《美食祈禱和戀愛》Chapter 29 (61):姐姐離開了
Here's another example of the difference in our worldviews. A family in my sister's neighborhood was recently stricken with a double tragedy, when both the young mother and her three-year-old son were diagnosed with cancer. When Catherine told me about this, I could only say, shocked, "Dear God, that family needs grace." She replied firmly, "That family needs casseroles," and then proceeded to organize the entire neighborhood into bringing that family dinner, in shifts, every single night, for an entire year. I do not know if my sister fully recognizes that this is grace.
另有一個例子可以說明我們之間不同的世界觀。 我姐姐家附近有一戶人家最近遭受雙重悲劇的打擊，年輕的母親和她三歲的兒子兩人被診斷罹患癌症。凱瑟琳告知我此事時，我只能吃驚地說：“天啊，這家人需要恩典。”她堅定地回答：“這家人需要燒鍋燉菜。”而後着手把整個街坊鄰居組織起來，每個晚上輪流帶晚餐給這家人，持續一整年。我不清楚我姐姐承不承認這正是恩典。
We walk out of St. Susanna, and she says, "Do you know why the popes needed city planning in the Middle Ages? Because basically you had two million Catholic pilgrims a year coming from all over the Western World to make that walk from the Vatican to St. John Lateran—sometimes on their knees—and you had to have amenities for those people."
我們走出聖蘇撒納的時候，她說：“你可知道爲什麼中世紀的教宗需要都市計劃？因爲，基本上每一年有兩百萬名天主教朝聖者從西方世界各地前來，從梵蒂岡徒步走到聖若望拉特朗（St John Lateran）大殿——有時跪着走——你需要爲這些人提供設施。”
My sister's faith is in learning. Her sacred text is the Oxford English Dictionary. As she bows her head in study, fingers speeding across the pages, she is with her God. I see my sister in prayer again later that same day—when she drops to her knees in the middle of the Roman Forum, clears away some litter off the face of the soil (as though erasing a blackboard), then takes up a small stone and draws for me in the dirt a blueprint of a classic Romanesque basilica. She points from her drawing to the ruin before her, leading me to understand (even visually challenged me can understand!) what that building once must have looked like eighteen centuries earlier. She sketches with her finger in the empty air the missing arches, the nave, the windows long gone. Like Harold with his Purple Crayon, she fills in the absent cosmos with her imagination and makes whole the ruined.
我姐姐的信仰是學習。她的聖經是牛津英語辭典。當她埋頭讀書，手指快速翻閱書頁時，她正與她的上帝同在。該日傍晚，我再一次看見我姐姐祈禱——她在羅馬古墟（Roman Forum）中央跪了下來，清除地面上的廢棄物（猶如擦黑板），而後拿起一塊小石子，在泥土上爲我畫下古典羅馬教堂的藍圖。她指着圖畫前方的廢墟，引導我瞭解（甚至用視覺形象挑戰我去了解！）1800年前的建築物是何種光景。她在空氣中比畫，畫出不復存在的拱門、中殿、窗戶，就像拿着神仙棒，用想象力填滿缺席的宇宙，使廢墟變得完整。
In Italian there is a seldom-used tense called the passato remoto, the remote past. You use this tense when you are discussing things in the far, far distant past, things that happened so long ago they have no personal impact whatsoever on you anymore—for example, ancient history. But my sister, if she spoke Italian, would not use this tense to discuss ancient history. In her world, the Roman Forum is not remote, nor is it past. It is exactly as present and close to her as I am.
意大利語當中有個不常使用的時態，叫（遙遠的過去 ）。在討論遙不可及的往事，很久以前發生但對你不再有任何個人衝擊的事情時，使用此一時態——比方說，古代歷史。然而我的姐姐若說意大利語，絕不會用這時態討論古代歷史。在她的世界中，羅馬古墟並不遙遠，也不是往事。而是處於當下而且近在咫尺的事情，就像我在她眼前一般真實。
She leaves the next day.
她隔天離開了。
"Listen," I say, "be sure to call me when your plane lands safely, OK? Not to be morbid, but . . ."
“聽着，”我說，“在你的飛機安全降落後，一定得打電話給我，好嗎？我知道這有點神經，只不過……”
"I know, sweetie," she says. "I love you, too."
Eat, Pray, Love
“我瞭解，親愛的，”她說，“我也愛你。”
