双语·当呼吸化为空气 回忆如潮水汹涌而来
我躺在尘土之中，阳光笼罩周身，回忆如潮水汹涌而来。这个只有一万五千人口的小镇显得愈发逼仄。而将近一千公里以外，斯坦福大学，我的新宿舍，似乎充满了闪闪发光的希望。
I lay there in the dirt, awash in sunlight and memory, feeling the shrinking size of this town of fifteen thousand, six hundred miles from my new college dormitory at Stanford and all its promise.
我对医学的了解，大概就是“缺席”，确切地说，是从小到大父亲的缺席。他每天天不亮就去上班，天黑才回家，把盘子里已经冷了的饭菜热一热吃掉。之前我家住在纽约的布朗士区，就在曼哈顿北边，一个人多热闹、富裕优越的郊区。我十岁的时候，和十四岁的哥哥、八岁的弟弟，一起跟着父亲搬到了亚利桑那州的金曼，这个位于两道山脉之间的沙漠谷地。外界对这个小镇，所知最多的，也就是开车经过时，顺道停下来加油的地方。吸引父亲的，是这里灿烂的阳光，当然还有很低的生活成本。不然，他如何实现夙愿，把三个儿子都送到梦寐以求的大学呢？这里还有个好机会，可以亲手创建一个他自己的地区性心脏专科诊所。对病人的尽心尽力与对医学事业的执着，很快让他成为备受尊重的社区成员。有时我们还是能见到他的，一般是深夜或者周末。他总是对我们满含关切的父爱，同时又有严苛的要求。拥抱我们，亲吻我们，又总是语气严厉地对我们进行教育：“做第一很容易：找到那个第一名，然后比他多得一分。”他可能在内心对自己有所妥协，做父亲，可以做得“短小精悍”，和孩子们相处时间虽然短，但高强度（又真诚）的爆发完全比得上……比得上其他父亲做的所有事情。而我满脑子想的都是，如果这就是当医生的代价，那简直太高了。
I knew medicine only by its absence—specifically, the absence of a father growing up, one who went to work before dawn and returned in the dark to a plate of re-heated dinner. When I was ten, my father had moved us—three boys, ages fourteen, ten, and eight—from Bronxville, New York, a compact, affluent suburb just north of Manhattan, to Kingman, Arizona, in a desert valley ringed by two mountain ranges, known primarily to the outside world as a place to get gas en route to somewhere else. He was drawn by the sun, by the cost of living—how else would he pay for his sons to attend the colleges he aspired to?—and by the opportunity to establish a regional cardiology practice of his own. His unyielding dedication to his patients soon made him a respected member of the community. When we did see him, late at night or on weekends, he was an amalgam of sweet affections and austere diktats, hugs and kisses mixed with stony pronouncements: “It’s very easy to be number one: find the guy who is number one, and score one point higher than he does.” He had reached some compromise in his mind that fatherhood could be distilled; short, concentrated (but sincere) bursts of high intensity could equal. . . whatever it was that other fathers did. All I knew was, if that was the price of medicine, it was simply too high.
从这个荒凉的高原，我能看到家里的房子，就在市区边缘，瑟巴特山脉脚下，周围是绵延的红岩沙漠，零星点缀着一些豆科灌木、风滚草和船桨一样的仙人掌。在这个地方，尘土如恶魔，不知来处，腾旋而起，模糊视线，继而又不知所终。绵延的旷野消失在无穷无尽之处。我家的两条宠物狗，曼克斯和尼普，对这广阔天地的自由自在从未厌倦过。每天，它们都会勇敢地出发，把沙漠新的“馈赠”带回家，比如一条鹿腿，没吃完的长耳野兔的残尸，这些都是存着以后吃的，还有被阳光晒得发白的马头盖骨，以及野狼的颚骨。
From my desert plateau, I could see our house, just beyond the city limits, at the base of the Cerbat Moun-tains, amid red-rock desert speckled with mesquite, tumbleweeds, and paddle-shaped cacti. Out here, dust devils swirled up from nothing, blurring your vision, then disappeared. Spaces stretched on, then fell away into the distance. Our two dogs, Max and Nip, never grew tired of the freedom. Every day, they’d venture forth and bring home some new desert treasure: the leg of a deer, unfinished bits of jackrabbit to eat later, the sunbleached skull of a horse, the jawbone of a coyote.
