅僅裝着你迷戀的前任戀人的微笑(你多麼希望能讓這笑容再次回到你身邊)，它是每一個快門聲後對你人生的光影記錄。它裏面記錄了你的狗、你的公寓、你的髮型、你的假期、你的工作、你的老單車——所有你在那一刻的模樣，而無論你在和誰約會，又在愛着誰。這是你會想要去珍惜一輩子的東西，不要因爲一時衝動而把它們都刪掉。
Instead, vault it. Copy everything that's too much to look at onto an external hard drive or some remote backup system, and then delete it from your machine. Put that hard drive in a sock drawer or under your bed. Give it to a friend. Place it where it won't distract and won't harm, but, when you're ready, can provide a vivid reminder of who you used to be. That's incredibly powerful! Don't destroy it on a whim。
把它珍藏起來。把那些不忍看的東西複製到外接硬盤或移動儲存設備上，然後把電腦裏的都刪了。把硬盤鎖進裝襪子的抽屜，或是塞到牀下。交給朋友保存也行。總之，把它放在一個不會讓你分心和傷心的地方，然後等你恢復過來的時候，它便能重放過去那個栩栩如生的你。這可棒極了！千萬別衝動之下毀掉它。
Playlists
播放列表
Yeah, toss these. All leftover playlists will do is smear heartbreaking meaning and nostalgia over songs you'd otherwise enjoy. Remember, you made this playlist explicitly for your ex—you tailored songs you both love in an order you thought might make them smile and miss you. And all those memories could swamp you based on nothing but this otherwise innocuous list of MP3s. So get rid of the list. Keep the songs though。
沒錯，扔了它們。所有那些你們曾經喜歡過的歌曲，都會在下一次播放的時候，提醒你那些心碎的過往並喚起你的追憶之心來。記住，這些歌曲列表是你爲前任專門設置的，它們是你倆都喜歡的歌，你曾爲了讓ta開心和想念你而特意排列了順序。這些回憶能讓你憑空悲傷，所以把這些播放列表刪掉吧，但歌可以保留。
Emails
郵件
Emails can be as banal and brief as any text message, but there are plenty of exceptions: long ones penned while abroad, or traveling, mail with attachments, breakup letters, I Miss You letters. Rather than sift through everything, archive it all. Do a search for his or her email, select all, and pack it away into a folder. Remember: this email is part of your life history. It includes details you won't remember by the time you're long over the breakup, and you'll be grateful for them。
電子郵件有時候就跟手機短信一樣乏味而簡潔，不過也有例外：比如出國或旅遊時寫的長郵件、帶附件的郵件、以及分手信和思念信。與其篩遍所有郵件，不如全部歸檔。然後把和ta有關的郵件找出來，全選並放到一個專屬文件夾。記住：郵件也是你的生活記錄。它們包含了那些你在分手很久以後會忘記的細節，而到時候你會慶幸自己保留了它們。
Texts
手機短信
Delete—this is just an invitation to wallow and/or leap back into ill-advised contact. Both are bad for you。
刪了吧。這些短信只會讓你沉溺於悲傷或誘使你去聯繫那個不該再聯繫的人。無論怎樣都對你沒好處。
Facebook tags
Facebook的圈人標記
Again, an opportunity to wallow, a web browser shortcut to melancholy. And who wants a future prospect to see a bunch of pictures with your ex?
這個也是誘使你沉溺於往事的壞東西，而且還是個瀏覽器的捷徑。任何希望有個光明未來的人都不會想看到一堆自己和ex的合影的！
There should be a pattern emerging here. It's difficult, but you need to discern what baggage is going to be useful even after all the heavy, horrible, hurtful emotions wear off. What are the bytes that'll have significance on their own, without the love connection? What stuff will remind you about your life in some broader sense than a relationship that occupied some months or years of it? What'll be that GIF or TXT you wish to hell you hadn't erased, because who knows what it might've reminded you of about the way you used to be?
但要懂得區分。儘管這很難，但你需要分辨出那些在你消化掉沉重、恐懼和心碎感後，仍能帶來作用的東西。哪些是抹去愛情痕跡後依舊意義重大的照片？哪些是能體現你生命印記而非僅僅記錄你愛情長跑的照片？哪些是你刪除以後必定會後悔的東西？無論是gif還是txt格式的東西，它們之中總有些能喚醒你對過去的記憶。
Those things deserve backup. The rest was just noise all along。
這些東西值得備份。其他的都只是浮雲。
