Why I Still Cling to1 the Mailman

By Robert Klose

中國宋代詞人晏幾道曾作詞《蝶戀花》：“欲盡此情書尺素，浮雁沉魚，終了無憑據(jù)?！痹~人傾訴于紙上，想寄予心愛之人，可她已流落不知去向，他不知將書信寄往何處，一腔熱情不知向誰傾訴。本文作者生于現(xiàn)代西方國家，在這個人人都已習慣了發(fā)送電子郵件的時代，雖然年代、地域和環(huán)境都相差甚遠，但懷揣長信卻不知寄往何處的不安之情卻是相通的。

I no longer run for the mail the way I used to.I remember, prior to the e-mail age, the sense of heightened anticipation as the hour of mail delivery approached, wondering what slender,handwritten treasures would appear in my box.2. 我還記得在電子郵件時代來臨之前的那股強烈的期盼之情，信件到來時刻一點點靠近時，總會好奇究竟會有怎樣薄薄的墨跡寶物在我的信箱中出現(xiàn)。prior to:在……之前；heightened: 增強的，提高的；anticipation: 盼望，期待；slender: 微薄的。I once received a letter from a long-lost friend and swelled with such joy that I ran the mail carrier down and shook his hand, as if he had done a heroic deed in conveying the missive to me.3. swell with: 充滿了（某種情感）；run down:找到（某人 / 某物）；heroic: 英雄的，高尚的；missive: 信件，信函。

Once a day. Six days a week. That was the rhythm.Through snow, rain, heat, and gloom4. gloom: 黑暗，陰暗。of night. I first learned to love the mail as a young boy. The first thing I ever received that was personally addressed to me was from my buddy Duane. We had been the fastest5. fast: 忠實的，感情牢固的。of 9-year-old friends. Then he moved away,to Massachusetts. The parting was difficult, but boys didn’t cry.

Within the week, however, there was a letter in my mailbox. It was from Duane, and it read, “I’m OK, but I miss you.” That first conveyance to me of a written word from a great distance had all the import of the first Morse code message: “What hath God wrought.”6. conveyance: 表達，表示；import: 重要性，含義；Morse code: 摩斯密碼，一種信號代碼，通過不同的排列順序來表達不同的英文字母、數(shù)字和標點符號；wrought: 〈過時〉work的過去式和過去分詞。It was at that moment that I became a letter writer, quickly discovering that the more letters I wrote, the more I received.

I wrote letters through elementary school, high school, college, and beyond. It got to the point where I could comfortably expect to receive a letter a day. The daily mail delivery was, for me, like a beacon at sea—something toward which my thoughts began to move upon waking.7. 對我而言，每日的信件正如海上的燈塔——每天一睜開眼，我的思想就開始向往之。beacon:燈塔，信號塔。What quickened my blood, of course, was the element of surprise: From whom would the letter be today? And what would the news be?

And then, seemingly in the blink of an eye, the earth shifted.8. in the blink of an eye: 一眨眼的工夫；shift: 改變，轉(zhuǎn)變。此處形容發(fā)生了天翻地覆的變化。E-mail had arrived. Despite being intrigued9. intrigue: 使……好奇，引起……的興趣。by the new technology, I promised myself that I would never stop writing letters by hand. However, I had no control over the proclivities of others, and slowly,inexorably, and then with quickened pace, the letters disappeared from my mailbox, having been replaced with electronic “messages” (a totally different beast—in contrast to letters, all e-mails look alike).10. proclivity: （尤指壞的）傾向；inexorably: 不可阻擋地，不容變更地；beast: 某種東西，具有某種特點的事物（一般為幽默用法）。

And so, like a shipwrecked man stuf fing notes into bottles, tossing them into the waves, and hoping for the best, I continue to write longhand, licking envelopes,sticking stamps, and handing my outgoing mail to the carrier who regards me with a curious eye, as if he is perceiving the last member of a species on the brink of extinction.11. 因此，就像沉船事故的幸存者把小字條塞入瓶中，滿心希望地投到海浪里那樣，我懷著同樣的心情繼續(xù)手寫書信，舔信封的封口，粘上郵票，把我要寄出的信交給郵差，他那疑惑的眼神就好像在看瀕危物種中的最后一個似的。toss:拋，扔；longhand: 普通書寫的（與打字或速記相對）；brink: 邊緣。But he must share the pathos, for the moment he takes my letter he invariably says,12. pathos: 傷感，憐憫；invariably: 不變地，始終如一地。

“Thanks for your business.”Yes, it’s clear that he feels sorry for me, a man continually spitting into the wind13. spit into the wind: 逆風而行，比喻逆潮流行事。and not learning any lessons from it. But I feel bad for him as well, trudging through the snow, only rarely bringing me a letter from a friend, and more likely delivering advertising circulars or an unsolicited “Open Right Away!”announcement congratulating me for having reached the final tier in a million-dollar sweepstakes.14. trudge: 艱難地走，步履沉重地走；circular:（夾在報紙、雜志中寄給消費者的）廣告宣傳品；unsolicited: 未經(jīng)要求的，主動發(fā)出的；tier: 一層，一等級；sweepstake: 抽彩（名字被選中便贏得獎品）。

But it gets sadder than this. Some months ago, while thinking about but not anticipating the mail, I noticed the lateness of the hour and my still-empty mailbox.By 6 that evening there was still no sign of the carrier.The next morning I called the post of fice. “Oh,” the cheerful voice intoned15. intone: 平穩(wěn)清晰地說。. “It got dark, so the carrier went home.”

So much for the gloom of night.

“He’ll bring your mail this afternoon,” the voice concluded.

That wasn’t true. When the carrier finally did make his way down my street, I signaled to him, but he shrugged amiably and said,“Nothing for you today.”16. signal: 示意，打信號；shrug: 聳肩；amiably: 和藹地，友善地。

I think that, at some level, I already knew that.