《美食祈禱和戀愛》Chapter 28 (56):我想David了

It is this happiness, I suppose (which is really a few months old by now), that gets me to thinking upon my return to Rome that I need to do something about David. That maybe it's time for us to end our story forever. We were already separated, that was official, but there was still a window of hope left open that perhaps someday (maybe after my travels, maybe after a year apart) we could give things another try. We loved each other. That was never the question. It's just that we couldn't figure out how to stop making each other desperately, shriekingly, soul-punishingly miserable.

這樣的喜悅（事實上至今已有數個月之久），使我在返回羅馬時，考慮該與大衛做個了斷。或許該讓我們的故事畫上句點。我們已正式分開，卻仍開着一扇希望之窗，期待有一天（或許在我的旅行過後，或許在分開一年後）我們能重新來過，我們彼此相愛。這從無疑問。只不過我們不明白如何不讓對方痛苦得絕望、尖叫、痛徹心扉。

Last spring David had offered this crazy solution to our woes, only half in jest: "What if we just acknowledged that we have a bad relationship, and we stuck it out, anyway? What if we admitted that we make each other nuts, we fight constantly and hardly ever have sex, but we can't live without each other, so we deal with it? And then we could spend our lives together—in misery, but happy to not be apart."

上個春天，大衛爲我們的苦難提出瘋狂的解決方法，只不過有點半開玩笑：“如果我們承認我們關係惡劣，卻硬着頭皮撐下去，會有什麼結果？如果我們承認我們讓彼此發狂，我們一天到晚吵架，幾乎不再做愛，卻無法離開彼此而生活，於是應付下去，會有什麼結果？然後我們可以白頭偕老、共度一生——悲慘度日，但慶幸沒分道揚鑣。”

Let it be a testimony to how desperately I love this guy that I have spent the last ten months giving that offer serious consideration.

我認真考慮過這項提議，由此可見這個與我共處十個月的男人讓我愛得多癡狂。

The other alternative in the backs of our minds, of course, was that one of us might change. He might become more open and affectionate, not withholding himself from anyone who loves him on the fear that she will eat his soul. Or I might learn how to . . . stop trying to eat his soul.

我們腦海中的另一個解決辦法，當然是我們其中一人可能改變。他可能變得更開明、更溫柔，不再因爲恐懼被愛他的人吞噬靈魂而退避三舍。或者我可能學會如何……不再嘗試吞噬他的靈魂。

So many times I had wished with David that I could behave more like my mother does in her marriage—independent, strong, self-sufficient. A self-feeder. Able to exist without regular doses of romance or flattery from my solitary farmer of a father. Able to cheerfully plant gardens of daisies among the inexplicable stone walls of silence that my dad sometimes builds up around himself. My dad is quite simply my favorite person in the world, but he is a bit of an odd case. An ex-boyfriend of mine once described him this way: "Your father only has one foot on this earth. And really, really long legs . . ."

我時常希望和大衛在一起的時候，舉止多像一點我母親在婚姻中的獨立、堅強、自主的態度，一個自給自足的人。無須從我那孤寂農人的父親那兒定期服用浪漫或讚美，即可安然存活。她在我父親有時給自己築起的沉默之牆當中，仍能歡歡喜喜地栽種雛菊。我父親是世界上我最喜愛的人，但他有點古怪。我的一個前男友曾如此描述過他：“你爹只有一隻腳踩在地面上，而且腿很長很長……”

What I grew up watching in my household was a mother who would receive her husband's love and affection whenever he thought to offer it, but would then step aside and take care of herself whenever he drifted off into his own peculiar universe of low-grade oblivious neglect. This is how it looked to me, anyway, taking into account that nobody (and especially not the children) ever knows the secrets of a marriage. What I believed I grew up seeing was a mother who asked nothing of anybody. This was my mom, after all—a woman who had taught herself how to swim as an adolescent, alone in a cold Minnesota lake, with a book she'd borrowed from the local library entitled How to Swim. To my eye, there was nothing this woman could not do on her own.

在我成長的家，我看着母親在她丈夫想到給予愛與感情的時候接受他的愛，在他沉浸於自己、罔顧一切的世界時，則避向一旁照顧自己。總之，這是我的看法，如果還考慮到沒有人（尤其是小孩）知道婚姻的祕訣的話。我成長期間所看見的母親，對任何人皆無所求。這畢竟是我的母親——青春期的她，獨自在明尼蘇達的寒冷湖泊中自學游泳，帶着她從當地圖書館借來的《學游泳》一書。在我看來，沒有一件事是這女人無法獨力完成的。

But then I'd had a revelatory conversation with my mother, not long before I'd left for Rome. She'd come into New York to have one last lunch with me, and she'd asked me frankly—breaking all the rules of communication in our family's history—what had happened between me and David. Further disregarding the Gilbert Family Standard Communications Rule-book, I actually told her. I told her everything. I told her how much I loved David, but how lonely and heartsick it made me to be with this person who was always disappearing from the room, from the bed, from the planet.

然而，在我動身前往羅馬前不久，我和我母親進行了一場啓示性的對談。她到紐約和我吃最後一餐午飯，她坦白問我——打破我們家族史上所有的溝通規範——我和大衛之間出了什麼問題。我又一次無視於“吉爾伯特家族標準溝通手冊”，竟然告訴了她，我一五一十地告訴了她。我跟她說我深愛大衛，但這個老是從房間、牀上、地球上銷聲匿跡的人，讓我多麼孤單消沉。

"He sounds kind of like your father," she said. A brave and generous admission.

“聽來起他和你父親有點像。”她說。一種勇敢而寬容的供認。

"The problem is," I said, "I'm not like my mother. I'm not as tough as you, Mom. There's a constant level of closeness that I really need from the person I love. I wish I could be more like you, then I could have this love story with David. But it just destroys me to not be able to count on that affection when I need it."

“問題是，”我說，“我不像我的母親。媽，我不像你那麼堅強。我需要從我愛的人身上得到一定程度的親。我希望自己能多像你一點，那我就能和大衛擁有這段愛情故事。可是在我需要的時候，無法仰賴這份感情，這簡直要毀了我。”

Then my mother shocked me. She said, "All those things that you want from your relationship, Liz? I have always wanted those things, too."

接着，我的母親的話使我大吃一驚。她說：“小莉，你想從兩人關係中得到的一切，也是我一直想要的東西。”

In that moment, it was as if my strong mother reached across the table, opened her fist and finally showed me the handful of bullets she'd had to bite over the decades in order to stay happily married (and she is happily married, all considerations weighed) to my father. I had never seen this side of her before, not ever. I had never imagined what she might have wanted, what she might have been missing, what she might have decided not to fight for in the larger scheme of things. Seeing all this, I could feel my worldview start to make a radical shift.

那一刻，彷彿我堅強的母親伸出手來打開拳頭， 讓我終於看見她幾十年來爲了和我父親維持快樂的婚姻（若基於種種考慮，她確實婚姻快樂）而承受的傷痕。我從未見過她這一面，從來不曾。我未曾想象過她要什麼，她錯失了什麼，在爲大局着想而決定不去爭取的東西。看見的這一切，使我感到我的世界觀開始發生急劇變化。

If even she wants what I want, then . . .?

倘若連母親都需要我要的東西，那麼……？