《美食祈禱和戀愛》Chapter 69 (152):住在邊境的人
By the way, I found my word.
順便提一下，我找到了我的用詞。I found it in the library, of course, bookworm that I am. I'd been wondering about my word ever since that afternoon back in Rome when my Italian friend Giulio had told me that Rome's word is SEX, and had asked me what mine was. I didn't know the answer then, but kind of figured my word would show up eventually, and that I'd recognize it when I saw it.
像我這樣的書蟲，當然是在圖書館找到的。打從在羅馬那天下午，我的意大利朋友朱利歐說羅馬的用詞是“性”，問起我的用詞，我便一直在想自己的用詞是什麼。我當時不清楚答案，卻認爲自己的用詞終會出現，看見它的時候就會認出它來。So I saw it during my last week at the Ashram.
於是，待在道場的最後一個禮拜，我看到了它。
I was reading through an old text about Yoga, when I found a description of ancient spiritual seekers. A Sanskrit word appeared in the paragraph: ANTEVASIN. It means "one who lives at the border." In ancient times this was a literal description. It indicated a person who had left the bustling center of worldly life to go live at the edge of the forest where the spiritual masters dwelled. The antevasin was not one of the villagers anymore—not a householder with a conventional life. But neither was he yet a transcendent—not one of those sages who live deep in the unexplored woods, fully realized. The antevasin was an in-betweener. He was a border-dweller. He lived in sight of both worlds, but he looked toward the unknown. And he was a scholar.
當時我正在閱讀一段有關瑜伽的古經文，看見對古代心靈探索者的描述。文中出現一個梵語詞彙：“安特瓦信”（antevasin），意思是“住在邊境的人”。在古時候，這是字面的描述。表示某人遠離喧囂的世俗生活，跑去住在靈脩大師們居住的森林邊沿。“安特瓦信”不再是村民——不再是過傳統生活的居民。但他也不是超凡者——不是住在深山野地的聖賢之一。“安特瓦信”是中間人。他住在邊境。他看得見兩個世界，卻看向未知。他是學者。When I read this description of the antevasin, I got so excited I gave a little bark of recognition. That's my word, baby! In the modern age, of course, that image of an unexplored forest would have to be figurative, and the border would have to be figurative, too. But you can still live there. You can still live on that shimmering line between your old thinking and your new understanding, always in a state of learning. In the figurative sense, this is a border that is always moving—as you advance forward in your studies and realizations, that mysterious forest of the unknown always stays a few feet ahead of you, so you have to travel light in order to keep following it. You have to stay mobile, movable, supple. Slippery, even. Which is funny, because just the day before, my friend the poet/plumber from New Zealand had left the Ashram, and on his way out the door, he'd handed me a friendly little good-bye poem about my journey. I remembered this verse:
讀到“安特瓦信”的描述時，我興奮至極，發出一小聲驚歎表示認可。“這是我的用詞，寶貝！”在現代，原始森林一景自然是用在比喻上，而邊境也是比喻用法。但你仍能住在那裏。你仍能住在舊思維和新體悟之間，永遠處於學習狀態。就比喻的含義來說，這個邊境不斷移動——當你朝向自己的學習和理解推進時，這片未知的神祕之林始終在前方數米之處，因此你必須輕裝上路才趕得上。你得保持移動、變化、靈活的狀態，甚至滑溜。這很有趣，因爲前一天，我的新西蘭水管工詩人朋友離開道場，出門時遞給我一首告別小詩，關於我的旅程。我記得這幾行：Elizabeth, betwixt and between Italian phrases and Bali dreams, Elizabeth, between and betwixt, Sometimes as slippery as a fish . . .
伊莉莎白，非驢非馬，意大利語辭藻，巴釐美夢，伊莉莎白，非驢非馬，時而滑溜，好似魚兒……I've spent so much time these last years wondering what I'm supposed to be. A wife? A mother? A lover? A celibate? An Italian? A glutton? A traveler? An artist? A Yogi? But I'm not any of these things, at least not completely. And I'm not Crazy Aunt Liz, either. I'm just a slippery antevasin—betwixt and between—a student on the ever-shifting border near the wonderful, scary forest of the new. Eat, Pray, Love
過去幾年來，我花費許多時間猜想自己該是什麼。妻子？母親？情人？獨身者？意大利人？貪吃鬼？旅人？藝術家？瑜伽士？但我什麼都不是，至少不完全是。我也不是古怪的小莉阿姨。我只是滑溜的“安特瓦信”，非驢非馬，在接近美妙險峻的新森林邊境，始終變動不定，持續學習。
