The Paperboy’s Secret报童的秘密

In boyhood, guilt was a constant companion. I stopped mentioning the quarters that Mr. Wood put into my pocket.

May 31, 20262026年5月31日

Apart from summer, I delivered in darkness. Invisibility was part of childhood: I saw more of others than they saw of me.除了夏天，我都是在黑暗中送报。隐身感是童年的一部分：我观察别人，多过他们观察我。Photographs by David Williams for The New Yorker摄影：大卫·威廉姆斯（为《纽约客》拍摄）

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My first job in journalism—long before I knew that I wanted to write, and decades before I became a foreign correspondent—was delivering newspapers for the Columbia Missourian密苏里人报. I started at 5 A.M. on February 1, 1979, during one of those cold, snowy winters that used to be common in mid-Missouri. The front page featured a photograph of two local children playing in the snow, and a fifty-four-point headline carried news from a distant world: “TRIUMPHANT KHOMEINI RETURNS TO TEHRAN.霍梅尼凯旋归来，抵达德黑兰。” The paper consisted of thirty-four pages, and had a cover price of fifteen cents. Along with my older sister, Amy, I folded the newspapers and set out with a list of addresses. Our father accompanied us on the first day, but after that we were on our own.我人生中第一份新闻工作——远在我知道自己想写作之前，也远在我成为驻外记者几十年前——是为《哥伦比亚密苏里人报》（Columbia Missourian）送报。1979年2月1日凌晨5点，我开始了这份工作，那是密苏里州中部典型的寒冷多雪的冬天。头版刊登了一张当地两个孩子在雪中玩耍的照片，五十四磅的粗体标题传达着来自遥远世界的消息：“霍梅尼凯旋归来，抵达德黑兰”。报纸共三十四页，零售价十五美分。我和姐姐艾米一起折好报纸，拿着地址单出发。第一天父亲陪着我们，但之后就全靠我们自己了。

Amy and I planned to share the route, and our earnings would help pay the fees at a summer camp. At the age of nine, I was probably too young to deliver papers, but Amy, at thirteen, was almost certainly too old. She was striking, with black hair, a fair complexion, and cat-green eyes; people noticed Amy wherever she went. During the spring, we alternated paper-route days, but I could tell that she didn’t enjoy it. A few times, she woke me at 5 A.M., claimed to be sick, and asked me to substitute. I noticed that Amy tended to feel bad on Wednesdays and Sundays, when the paper was heavy with extra ads and special sections.艾米和我计划分担这条送报路线，赚来的钱可以帮我们支付夏令营的费用。九岁时，我可能太小了，不适合送报，而十三岁的艾米几乎肯定太大了。她长得很漂亮，黑发，皮肤白皙，有着猫眼绿的眼睛；无论走到哪里，人们都会注意到艾米。春天的时候，我们轮流送报，但我看得出她并不喜欢。有几次，她在凌晨5点叫醒我，谎称生病，让我替她去。我注意到艾米往往在周三和周日感到不舒服，因为那天报纸很厚，有额外的广告和特刊。

We had always gotten along well, perhaps because our personalities were so different. Amy was easygoing and extroverted, and I was not; she thrived at school, which I hated. Almost everything that my sister disliked about the paper route was something that appealed to me. I liked waking up early, and I liked the repetition. I liked the fresh smell of the newspapers that were dropped off in a stack every morning at the end of our driveway. I liked the official paperwork: the stop notices, the new-subscriber slips. The Missourian’s密苏里人报的 circulation department sent these forms in white envelopes that read:我们一直相处得很好，也许是因为我们的性格截然不同。艾米随和且外向，而我不是；她在学校如鱼得水，而我却很讨厌学校。姐姐对送报路线不喜欢的几乎所有地方，都恰恰是我所向往的。我喜欢早起，也喜欢这种重复感。我喜欢每天早上堆在车道尽头的报纸散发出的那种新鲜气味。我喜欢那些正式的文书工作：停刊通知、新订户单。密苏里人报的发行部用白色的信封寄送这些表格，上面写着：

GOOD SERVICE IS GOOD BUSINESS
PROPER & PUNCTUAL DELIVERY
BUILD BIG PROFITS FOR YOU
优质服务即是优质生意；妥善且准时的投递，为您创造巨大收益

Mostly, I liked the silence and solitude. Back then, in a small Midwestern city, almost nobody exercised before dawn, and dog-walkers were rare. The one I saw most frequently was on the address list that I had memorized: Glenn Wood, 110 South Garth Avenue. The first time I did the route alone, he was out in front of his house with his dog. He introduced himself, and he told me that the dog was named Sadie. Then he gave me a quarter.大多数时候，我喜欢那种安静与孤独。那时候，在一个中西部的小城市里，黎明前几乎没人锻炼，遛狗的人也很少见。我最常遇见的那个人就在我背下的地址单上：格伦·伍德（Glenn Wood），南加斯大道110号。第一次我独自送报时，他正带着他的狗在屋前。他作了自我介绍，告诉我那只狗叫萨迪（Sadie）。然后，他给了我一角五分钱（quarter）。

I came home excited. The route paid a little more than a dollar a day, so a quarter tip was significant. A couple of days later, Mr. Wood gave me another quarter. When I mentioned his name to my parents, they recognized him as the city clerk who signed municipal notices that appeared in the paper. He was in his early sixties, and part of his face was covered with a large purple birthmark. My mother referred to such discolorations, in respectful terms, as “raspberries”—a quiet woman at our church had a similar blemish. Like all physical deformities, raspberries were a sign of inner goodness, or at least that was an idea I had picked up from the Bible and from things the priest said in sermons.我兴奋地回了家。这条路线每天的报酬略多于一美元，所以一角五分钱的小费非常可观。几天后，伍德先生又给了我一角五分钱。当我向父母提起他的名字时，他们认出他是市政职员，报纸上出现的市政公告就是由他签署的。他六十出头，半边脸上覆盖着一块巨大的紫色胎记。我母亲用尊重的口吻称这种变色为“覆盆子”——我们教堂里一位文静的女士也有类似的瑕疵。像所有身体畸形一样，“覆盆子”被视为内在善良的标志，至少这是我从《圣经》和牧师讲道中学到的观点。

Mr. Wood also greeted Amy on her paper mornings, but he rarely tipped her. It was unusual for an adult to show more interest in me; even at nine, I recognized that Amy possessed some magnetism that I lacked. After a while, I stopped mentioning the quarters, because I worried that Amy might demand half the money. In truth, she wasn’t likely to do such a thing, but that would have been my own response, so it seemed prudent to protect against it.伍德先生在艾米送报的早晨也会和她打招呼，但他很少给她小费。成年人对我表现出更多的兴趣是很不寻常的；即使在九岁时，我也意识到艾米拥有某种我所缺乏的吸引力。过了一段时间，我不再提起那些一角五分钱的事，因为我担心艾米可能会要求平分这笔钱。事实上，她不太可能这样做，但这会是我自己的反应，所以防患于未然似乎是明智的。

In July, Amy and I spent all our paper-route earnings to attend the camp, which was in Minnesota. A number of older boys developed crushes on Amy there, and I was rushed to the emergency room to receive stitches after slicing my left wrist open with a scalpel during a crafts unit. I had never seen so much blood; I could tell that the two young counsellors who drove me to the hospital were terrified. Not long after we returned home, Amy quit the paper route. By now, I was ten, and smart enough to recognize that only a sucker would work all year to send himself away in the summer. I never went back to camp, and eventually I decided on two goals of my own. I wanted to become Carrier of the Year, and I wanted to save enough money to buy a car when I turned sixteen.七月份，艾米和我花光了所有送报赚来的钱去参加夏令营，地点在明尼苏达州。在那里，一些大男孩对艾米产生了爱慕之情，而我在手工课上用手术刀割伤了左手腕，被紧急送往急诊室缝针。我从未见过那么多的血；我能看出那两个开车送我去医院的年轻辅导员被吓坏了。我们回家后不久，艾米就辞掉了送报的工作。当时我已经十岁了，足够聪明地意识到，只有傻瓜才会整年工作，只为了在夏天把自己送走。我再也没有去过夏令营，最终我定下了两个自己的目标。我想成为“年度最佳报童”，并且我想攒够钱，在十六岁时买一辆车。

On many mornings, I saw Mr. Wood. He often asked about school and sports, and he told me that he had been a baseball coach and a Boy Scout leader. He was active in the local Methodist church. At some point, he started putting the quarters into my pocket himself. He would press close, and put his arm around me, and then I would feel his hand inside my pocket. I sensed that this wasn’t right, but it happened so subtly that I couldn’t even say how it began. After a while, it became almost normal. Like the quarters, this was something I didn’t mention when I got home.很多个早晨，我都会见到伍德先生。他经常问起学校和体育运动，还告诉我他曾经是一名棒球教练和童子军领袖。他积极参与当地的卫理公会教堂活动。后来，他开始亲自把一角五分钱塞进我的口袋里。他会靠得很近，搂住我，然后我就会感觉到他的手伸进了我的口袋。我感觉到这不对劲，但事情发生得如此微妙，以至于我甚至说不清它是怎么开始的。过了一段时间，这变得几乎正常了。就像那些一角五分钱一样，这也是我回家后不会提起的事情。

Columbia had around sixty thousand residents, and it was home to two competing papers, with the Daily Tribune每日论坛报 delivered in the afternoon. Both papers announced Carrier of the Year in October, to commemorate International Newspaper Carrier Day. This occasion was often marked by an official proclamation from the city’s mayor:哥伦比亚市约有六万名居民，拥有两家竞争激烈的报纸，下午投递的是《每日论坛报》（Daily Tribune）。两家报纸都在十月宣布“年度最佳报童”，以纪念国际报童日。这一场合通常会伴随着市长发表的官方公告：

WHEREAS, many of the citizens of Columbia rely on newspaper carriers to bring them their only information concerning local and world events; and鉴于哥伦比亚的许多市民依赖报童为他们带来获取当地和世界大事的唯一信息；且
WHEREAS, many prominent citizens of the United States and Columbia started in the business world as a news carrier . . .鉴于美国和哥伦比亚的许多杰出公民最初都是从报童做起……
鉴于哥伦比亚的许多市民依赖报童为他们带来获取当地和世界大事的唯一信息；且鉴于美国和哥伦比亚的许多杰出公民最初都是从报童做起……

During my third year, my friend Eric Neuner won Carrier of the Year. The Missourian published a picture of Eric receiving his award from James Kirkpatrick, the Missouri secretary of state. Eric was a year older than me, a good athlete and a voracious reader. He was the only other carrier I knew who read almost everything in the newspapers he delivered. That had become part of my morning routine: halfway through folding papers, I took a break to read the sports section, and then, after I got home, I tried to finish the newspaper at breakfast. I skimmed most political and international news, but I read everything about local accidents, arrests, and scandals. I loved the syndicated “Dear Abby” column, especially the headlines:在我送报的第三年，我的朋友埃里克·诺伊纳（Eric Neuner）赢得了“年度最佳报童”。《密苏里人报》刊登了一张埃里克从密苏里州州务卿詹姆斯·柯克帕特里克（James Kirkpatrick）手中接过奖项的照片。埃里克比我大一岁，是个优秀的运动员，也是个如饥似渴的读者。他是我认识的唯一一个几乎会读完自己投递的报纸上所有内容的报童。这已经成了我早晨例行公事的一部分：折报纸折到一半时，我会休息一下读读体育版，回家后，我会试着在早餐时读完报纸。我浏览了大部分政治和国际新闻，但我读遍了所有关于当地事故、逮捕和丑闻的报道。我特别喜欢联合专栏“亲爱的艾比”（Dear Abby），尤其是那些标题：

WIFE IN HAND, BETTER THAN NIECE IN BUSH手中有妻，胜过丛中有侄女
OVERWEIGHT SON CHEATS ON DIET BY NIBBLING FROM NEIGHBOR’S DOG DISH超重儿子偷吃邻居狗食来减肥
LUSTY LIFEGUARD GETS INTO SEXUAL HOT WATER风流救生员陷入性丑闻热点
手中有妻，胜过丛中有侄女；超重儿子偷吃邻居狗食来减肥；风流救生员陷入性丑闻热点

The first step toward becoming Carrier of the Year was to win Carrier of the Month. Candidates were disqualified if they received more than four customer complaints, and they had to participate in subscription drives. In the afternoons, I went door to door, trying to persuade people to take the Missourian. I learned that, despite my shyness, I was good at selling. I liked the nervousness I felt after pushing a strange doorbell, knowing that I would have to perform my sales pitch.成为“年度最佳报童”的第一步是赢得“月度最佳报童”。如果候选人收到超过四次客户投诉，就会被取消资格，而且他们必须参加订阅推广活动。下午，我挨家挨户敲门，试图说服人们订阅《密苏里人报》。我发现，尽管我很害羞，但我很擅长销售。我喜欢按下陌生门铃后感到的那种紧张感，因为我知道接下来必须完成我的销售推销。

Video From The New Yorker来自《纽约客》的视频

Charles Melton Loves Anime (and Is Tired of Beefing with People) | The New Yorker Mini Interview查尔斯·梅尔顿热爱动漫（且厌倦了与人争执）| 《纽约客》迷你采访

It took me a little more than a year to win Carrier of the Month. The announcement appeared on March 8, 1980, on page 3, along with the international headlines:我花了一年多一点的时间才赢得了“月度最佳报童”。公告出现在1980年3月8日的第3版，旁边是国际头条新闻：

NEW VIOLENCE SWEEPS EL SALVADOR; 29 DEAD萨尔瓦多暴力升级，29人死亡
SOVIETS GEARED FOR OFFENSIVE IN AFGHANISTAN苏联准备在阿富汗发动攻势
COLUMBIA MISSOURIAN CONGRATULATES CARRIER OF THE MONTH PETER HESSLER《哥伦比亚密苏里人报》祝贺月度最佳报童彼得·海斯勒
萨尔瓦多暴力升级，29人死亡；苏联准备在阿富汗发动攻势；《哥伦比亚密苏里人报》祝贺月度最佳报童彼得·海斯勒

The article included a photograph, along with my grade and home address. In those days, publishing such details wasn’t considered risky for a child; the paper did the same thing for its Safe Bike Rider of the Week feature. The article about my award noted that I stood just four feet three inches tall, and it quoted a subscriber. “He’s so tiny that some mornings his papers drag,” she said. “He’s a swell little fellow.” I received a free haircut from Fantastic Sam’s, a banana split from Baskin-Robbins, and five dollars.文章里附了一张照片，还有我的年级和家庭住址。在那个年代，公开这些细节并不被认为对孩子有风险；报纸在“每周安全骑手”栏目中也会这样做。关于我获奖的文章提到我身高只有四英尺三英寸（约1.3米），并引用了一位订户的话。“他太小了，有时候报纸都会拖在地上，”她说。“他是个很棒的小家伙。”我得到了一次来自Fantastic Sam’s的免费理发，一份来自芭斯罗缤（Baskin-Robbins）的香蕉船，还有五美元。

Size was my worst handicap as a carrier. I was so small that I had been held back in school, but even with a year’s advantage I remained among the shortest in my grade. I was naturally coördinated, and I believed that I was one of the fastest folders in the history of paperboys. Each step of the process—grab the paper, fold it twice, wrap the rubber band抓起报纸，折叠两次，套上橡皮筋—was so quick and fluid that I imagined my hands as a Road Runner blur. Carriers often became obsessed with speed and efficiency. Eric, who was much bigger than me, rigged a bike with saddlebags to balance his load. My friend Brian Fick bought a Casio digital watch and timed how long it took him to bicycle his route every morning. Brian decided to skip the rubber bands, using instead the plastic bags that the Missourian gave us for rainy days, because he believed that they slid more quickly out of the canvas sack.体型是我作为报童最大的劣势。我太小了，以至于在学校留过级，但即使有一年的优势，我依然是年级里最矮的几个之一。我天生协调性好，而且我相信我是报童史上折报纸最快的人之一。整个过程的每一步——抓起报纸、折叠两次、套上橡皮筋——都如此迅速而流畅，以至于我把自己想象成“走鹃”（Road Runner）般的残影。报童们经常沉迷于速度和效率。比我高大得多的埃里克改装了一辆带有鞍袋的自行车来平衡负荷。我的朋友布莱恩·菲克（Brian Fick）买了一块卡西欧数字手表，记录他每天骑车完成路线的时间。布莱恩决定省掉橡皮筋，改用《密苏里人报》在雨天发给我们的塑料袋，因为他认为这样从帆布袋里拿出来会更快。

My route was hilly, and I carried more than forty papers. Nowadays, it’s easy to forget how large newspapers used to be. A page from the Missourian was two inches wider and nearly three inches longer than a page from today’s New York Times时报, and the typical Sunday Missourian, with sixty or more pages, weighed about a pound. I couldn’t handle such weight on a bike, so I walked, cutting through yards and finding gaps in fences and hedges. If I passed through the neighborhood later in the day as a civilian, I recognized thin ribbons of worn yellow grass crossing the green lawns. I was the only person who knew what those ribbons represented—the secret ways I walked every morning.我的路线多山坡，我送的报纸超过四十份。如今，人们很容易忘记以前的报纸有多大。一张《密苏里人报》的页面比今天的《纽约时报》宽两英寸，长近三英寸，而典型的周日版《密苏里人报》有六十多页，重约一磅。我无法在自行车上处理这种重量，所以我选择步行，穿过庭院，寻找围栏和树篱间的缝隙。如果我后来以平民身份经过那个社区，我会认出草坪上那些磨损的黄色草带。我是唯一知道这些带子代表什么的人——那是我每天早上行走的秘密路径。

Most of the year, apart from summer, I delivered in darkness. Lights went on in certain houses at certain times, and I could tell if I was running late by the patterns of illuminated windows. In one Carrier of the Month feature, the Missourian quoted the winner (Mike Wagner, twelve years old, 2 Lucerne Court). “I get to see things other people don’t see,” Wagner said, without elaborating. I felt the same way, although I also had a horror-fascination with the idea that someday I would come across a dead body. In addition to winning Carrier of the Year, Eric Neuner achieved renown when he stumbled upon a trail of blood early one morning on Edgewood Avenue, after somebody had injured himself trying to break into a car. The paper occasionally ran stories about crimes or fires that had been reported by Missourian carriers. (January 12, 1982: “YOUTH TIPS OFF POLICE TO THEFT AT WIDOW’S HOME.”少年向警方举报寡妇家失窃。”)一年中除了夏天，我大部分时间都是在黑暗中送报。特定的房子在特定的时间亮起灯，我可以通过窗户的亮灯模式判断自己是否迟到了。在一次“月度最佳报童”的专题报道中，《密苏里人报》引用了获奖者（迈克·瓦格纳，十二岁，卢塞恩法院2号）的话。“我能看到别人看不到的东西，”瓦格纳说，没有多做解释。我也有同感，尽管我也有一种恐怖的着迷，担心有一天会撞见一具尸体。除了赢得“年度最佳报童”，埃里克·诺伊纳在一天清晨偶然发现埃奇伍德大道上有一条血迹时也名声大噪，当时有人在试图闯入汽车时受了伤。报纸偶尔会刊登由报童举报的犯罪或火灾故事。（1982年1月12日：“少年向警方举报寡妇家失窃。”）

One morning, I was taking a shortcut beside a house on South Garth Avenue when I happened to see a high-school student getting dressed inside. The boy was a year older than Amy, who I knew found him cute. He stood in his underwear in front of a low window. We were about ten feet apart, separated by the pane of glass, and I froze. Then, very carefully, I tried to walk away. But he must have heard something, and his head snapped up. For an instant, it felt as though our eyes met. I hoped that it was only my imagination—I knew it was hard to see outside from a lit room.一天早上，我抄近路经过南加斯大道的一所房子时，碰巧看到一个高中生在里面穿衣服。那个男孩比艾米大一岁，我知道艾米觉得他很帅。他只穿着内衣站在一扇低矮的窗户前。我们相距约十英尺，中间隔着一块玻璃，我僵住了。然后，我非常小心地试图走开。但他一定听到了什么，猛地抬起头。那一瞬间，感觉我们的目光交汇了。我希望那只是我的错觉——我知道从明亮的房间里很难看清外面。

The following morning, the window had been covered with a makeshift curtain. For days, I feared that the boy’s parents would complain to the paper or to my parents. The headlines had made it clear that people could get arrested for such things. (November 23, 1980: “PEEPING TOM: AN OVERLOOKED PROBLEM THAT SHOULD BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY.”偷窥狂：一个不容忽视的严重问题。”) I prepared explanations—it wasn’t intentional, this is where I walk every morning我不是故意的，我每天早上都走这条路—but I knew that nobody would believe me.第二天早上，窗户上已经挂上了一个临时的窗帘。好几天，我都很担心那个男孩的父母会向报社或我的父母投诉。头条新闻已经很清楚地表明，人们会因为这种事情被捕。（1980年11月23日：“偷窥狂：一个不容忽视的严重问题。”）我准备好了各种解释——我不是故意的，我每天早上都走这条路——但我知道没人会相信我。

In boyhood, guilt was a constant companion. It tagged along wherever I went; there was always something I had done, some hidden mistake or private atrocity, that was on the verge of being discovered. I often got in trouble at school, usually for making other kids laugh in class, and I dreaded the angry notes that teachers included in my report cards. A couple of times, I shoplifted baseball cards from the local drugstore. I slipped a pack or two into my shorts, and then I paid for one at the counter, being sure to smile and make eye contact. It was easy, but afterward I felt bad, and I stopped before it became a habit.在少年时代，内疚感是一个如影随形的伙伴。无论我去哪儿，它都跟着；总有一些我做过的事、一些隐藏的错误或私下的暴行，即将被发现。我在学校经常惹麻烦，通常是因为在课堂上逗其他孩子发笑，我很害怕老师写在成绩单上的愤怒评语。有几次，我从当地的药店偷了棒球卡。我把一两包塞进短裤里，然后在柜台付了一包的钱，确保微笑并与人目光接触。这很容易，但事后我感觉很糟，在它变成习惯之前我就停止了。

I attended a small Catholic school, and periodically all the students were escorted into the church in order to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation. The screened confessional booths were situated in the back, but it was also possible to meet a priest face to face. Anybody who chose this option had to walk past the altar to the front of the church, where the priest waited in a small room. Perhaps because of this visibility, it became a point of pride for tough-minded boys to scorn the screens. In our opinion, only girls and weaklings slunk to the back; it felt good to stride before the congregation with your head high.我就读于一所天主教小学，学生们会定期被带到教堂接受“和解圣事”（忏悔）。带屏风的忏悔室设在后面，但也可能与牧师面对面交流。任何选择这种方式的人都必须走过祭坛来到教堂前部，牧师在一个小房间里等待。也许是因为这种可见性，强硬的男孩们以蔑视屏风为荣。在我们看来，只有女孩和软弱的人才会溜到后面；昂首挺胸走在会众面前感觉很好。

But once I was sitting across from the priest my courage evaporated. I mumbled through some ten-cent sins—I disobeyed my parents, I was mean to my sister我不听父母的话，我对姐姐很刻薄—and got out as quickly as possible. On my way back to the pew, the guilt was still there, loping doggedly at my side.但一旦坐在牧师对面，我的勇气就烟消云散了。我含糊地嘟囔了一些微不足道的罪过——我不听父母的话，我对姐姐很刻薄——然后尽快逃了出来。在回长椅的路上，内疚感依然存在，顽固地跟在我身边。

A couple of times, I thought about mentioning Mr. Wood to the priest. Something in my mind shut off when he touched me: my body would freeze, and I would think about nothing until it was over and the quarter was safely inside my pocket. Mr. Wood smoked cigars, and the heavy scent was often on his clothes when he came close. Occasionally, he pretended to miss the pocket, and his hand slipped inside my pants. “Whoops!” he would say. “Sorry about that.” At those moments, I felt the touch of his fingers, and I flinched and pulled away.有几次，我想过向牧师提起伍德先生。当他触碰我时，我脑子里有什么东西关闭了：我的身体会僵住，什么都不想，直到一切结束，一角五分钱安全地放进我的口袋。伍德先生抽雪茄，当他靠近时，他的衣服上经常有浓重的气味。偶尔，他假装没放准口袋，手滑进了我的裤子里。“哎呀！”他会说。“抱歉。”在那一刻，我感觉到他手指的触碰，我畏缩并避开了。

He seemed to sense when I became too uncomfortable. A week or more might pass before he put his arm around me again, and during the interlude he remained friendly. He was the only person on the route who talked to me regularly. His children were much older than me, and I told myself that this was the source of his affection—he was a father, after all. His wife rarely joined him on his walks; the few times I met her, she didn’t say much. After a while, Mr. Wood asked if I wanted to earn some extra money on Saturdays. His fraternal lodge, the Odd Fellows, organized a group of boys who sold soft drinks at University of Missouri football games.他似乎能感觉到我什么时候变得太不舒服。可能过了一周或更久，他才会再次搂住我，在那期间他依然很友好。他是这条送报路线上唯一经常和我交谈的人。他的孩子比我大得多，我告诉自己这就是他对我表现出亲昵的原因——毕竟他是一位父亲。他的妻子很少陪他散步；我仅有的几次见到她，她也没说什么。过了一段时间，伍德先生问我周六想不想赚点外快。他的兄弟会组织“奇人会”（Odd Fellows）组织了一群男孩在密苏里大学的橄榄球比赛中卖软饮料。

I decided not to say anything to the priest. I knew from the past that most of my worries turned out to be baseless. After I saw the high-school boy getting dressed, there wasn’t any fallout. Maybe he hadn’t recognized me, or maybe he just hadn’t thought much about it. In my experience, invisibility was part of childhood. It was like the illuminated windows on a darkened street—I saw more of other people than they could see of me.我决定不向牧师说任何事。我从过去的经验知道，我的大多数担忧最终都是毫无根据的。在我看到那个高中生穿衣服后，没有任何后果。也许他没认出我，或者也许他根本没往心里去。在我的经验中，隐身感是童年的一部分。就像黑暗街道上亮着的窗户——我看到别人，多过他们能看到我。

My home was less than a mile from the campus of the University of Missouri. My father taught in the sociology department, and many professors, some of them well known, lived in our neighborhood. I delivered the paper to 408 Thilly Avenue, which belonged to an English professor and a fiction writer who had co-founded the Missouri Review密苏里评论. A famous biologist had built the house at 504 Westmount Avenue. My father told me that 106 West Lathrop Road, an old, slightly run-down two-story at the edge of the woods, had once been occupied by a strange, great man named Thorstein Veblen. According to my father, Veblen had lived in the basement, which he entered and exited through a window.我家离密苏里大学校园不到一英里。我父亲在社会学系教书，许多教授，其中一些很有名，都住在我们社区。我给西利大道（Thilly Avenue）408号送报，那属于一位英语教授和小说家，他曾共同创办了《密苏里评论》（Missouri Review）。一位著名的生物学家建造了西蒙特大道（Westmount Avenue）504号的房子。我父亲告诉我，拉思罗普路（West Lathrop Road）106号是一栋位于树林边缘、有些破旧的老式两层楼房，曾经住着一位怪异而伟大的人，名叫索尔斯坦·凡勃伦（Thorstein Veblen）。据我父亲说，凡勃伦住在地下室，他通过窗户进出。

Whenever I passed the house, I imagined somebody clambering through the window wells. Veblen’s name was hard to remember, but I connected the house and its basement to the phrase “conspicuous consumption.” Long before I understood the term, I was taken with its poetry. That was true of many of my father’s work words: “methodology,” “longitudinal,” “social deviance.”每当我经过那栋房子，我就会想象有人爬过窗井。凡勃伦的名字很难记住，但我把那栋房子及其地下室与“炫耀性消费”（conspicuous consumption）这个词联系了起来。远在我理解这个词之前，我就被它的诗意所吸引。我父亲工作中提到的许多词汇都是如此：“方法论”、“纵向”、“社会偏差”。

He used these terms casually, and he loved telling stories. If he heard something vivid or shocking, he couldn’t stop himself from repeating it, not even to a child. Because of my father, I knew that one house on my route, 703 Westmount Avenue, had been home to an alcoholic who killed himself in the attic. A few doors down, another man blew out his brains with a gun. Various other homes stood as narrative monuments to failed marriages and post-tenure crackups. To this day, if I think of a certain red brick house, I can hear my father describing how the professor who lived there suddenly started failing all his students for no reason. From an early age, I recognized that the university was a place where adults might behave erratically.他随口使用这些术语，并且喜欢讲故事。如果他听到什么生动或令人震惊的事情，他忍不住要复述出来，即使是对着孩子。多亏了我父亲，我知道我送报路线上的西蒙特大道703号曾住着一个在阁楼自杀的酒鬼。隔几户人家，另一个男人用枪轰掉了自己的脑袋。其他各种住宅则是婚姻失败和终身教职后崩溃的叙事纪念碑。直到今天，如果我想到某栋红砖房，我还能听到我父亲描述住在那里的一位教授如何突然无缘无故地给所有学生不及格。从很小的时候起，我就意识到大学是一个成年人可能会行为古怪的地方。

Thorstein Veblen was the kind of character who appealed to my father. Veblen, an economist and a sociologist, became famous after publishing “The Theory of the Leisure Class,” in 1899. His social commentary reflected disgust with the unfettered capitalism of the Gilded Age, and his cynical aphorisms became widely quoted. (“Always and everywhere invention is the mother of necessity.”) Veblen taught at the University of Chicago, but he was let go on account of relentless philandering. The same thing got him dismissed from his next position, at Stanford. In 1911, with diminishing options, he arrived at M.U., where a former student headed the economics department. The former student found Veblen a job, and he let him live in the basement of his home on Lathrop.索尔斯坦·凡勃伦是我父亲喜欢的那种角色。凡勃伦是一位经济学家和社会学家，在1899年出版《有闲阶级论》后成名。他的社会评论反映了对镀金时代不受约束的资本主义的厌恶，他愤世嫉俗的警句被广泛引用。（“发明永远是必要之母。”）凡勃伦在芝加哥大学任教，但因不断地拈花惹草而被解雇。同样的原因使他被下一份工作——斯坦福大学——解雇。1911年，在选择日益减少的情况下，他来到了密苏里大学，那里的一位前学生担任经济系主任。这位前学生为凡勃伦找了一份工作，并让他住在拉思罗普路自己家的地下室里。

An elderly colleague of my father remembered seeing Veblen on campus. He had been a thin, gloomy figure, and it was a mystery why women were attracted to him. A story the colleague told, which my father loved repeating, was that university officials warned Veblen that they were aware of his reputation for having seduced the wives of administrators at Stanford. They told him that such behavior would not be tolerated at M.U. “Oh, I’ve seen your administrators’ wives,” Veblen responded. “You have nothing to worry about.”我父亲的一位年长同事记得在校园里见过凡勃伦。他是一个瘦削、忧郁的人物，为什么女性会被他吸引一直是个谜。那位同事讲过一个我父亲喜欢反复讲述的故事，说大学官员警告凡勃伦，他们知道他有引诱斯坦福大学行政人员妻子的名声。他们告诉他，这种行为在密苏里大学是不被容忍的。“哦，我见过你们行政人员的妻子们了，”凡勃伦回应道。“你们没什么可担心的。”

The story may have been apocryphal, but it rings true to descriptions in “Thorstein Veblen and His America,” a 1934 biography. The book gives a lively account of the six years that Veblen spent in Columbia, which he loathed. When the Chamber of Commerce offered a prize for a new city slogan, Veblen proposed that the town be described as a woodpecker hole in “a rotten stump called Missouri.” Veblen typically gave every student in his class the same grade, an M, or Medium, the equivalent of a C. If a student needed a higher mark for some scholarship or application, Veblen simply changed it. Once, administrators confronted him about the carelessness of his grading. “My grades are like lightning,” Veblen replied. “They are liable to strike anywhere.” The biography notes the same detail that captured my imagination as a child: Veblen went in and out of his basement apartment through a window.这个故事可能是杜撰的，但它与1934年的传记《索尔斯坦·凡勃伦与他的美国》中的描述相符。这本书生动地记录了凡勃伦在哥伦比亚度过的六年，他非常讨厌那里。当商会为城市新口号悬赏时，凡勃伦建议将该镇描述为“一个叫密苏里的烂树桩”上的啄木鸟洞。凡勃伦通常给班上每个学生相同的成绩，即M（Medium，中等），相当于C。如果学生因奖学金或申请需要更高的分数，凡勃伦就直接修改。有一次，行政人员质问他评分的草率。“我的成绩就像闪电，”凡勃伦回答。“它们可能会击中任何地方。”传记中提到了那个在我童年时就激发了我想象力的细节：凡勃伦通过窗户进出他的地下室公寓。

As a graduate student, my father was mentored by a Chinese American sociologist named Peter Kong-ming New, who gave him some advice: Never accept an appointment as chair of your department. If anybody insists that you undertake some administrative task, do it so poorly that he never asks again.作为研究生，我父亲曾师从一位名叫彼得·孔明·纽（Peter Kong-ming New）的华裔社会学家，他给了他一些建议：永远不要接受系主任的任命。如果有人坚持让你承担某种行政任务，就把它做得非常糟糕，以至于他再也不会要求你做。

My father followed this advice like the Gospel. He was a devoted teacher, and he liked research, but he refused to have anything to do with administration. In the various M.U. stories that he told, many of them funny and cynical, one of the ugliest words was “dean.” Other nasty names included “provost” and “chancellor.” In this respect, he followed a long tradition of social scientists who apply caustic commentary to their host institutions. At M.U., Thorstein Veblen had written a vicious screed about university administrations called “The Higher Learning in America.” He told a colleague that the subtitle would be “A Study in Total Depravity.” Unsurprisingly, M.U. declined to publish it.我父亲像信奉福音一样遵循这一建议。他是一位敬业的老师，也喜欢研究，但他拒绝参与任何行政工作。在他讲述的各种密苏里大学的故事中，许多既滑稽又愤世嫉俗，其中最丑陋的词之一就是“院长”（dean）。其他讨厌的称呼还包括“教务长”（provost）和“校长”（chancellor）。在这方面，他遵循了社会科学家对东道主机构进行尖锐评论的悠久传统。在密苏里大学，索尔斯坦·凡勃伦曾写过一篇关于大学行政管理的恶毒文章，题为《美国的高等教育》。他告诉一位同事，副标题将是“一项关于彻底堕落的研究”。不出所料，密苏里大学拒绝出版它。

By avoiding administrative duties, my father also guaranteed himself a low salary. He rarely received much of a raise, and anybody who read the Missourian knew that the university was struggling. (August 2, 1981, front page: “M.U. PAY PLUMMETS TO BIG EIGHT CELLAR密苏里大学薪资跌至‘八大盟校’底层.”) But this created little distress in our household. My religious mother liked to quote Matthew: “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”通过避免行政职责，我父亲也保证了自己的低薪。他很少获得加薪，任何读过《密苏里人报》的人都知道大学正处于困境。（1981年8月2日，头版：“密苏里大学薪资跌至‘八大盟校’底层。”）但这在我们的家庭中并没有造成什么困扰。虔诚的母亲喜欢引用《马太福音》：“骆驼穿过针的眼，比财主进神的国还容易呢。”

I often heard that verse at Mass, but I wasn’t very old before I recognized that virtually nobody other than my parents took it seriously. My mother was critical of people who seemed grasping or financially ambitious, and she celebrated volunteerism. One of my parents’ highest aspirations for a child was to someday join the Peace Corps. They volunteered at the local mental hospital, and my father often took me to help out at a soup kitchen. When my school struggled to find a P.E. instructor, my parents agreed to teach it twice a week for no pay.我经常在弥撒中听到那句经文，但在我年纪还很小时，我就意识到除了我父母，几乎没有人把它当回事。我母亲对那些看起来贪婪或有经济野心的人持批评态度，她推崇志愿服务。我父母对孩子最高的期望之一就是将来能加入和平队（Peace Corps）。他们在当地精神病院做志愿者，我父亲经常带我去施粥处帮忙。当我的学校难以找到体育老师时，我父母同意每周免费教两次课。

My father’s many stories never touched on personal finance. The topic bored him, and in any case there was nothing to talk about: he saved nothing and made no investments. My parents packed me and my three sisters into a beige AMC Hornet, a flagship of nineteen-seventies American automotive decline. After my youngest sister entered school, my mother returned to work in a manner that seemed calculated to generate the least possible income. She enrolled as a graduate student, spent years researching a thesis about nineteenth-century Jewish immigration to Missouri, and finally taught history as an adjunct at a small college.我父亲的许多故事从不涉及个人理财。这个话题让他感到无聊，反正也没什么可谈的：他不存钱，也不做任何投资。父母把我三个姐妹塞进一辆米色的AMC大黄蜂（AMC Hornet）里，那是七十年代美国汽车衰落的旗舰产品。我最小的妹妹入学后，母亲重返工作岗位，其方式似乎是为了产生尽可能少的收入。她注册成为研究生，花了几年时间研究关于十九世纪犹太移民到密苏里的论文，最后在一所小型学院担任历史兼职讲师。

In contrast, I was obsessed with money. The newspapers that I delivered were full of dollar signs: during the era of Carter and Reagan, the prime interest rate sometimes exceeded twenty per cent, and unemployment was as high as ten per cent. The Missourian ran a column called “Inflation Fighters,” which offered tips for home economy: cornmeal can be used as a facial cleanser; stale beer is good for setting hair; it’s better to fill a gas tank only halfway, because a lighter car gets better mileage. As the economy staggered along, “Inflation Fighters” became increasingly desperate: “Why waste money on tape when you can make your own? Muslin can be melted with one part oil, six parts wax and ten points resin to produce adhesive tape.”相比之下，我却对钱着迷。我投递的报纸里充满了美元符号：在卡特和里根时代，最优贷款利率有时超过百分之二十，失业率高达百分之十。《密苏里人报》开辟了一个名为“通胀斗士”（Inflation Fighters）的专栏，提供家庭经济小贴士：玉米粉可以用作洗面奶；陈啤酒适合定型头发；最好只加半箱油，因为车轻更省油。随着经济步履蹒跚，“通胀斗士”变得越来越绝望：“为什么要浪费钱买胶带，当你能自己制作时？平纹细布可以用一份油、六份蜡和十份树脂熔化来制作粘性胶带。”

Other carriers also fixated on money. The Missourian was delivered by more than sixty children, most of them boys, and periodically the paper sponsored an event for us at its office or at a local pizzeria. These get-togethers were often covered by the newspaper, and in photographs I am invariably in the front row, looking small and eager. One year, carriers were invited to a free movie at the Biscayne Theatre. Whoever organized this screening was smart enough to keep the aftermath out of the paper. The film was “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” which, for a group of children who set out alone every morning before dawn, was unbelievably terrifying. I attended with Eric Neuner and his younger brother Paul, who couldn’t have been older than seven or eight. Paul dashed out of the theatre to vomit; recently, when I spoke with the brothers, they could recall specific scenes and actors with startling clarity. Eric told me that he had recurring nightmares about the movie well into adulthood.其他报童也专注于钱。超过六十个孩子投递《密苏里人报》，大多数是男孩，报社定期在办公室或当地披萨店为我们举办活动。这些聚会经常被报纸报道，照片里我总是站在前排，看起来既渺小又热切。有一年，报童们被邀请到比斯坎剧院（Biscayne Theatre）观看免费电影。组织这次放映的人很聪明，没把后续报道写进报纸。那部电影是《人体入侵者》（Invasion of the Body Snatchers），对于一群每天黎明前独自出发的孩子来说，这简直太恐怖了。我和埃里克·诺伊纳以及他比我小七八岁的弟弟保罗一起参加。保罗冲出剧院呕吐；最近，当我与这对兄弟交谈时，他们仍能以惊人的清晰度回忆起具体的场景和演员。埃里克告诉我，直到成年，他还会做关于这部电影的噩梦。

The Neuners were among the most entrepreneurial of the carriers. They bought a lawnmower and subcontracted other kids to cut grass around the neighborhood. Paul was the first paperboy I knew who bought stocks. He invested with a child’s eye, purchasing shares in Coca-Cola and the Wrigley Company. After Paul acquired Coke stock, he forbade his family to consume Pepsi products. Each year, like all Wrigley investors, Paul was mailed an annual report and some sticks of gum.诺伊纳兄弟是报童中最有创业精神的。他们买了一台割草机，分包给其他孩子去修剪社区周围的草坪。保罗是我认识的第一个买股票的报童。他以孩子的眼光进行投资，购买了可口可乐和箭牌公司的股票。保罗获得可口可乐股票后，禁止家人消费百事可乐产品。每年，像所有箭牌投资者一样，保罗都会收到一份年度报告和几条口香糖。

I nagged at my father to help me invest, but he had never bought a stock in his life. Another paperboy, Sam Abadir, took a bus downtown and found a stockbroker’s office. Sam decided that the trading fees were too high unless you invested at scale, which was also my conclusion. I opened a certificate of deposit at the local bank instead. The year that I turned twelve, my mother wrote a note in her journal describing me as “Amy’s banker and confidant.” Amy knew that if she ran low on cash, her little brother would front her a loan. A few times, my parents asked for the same thing. It made me feel proud; there was often an old-soul quality to us paperboys. I still have a letter that Eric mailed me the summer I went to camp, reassuring me that my folks were staying out of trouble. He wrote, “Your parents are doing a great job on your paper route. I see them every morning.”我缠着父亲帮我投资，但他这辈子从没买过股票。另一个报童萨姆·阿巴迪尔（Sam Abadir）坐公交车去市中心找了一家股票经纪公司。萨姆认为除非大规模投资，否则交易费太高，这也是我的结论。我转而在当地银行开了一个定期存款账户。我十二岁那年，母亲在日记中写道，称我为“艾米的银行家和知己”。艾米知道如果她缺钱，她的小弟弟会借给她。有几次，我父母也提出了同样的要求。这让我感到自豪；我们报童身上经常有一种老灵魂的特质。我至今还保留着埃里克在我去夏令营那年寄给我的信，安慰我说我父母没惹麻烦。他写道：“你父母在帮你送报方面做得很好。我每天早上都能见到他们。”

I knew that customer relations were my best chance to win Carrier of the Year. Each December, I made holiday cards by hand and delivered them with the newspaper; usually, this generated the equivalent of two months’ pay in tips. Once, I tried the same thing at Easter, but the response rate was low. (It never occurred to me that some subscribers might not celebrate Easter, perhaps because my mother had yet to research her thesis.) On snowy days, I went to subscribers’ homes and offered to shovel their driveways for a fee. After Mr. Wood invited me to join his group of boys at the M.U. football stadium, I worked every home-game Saturday. I walked up and down the stands with a tray of sodas; each time I refilled the tray, I was given a dollar. Most of the other carriers I knew did the same thing for different organizations; Eric and Paul sold drinks with a group that was organized by the local Little League. All of us kept an eye out for drunks, who tipped better. Alcohol was banned at the stadium, but the Missourian ran stories about smuggling techniques. Some fans injected vodka into oranges with hypodermic needles.我知道客户关系是我赢得“年度最佳报童”的最佳机会。每年十二月，我都会亲手制作节日贺卡并随报纸一起投递；通常，这能带来相当于两个月工资的小费。有一次，我在复活节试了同样的方法，但回复率很低。（我从未想过有些订户可能不过复活节，也许因为我母亲还没研究她的论文。）下雪天，我到订户家里，提出收费帮他们铲车道。伍德先生邀请我加入他在密大橄榄球场的男孩团队后，我每个有主场比赛的周六都会去工作。我端着一盘苏打水在看台上走来走去；每次我重新装满托盘，就会得到一美元。我认识的大多数其他报童也为不同的组织做同样的事情；埃里克和保罗与当地小联盟组织的一个团体一起卖饮料。我们都留意着醉汉，因为他们给的小费更多。球场禁止饮酒，但《密苏里人报》刊登了关于走私技巧的报道。一些球迷用皮下注射针头将伏特加注入橙子中。

Once, my school assigned me to interview somebody in city government. I asked Mr. Wood, who invited me to stop by his home in the evening. Years later, my father said that some instinct told him to accompany me. We sat in the Woods’ living room while I conducted the interview. But my father’s instinct didn’t approach the point of suspicion. Mr. Wood was among the most popular figures in local government, and people admired the volunteer projects that he organized with teen-age boys. These projects were covered periodically in the Missourian.密苏里人报。 (December 18, 1981: “YOUTHS SHOVEL SNOW TO SERVE少年铲雪服务.”)有一次，学校指派我采访一位市政府官员。我问了伍德先生，他邀请我晚上去他家。多年后，我父亲说某种直觉告诉他要陪我一起去。我们坐在伍德家的客厅里，我进行了采访。但我父亲的直觉并没有达到怀疑的程度。伍德先生是当地政府中最受欢迎的人物之一，人们钦佩他组织的那些青少年志愿者项目。这些项目定期在《密苏里人报》上报道。（1981年12月18日：“少年铲雪服务。”）

Columbia was two hours by car from St. Louis and Kansas City, the nearest cities of any size. The town was remote, but the presence of the university meant that its provincialism was that of a self-contained world. The Missourian localized big events: in 1981, two days after President Reagan was shot, the paper featured a Columbia high-school grad who, as a Secret Service agent, had helped subdue John Hinckley, Jr. If something happened overseas, reporters sought out international students at M.U. who might be willing to comment. In January, 1980, the paper explained why foreign news mattered:哥伦比亚市距离圣路易斯和堪萨斯城这两个最近的城市有两小时车程。该镇地处偏远，但大学的存在意味着它的狭隘是一种自给自足的世界的狭隘。《密苏里人报》将重大事件本地化：1981年，里根总统遇刺两天后，报纸刊登了一位哥伦比亚高中毕业生，他作为特勤局特工，曾协助制服了约翰·欣克利（John Hinckley, Jr.）。如果海外发生什么事情，记者会寻找可能愿意发表评论的密大国际学生。1980年1月，报纸解释了为什么外国新闻很重要：

Despite the fact that Columbia is not exactly at the crossroads of the world, the spin off of the crisis in Iran and the invasion of Afghanistan is very evident here, and we have tried to show you how in our pages. . . . Because one out of every four bushels of wheat grown in this country is shipped to Russia, such an embargo would have a devastating effect on the wheat farmers in this country, and Boone County, among others, would suffer the consequences.
尽管哥伦比亚并不完全处于世界十字路口，但伊朗危机和阿富汗入侵的连锁反应在这里非常明显，我们已尝试在版面上向您展示其影响……因为这个国家生产的每四蒲式耳小麦中就有一蒲式耳运往俄罗斯，这种禁运将对这个国家的小麦农民产生毁灭性影响，而布恩县（Boone County）等地区也将遭受后果。

The pedagogical tone reflected the fact that the Missourian was a teaching newspaper, staffed and published by M.U.’s School of Journalism. No other journalism school in the country produced a daily community paper, and many famous media figures had started out as Missourian reporters, including Seymour Topping, who was the managing editor of the Times in the late seventies and early eighties.这种教育性的语气反映了《密苏里人报》是一份教学报纸的事实，由密大新闻学院负责运营和出版。全国没有其他新闻学院制作每日社区报纸，许多著名的媒体人物都是从《密苏里人报》记者起步的，包括西摩·托平（Seymour Topping），他在七十年代末和八十年代初担任《纽约时报》的执行主编。

The Daily Tribune also had an excellent reputation, in part because it hired reporters and editors who had been trained at the Missourian. People sometimes said that Columbia had more journalists per capita than anywhere else in America. Periodically, the Missourian’s editorial page acknowledged the town’s support:《每日论坛报》也享有极高的声誉，部分原因是它聘请了在《密苏里人报》受过培训的记者和编辑。人们有时说，哥伦比亚的人均记者人数比美国任何地方都多。《密苏里人报》的社论版定期感谢该镇的支持：

We often hear complaints that the city is over-covered, that people spend hours helping us train the newest generations of Kilpatricks, Germonds, and Toppings.我们经常听到抱怨说这个城市被过度报道了，人们花费数小时帮助我们培训基尔帕特里克、格蒙德和托平的新一代。
It’s true, of course, that we ask many of you to help us. You, and especially those of you in public office, are our extended faculty and editors. We train the world’s journalists. Thank you for helping.当然，确实是我们请求你们中的许多人来帮助我们。你们，尤其是那些在公职岗位上的人，是我们延伸的教员和编辑。我们培训世界记者。谢谢你们的帮助。
我们经常听到抱怨说这个城市被过度报道了，人们花费数小时帮助我们培训基尔帕特里克（Kilpatricks）、格蒙德（Germonds）和托平（Toppings）的新一代。当然，确实是我们请求你们中的许多人来帮助我们。你们，尤其是那些在公职岗位上的人，是我们延伸的教员和编辑。我们培训世界记者。谢谢你们的帮助。

Over time, I became a more sophisticated reader of the paper. I especially liked quotations, the way a voice came to life in a story. A sixth-grade English teacher was the first person to tell me that I should think about writing as a career. But it never crossed my mind that someday I might work at the Missourian or become a journalist. I assumed, in a vague way, that I would grow up to be a professor like my father. Between the stories that my father told and the stories that appeared in the paper, my view of university life was impossibly colorful. The Missourian had some gifted writers, and they had a nose for the best campus stories. In 1982, when a Playboy花花公子 photographer rented a cheap suite at the Holiday Inn East to scout prospects for the magazine’s “Girls of the Big Eight” issue, five hundred women showed up, including a Missourian reporter. She coolly documented the scene’s details—a Polaroid camera, three cases of Rock and Roll Beer—along with the photographer’s casual misogyny. (“Many of the girls who come in are a little on the heavy side. And they think we can do miracles with them.”)随着时间的推移，我成为了报纸更成熟的读者。我特别喜欢引语，喜欢声音在故事中鲜活起来的方式。一位六年级的英语老师是第一个告诉我应该考虑把写作作为职业的人。但我从未想过有一天我可能会在《密苏里人报》工作或成为一名记者。我模糊地认为，我会长大成为像我父亲那样的教授。在我父亲讲述的故事和报纸上出现的故事之间，我对大学生活的看法变得不可思议地丰富多彩。《密苏里人报》有一些天才作家，他们对最好的校园故事有着敏锐的嗅觉。1982年，当一名《花花公子》（Playboy）摄影师在假日酒店东店租了一间廉价套房，为该杂志的“八大盟校女孩”专题搜寻人选时，五百名女性出现了，其中包括一名《密苏里人报》的记者。她冷静地记录了现场的细节——一台宝丽来相机，三箱摇滚啤酒——以及摄影师随意的厌女症。（“很多进来的女孩有点胖。她们以为我们可以创造奇迹。”）

One year, after a sophomore decided to use a shotgun as a prop for an anti-suicide speech in class, the story made page 1, with a classic lede:有一年，一名大二学生决定在课堂上使用猎枪作为反自杀演讲的道具，这个故事上了头版，并配有一个经典的导语：

Dean Pidgeon pointed an unloaded shotgun at himself Monday as part of his University public speaking class project, and while the gun never went off, his presentation backfired.
周一，皮金院长（Dean Pidgeon）在大学公共演讲课的项目中用一把未上膛的猎枪指着自己，虽然枪没有走火，但他的演讲却适得其反。

The writer described a classmate diving beneath a desk, screaming, “Don’t do it!” I liked stories with action, and I would read anything about fraternities or sororities. My father griped constantly about Greek life, a nemesis of M.U. professors since at least the days of Veblen. (According to the biography, Veblen once told a student, “I don’t say that I will fail any member of a sorority or fraternity, but no member of such an organization has ever yet passed one of my courses.”) The Missourian covered so many frat fires that it almost qualified as a regular beat; the houses tended to ignite because of carelessness and poorly managed kitchens. Occasionally, the newspaper documented the quantity of beer consumed at a party with the same precision that it used to report the G.D.P. On September 11, 1982, a ninety-one-keg party at Phi Kappa Theta merited a page-7 headline (“FRATERNITY BASH IRKS UNIVERSITY兄弟会狂欢惹恼大学”), along with a golly-gee quote from the fraternity’s president: “We threw the party with good intent. Our purpose was not to get the campus drunk. We had no idea it would get so big.”作者描述了一位同学钻进课桌下尖叫着：“别那样做！”我喜欢有动作戏的故事，任何关于兄弟会或姐妹会的内容我都会读。我父亲总是抱怨希腊生活（Greek life），这可是自凡勃伦（Veblen）时代起密苏里大学教授们的死对头。（据传记记载，凡勃伦曾对一名学生说：“我不是说我会让任何姐妹会或兄弟会成员挂科，但至今还没有任何该组织的成员通过我的课程。”）《密苏里人报》报道兄弟会火灾的频率之高，几乎成了常规报道任务；这些房子往往因为粗心大意和厨房管理不善而起火。有时，该报记录派对上啤酒消耗量的精确程度，甚至与报道国内生产总值（GDP）不相上下。1982年9月11日，Phi Kappa Theta兄弟会举行的一场91桶啤酒派对登上了第7版的标题（“兄弟会狂欢惹恼大学”），随文还引用了该兄弟会主席的一句天真的话：“我们举办派对是出于好意。我们的目的不是让校园喝醉。我们没想到规模会变得这么大。”

I delivered to two fraternities. The sketchiest part of my route ran near campus, where residential neighborhoods gave way to some frat buildings and low-rent student housing. That was where I finally came across a body. Early one morning, I was climbing the interior stairway of a decrepit apartment building when I looked up and saw two motionless feet. The shoe soles faced me, heels touching, forming the shape of a V. For what seemed like a very long while, I didn’t move. Then, gathering my courage, I continued climbing. Step by step, the rest of the body came into view: legs, torso, head. He was a fully dressed man with a beard and greasy hair, flat on his back on a landing. I stopped, heart pounding. Then I knelt, listened closely, took a whiff, and made my diagnosis: drunk.我负责给两个兄弟会送报。我路线上最阴森的一段靠近校园，那里的住宅区过渡到了一些兄弟会建筑和廉价学生公寓。正是在那里，我最终撞见了一具尸体。一天清晨，我正爬上一栋破旧公寓楼的内部楼梯，抬头一看，看见了两只一动不动的脚。鞋底对着我，脚后跟并拢，形成了一个V字形。在一段看似漫长的时间里，我一动不动。随后，我鼓起勇气继续向上爬。一步一步，身体的其他部分映入眼帘：腿、躯干、头。那是一个留着胡子、头发油腻、衣着完整的男人，平躺在楼梯平台上。我停了下来，心脏狂跳。接着我跪下，仔细听了听，闻了闻，得出了诊断：喝醉了。

The largest fraternity I delivered to was Sigma Alpha Epsilon. It was housed in an impressive white building in the neoclassical-revival style, with six Ionic columns. I always approached the house from the back, following one of my secret pathways through a neighboring yard. On dark Sunday mornings, after Missouri Tigers game days, crossing the fraternity’s lawn was like entering an artillery field’s zone of fire. Various objects had been tossed from the two-level porch and lay scattered across the grass. There might be articles of clothing, both male and female. Once, I found a billiard ball, which I pocketed. The most common spent projectiles on the S.A.E. lawn were beer cans and bottles. After Columbia implemented a five-cent deposit law, I would collect as many empties as would fit inside my canvas sack.我送报的最大一个兄弟会是Sigma Alpha Epsilon。它坐落在一栋令人印象深刻的白色新古典主义复兴风格建筑中，有六根爱奥尼柱。我总是从后面接近这栋房子，沿着我的一条秘密小径穿过邻居的院子。在密苏里老虎队比赛日过后的昏暗周日早晨，穿过兄弟会的草坪就像进入了炮火区。各种各样的物品从两层高的门廊被扔下，散落在草地上。其中可能有男女衣物。有一次，我发现了一个台球，我把它装进了口袋。S.A.E.草坪上最常见的废弃物是啤酒罐和瓶子。在哥伦比亚市实施五分钱押金法后，我会收集尽可能多的空瓶装进我的帆布袋里。

Each spring, the S.A.E. members dug a grave in their lawn. The first year I saw this, it scared the living hell out of me. Walking across the grass, I stumbled upon a long pit and a wooden coffin, its shape shadowy in the predawn light. The second year, I was less surprised, and after that the annual appearance of a coffin and an open grave became a normal sign of springtime. As a boy, I never knew the purpose of this strange ritual. It wasn’t covered in the Missourian, and I must not have mentioned it to my parents, who had no memory of it years later. That was also typical of childhood, when many strange and unsettling things were accepted without explanation.每年春天，S.A.E.的成员们都会在草坪上挖一个坟墓。第一年我看到这个场景时，吓得魂飞魄散。走在草地上，我偶然发现了一个长坑和一口木棺材，在黎明前的微光中显得阴森可怖。第二年，我没那么惊讶了，此后，棺材和张开的坟墓每年如期出现，成了春天正常的标志。小时候，我从不知道这个奇怪仪式的目的。报纸没有报道过，我肯定也没跟父母提过，多年后他们也对此毫无记忆。这也是童年的典型特征，许多奇怪且令人不安的事情在没有解释的情况下就被接受了。

Recently, I tracked down some S.A.E. members from that era. They explained that the coffin was connected to a fictional figure called Paddy Murphy. Different chapters had their own versions, but the M.U. Paddy Murphy was somebody who had died from alcohol poisoning. Each year, a different brother played Paddy, lying in the coffin, where he was roasted by a series of mock eulogies. The coffin had been acquired by a brother with a summer job in a mortuary in St. Louis. He had driven the two hours to Columbia on Interstate 70 with the coffin sitting upright in the passenger seat of an open convertible.最近，我找到了那个时代的一些S.A.E.成员。他们解释说，棺材与一个叫帕迪·墨菲（Paddy Murphy）的虚构人物有关。不同的分会有各自的版本，但密苏里大学的帕迪·墨菲是一个死于酒精中毒的人。每年，会有不同的兄弟扮演帕迪，躺在棺材里，接受一系列模拟悼词的嘲弄。这口棺材是一个在圣路易斯殡仪馆做暑期工的兄弟弄来的。他开着敞篷车，把棺材竖在副驾驶座位上，在70号州际公路上开了两个小时才回到哥伦比亚。

On April 24, 1981, the Missourian ran an unsigned comment at the top of the Opinion page:1981年4月24日，《密苏里人报》在评论版顶部刊登了一则未署名的评论：

GLENN WOOD, CITY’S FRIEND: RETIRING BUT NOT FORGOTTEN
格伦·伍德，城市的挚友：退休但不会被遗忘

For over the past 17 ½ years, Glenn Wood has sat in the city clerk’s chair. But more than just a city clerk sat there. A friend to city residents, a confidant to council members, a reservoir of knowledge and an ambassador of good will all resided in that chair thanks to Mr. Wood.
在过去的17年半里，格伦·伍德一直坐在城市书记官的位置上。但坐在那里的不仅仅是一位城市书记官。多亏了伍德先生，城市居民的朋友、议会成员的知己、知识的宝库以及善意的使者，都汇聚于那个位置。

By then, I was nearly twelve, and strong enough that I had started using a bicycle on my route. One thing I liked about biking was that I could greet Mr. Wood but not stop. Even before the bicycle, I had made it clear that I didn’t want him touching me anymore. There was never a confrontation, but I found ways to keep my distance. When he asked if I wanted to participate in his youth group at the Odd Fellows Lodge, I told him that I was too busy.到那时，我快十二岁了，身体也强壮到开始骑自行车送报。骑车的一个好处是，我可以跟伍德先生打招呼而不必停下来。甚至在骑自行车之前，我就已经明确表示不想再让他碰我了。虽然从未发生过正面冲突，但我总能找到保持距离的方法。当他问我是否想参加他在“奇人团”（Odd Fellows Lodge）组织的青年小组时，我告诉他我太忙了。

I had read enough stories in the paper to know that Mr. Wood’s behavior was wrong. But I still had some confusion, because he was so admired in the community. The Missourian editorial noted that Mr. Wood had been a Scoutmaster and a Sunday-school teacher, and it mentioned his plans:我在报纸上读过足够多的故事，知道伍德先生的行为是错误的。但我仍然感到困惑，因为他在社区里如此受人尊敬。《密苏里人报》的社论提到伍德先生曾是童子军领队和主日学校老师，并提到了他的计划：

When Mr. Wood announced his retirement last December, he indicated he was looking forward to devoting more time to the teenage boys who belong to the junior chapter of the Odd Fellows Lodge.
去年12月伍德先生宣布退休时，他表示期待投入更多时间去关怀属于“奇人团”少年分会的男孩子们。

During the years that I delivered it, the Missourian remained the same size, averaging about thirty pages a day, and the circulation was stable. I had no idea that newspapers or carriers might have an uncertain future. But recently, while rereading issues from those years, I recognized signs of trouble. A 1983 feature about a spate of mergers noted that Columbia had become the third-smallest American city that still had competing dailies. In 1981, the Sunday edition ran a feature—“MAKE ROOM FOR DATA”“为数据腾出空间”—about the first wave of home computers. The writer referred to something called the Source, which could transmit information between machines:在我送报的那些年里，《密苏里人报》的规模保持不变，平均每天约三十页，发行量也很稳定。我根本不知道报纸或送报员的未来可能充满不确定性。但最近，在重读当年的报纸时，我认出了一些麻烦的迹象。1983年一篇关于一系列合并案的专题文章指出，哥伦比亚市已成为美国仍拥有竞争性日报的城市中规模第三小的城市。1981年，周日版刊登了一篇关于第一波家用电脑的专题报道——“为数据腾出空间”。作者提到了一个叫“源”（Source）的东西，它可以在机器之间传输信息：

What effects will home computers have on society? . . . The day of the newspaper carrier may come to a close as information services similar to the “Source” creep into more homes.
“家用电脑将对社会产生什么影响？……随着类似于‘源’这样的信息服务进入更多家庭，报纸投递员的日子可能就要走到尽头了。”

As a boy, I was oblivious to such predictions, and I also didn’t realize that the Missourian was struggling to find carriers. Periodically, a story appeared about somebody getting attacked on the job. In 1980, an adult woman carrier was robbed and sexually assaulted on her Missourian route; a couple of years later, a fourteen-year-old newspaper vender was held up at knifepoint. The paper sometimes celebrated carriers with descriptions of the job, which didn’t sound particularly appealing:小时候，我对这些预测一无所知，也没意识到《密苏里人报》正努力寻找投递员。报纸上不时出现有人在工作中遇袭的报道。1980年，一名成年女性投递员在送报途中遭到抢劫和性侵；几年后，一名十四岁的报童被持刀劫持。报纸有时会通过描述这份工作来赞美投递员，但听起来并不怎么吸引人：

A Missourian carrier holds a great responsibility. He or she is expected to:《密苏里人报》投递员肩负重任。他或她需要：
*Deliver a paper to each subscriber on time, despite early hours, stormy weather, cold temperatures, or poor health.*无论清晨、风暴、严寒或身体不适，都必须准时将报纸送到每位订户手中。
*Cover the entire route in time for school.*在学校上课前送完整个路线。
*Deal with paper thieves.*应对偷报贼。
*Brave the threats of unfriendly dogs.*勇敢面对不友善狗只的威胁。
《密苏里人报》投递员肩负重任。他或她需要：*无论清晨、风暴、严寒或身体不适，都必须准时将报纸送到每位订户手中。*在学校上课前送完整个路线。*应对偷报贼。*勇敢面对不友善狗只的威胁。

I was bitten by dogs repeatedly, with the worst offender being a cairn terrier on South Garth. The animal was tiny but vicious, and he often left my ankles bleeding. My father called the animal-control office, which was notoriously unreliable; in this case, someone there talked to the owner a couple of times and then gave up. She was in her thirties, a distracted woman living alone in a run-down rental. Somebody suggested doggy treats, but the animal ignored them and made a beeline for my leg. After that, my father consulted with our mailman, who went to his truck and returned with a large cannister of mace. The cannister featured an image of an angry mutt with saliva dripping from its jaws.我多次被狗咬，最凶猛的是南加斯街的一只凯恩梗。这只狗体型很小但非常凶恶，经常咬得我脚踝流血。我父亲给动物管理部门打了电话，但他们出了名的不靠谱；在这种情况下，那里的人跟狗主人谈了几次就放弃了。狗主人是个三十多岁的女人，独自住在一间破旧的租房里，整天心不在焉。有人建议用狗零食，但那只狗根本不理会，直冲我的腿咬来。在那之后，我父亲咨询了我们的邮递员，他从卡车里拿出一个大罐梅斯催泪喷雾。罐子上画着一只愤怒的杂种狗，下巴滴着唾液。

My father accompanied me the first morning I tried the spray. I always believed that, in comparison with him, I was growing up weak and soft. He told exotic stories about his childhood, in a working-class part of Los Angeles where fights had been common. As a boy, he had tattooed his left hand with a pachuco mark, a cross-shaped symbol near the thumb that was popular with the Chicano gangsters in his neighborhood. My father had dark skin, and by his forties the mark was hard to make out. But in his teen-age years it had been distinct enough to get noticed, unhappily, by his future father-in-law the first time they met.我第一次尝试使用喷雾的那天早上，父亲陪着我。我一直认为，与他相比，我成长得太软弱了。他讲述了自己童年的传奇故事，在洛杉矶一个工人阶级社区，打架是家常便饭。小时候，他在左手上纹了一个帕楚科（pachuco）标记，那是拇指附近的一个十字形符号，在邻里的奇卡诺（Chicano）黑帮中很流行。我父亲皮肤黝黑，到了四十多岁，这个标记已经很难辨认了。但在他十几岁时，这个标记非常清晰，以至于他第一次见到未来的岳父时，对方因为这个标记而对他印象极差。

My father told me to hold my ground when the dog charged. The terrier came up snarling, and I hit him in the face with a long, heavy stream. He collapsed against the trunk of a tree, where I sprayed him again. His breathing became increasingly labored. “I think he might die,” my father said. But then, like some demented jack-in-the-box, the terrier popped up and charged again. In the course of the following days, he seemed to develop an immunity to the spray.父亲叫我在狗冲过来时站稳脚跟。那只梗犬咆哮着冲上来，我对着它的脸喷出了一道又长又猛的喷雾。它撞在树干上倒下，我又补喷了一下。它的呼吸变得越来越沉重。“我想它可能会死，”父亲说。但随后，它像个疯狂的弹簧玩偶一样跳起来，再次冲了过来。在接下来的几天里，它似乎对喷雾产生了免疫力。

Every generation romanticizes the struggles of its youth. Like many people my age, I complain about helicopter parents, and I speak fondly of long unsupervised days during childhood. But I’m also under no illusions about the ways in which that world was a hard place. It’s obvious in the papers that I once delivered, which feature many stories about terrible accidents involving children—drowning in icy ponds or getting electrocuted after climbing utility poles.每一代人都浪漫化自己年轻时的挣扎。像许多同龄人一样，我抱怨“直升机父母”，并深情地谈论童年时无人监管的长日。但我也不对那个世界曾经的艰辛抱有幻想。我曾经投递的报纸里显而易见地充斥着许多涉及儿童的可怕事故——在冰冷的池塘里溺水，或爬电线杆时触电身亡。

There was also a lot of victim-blaming. In 1979, a woman wrote to “Dear Abby” complaining about getting rejected from jobs she applied to because she was overweight. “Face it, most fat women are not as attractive as their slim sisters,” Abby counselled. “So, do yourself a favor and quit asking for ‘kindness’ from others. See your doctor about a diet.” Two other advice seekers worked at a clothing store where their male boss had drilled holes so that he could peer into the dressing room. “A confrontation is not necessary,” Abby responded. “Every morning check the dressing room wall for holes, then cover them with adhesive paper. Do this routinely and your boss will soon realize that you are onto his dirty little peeping game.” This approach seemed common when authorities were uninterested or incompetent. If you have a problem, fix it yourself如果你有问题，自己解决.当时也有很多指责受害者的现象。1979年，一位女士写信给“亲爱的艾比”（Dear Abby），抱怨因为超重而被工作拒之门外。“面对现实吧，大多数胖女人没有苗条的姐妹有吸引力，”艾比建议道。“所以，帮自己一个忙，别再向别人要求‘善意’了。去看医生咨询一下节食吧。”另外两名求助者在一家服装店工作，她们的男老板钻了孔以便偷窥更衣室。“没必要对质，”艾比回应道。“每天早上检查更衣室墙上的孔，然后用胶带纸盖住。经常这样做，你的老板很快就会意识到你已经发现了他那肮脏的偷窥游戏。”这种方法在当局不感兴趣或无能时似乎很普遍。如果你有问题，自己解决。

After the dog mace failed, I borrowed my friend Joe Kopine’s Crosman BB pistol. Joe had purchased the gun because of its powerful air-cartridge system. It looked like a real weapon, with heavy black metal; a bright-orange tip would have seemed absurd to a boy of that era. I packed the pistol with the newspapers in my canvas bag. The next time the dog appeared, I drew the gun, held steady with both hands, and pulled the trigger. The dog leaped straight into the air, spinning and yelping. In the following week, I shot him another five or six times. And that was all it took; he never attacked again.在狗用喷雾失效后，我借了朋友乔·科派恩（Joe Kopine）的Crosman BB气手枪。乔买这把枪是因为它有强力的气瓶系统。它看起来像真武器，沉重的黑色金属；在那年代，枪口加上亮橙色标记对一个男孩来说简直荒谬。我把手枪和报纸一起塞进帆布袋里。下次狗出现时，我拔出枪，双手稳稳握住，扣动了扳机。狗直挺挺地跳到空中，一边旋转一边哀鸣。在接下来的一周里，我又射了它五六次。这就足够了；它再也没有攻击过我。

On the afternoon of May 4, 1982, my father told me that there was something we needed to talk about. He didn’t want to do it at home, and he looked upset. We set off together, on foot, in the direction of campus.1982年5月4日下午，父亲告诉我有些事情我们需要谈谈。他不想在家里谈，而且看起来很不安。我们一起步行出发，朝着校园方向走去。

He was uncharacteristically quiet. I was nearly thirteen, and I had mostly figured out how to get along in school. The longer we walked, the more I sensed that my father was upset by something other than a teacher’s bad report.他一反常态地沉默。我快十三岁了，基本已经摸清了如何在学校里应付。我们走得越远，我就越感觉到父亲的不安不仅仅是因为老师的差评。

He found a bench in the university’s Peace Park. It was a beautiful afternoon, and students were outside enjoying the sunshine. After we sat down, he said, “I wanted to tell you that Mr. Wood was arrested. It’s in the Tribune《论坛报》 today. It will be in the Missourian tomorrow.”他在大学的和平公园找了一张长椅。那是一个美丽的下午，学生们都在外面享受阳光。我们坐下后，他说：“我想告诉你，伍德先生被捕了。今天《论坛报》上有报道。明天《密苏里人报》也会登出来。”

Initially, I didn’t know what to say. Then I asked why Mr. Wood had been arrested.起初，我不知道该说什么。然后我问伍德先生为什么被捕。

“He was caught with a teen-age boy on a bus,” my father said. “He was arrested for sodomy.” There was a pause. “Do you know what that means?”“他在公交车上被发现和一个十几岁的男孩在一起，”父亲说。“他因鸡奸罪被捕。”停顿了一下，“你知道那意味着什么吗？”

I nodded slowly. Sodomy appeared periodically in articles about arrests, although it confused me—the word seemed to describe different things. The part in the Bible about Sodom also lacked key details. But I wasn’t going to ask those questions now.我慢慢地点了点头。鸡奸罪在有关逮捕的文章中不时出现，尽管这让我困惑——这个词似乎描述的是不同的事情。圣经中关于所多玛（Sodom）的部分也缺乏关键细节。但我现在不会问这些问题。

“I know that Mr. Wood often talked to you on the paper route,” my father said. “We need to know if he did anything to you. If he touched you or did anything inappropriate.”“我知道伍德先生经常在送报路上跟你说话，”父亲说。“我们需要知道他是否对你做过什么。如果他碰过你或做过任何不恰当的事。”

Now I understood why his mood hadn’t been recognizable. For the first time, I saw true fear in my father’s eyes. I thought for a moment before answering.现在我明白为什么他刚才的情绪那么奇怪了。我第一次在父亲眼中看到了真正的恐惧。我思考片刻后回答。

“No,” I said. “Nothing happened. He didn’t do anything to me.”“没有，”我说。“什么都没发生。他没对我做过什么。”

“Are you sure?” my father said. “It’s important that we know. If he did anything, the police need to talk to you.”“你确定吗？”父亲说。“知道真相很重要。如果他做过什么，警察需要跟你谈谈。”

“I’m sure,” I said.“我确定，”我说。

His face relaxed, and he said that he was glad that he had accompanied me when I went to the Woods’ home for my school project. “Who knows what he was planning,” my father said. “The story in the paper said that he has been molesting boys for years.”他的脸色舒缓下来，说很高兴我做学校项目去伍德家时他陪着我。“谁知道他在计划什么，”父亲说。“报纸上的故事说他多年来一直在猥亵男孩。”

I asked what would happen to Mr. Wood.我问伍德先生会怎么样。

“He’ll go to prison,” my father said. “They do terrible things to child molesters in prison.”“他会进监狱，”父亲说。“他们在监狱里对猥亵儿童的人做可怕的事情。”

I asked if he was already there.我问他是否已经在那里了。

“No. They have to have a trial. He’ll be at home until then. You haven’t been seeing him outside in the mornings recently, have you?”“没有。他们必须经过审判。在那之前他会待在家里。你最近早上在外面没见过他吧？”

“No.”“没有。”

“Good,” he said. “Make sure you don’t have any contact with him.”“很好，”他说。“确保不要和他有任何接触。”

Walking home that sunny afternoon, I sensed my father’s relief, and I felt as though I had protected him from something awful. But already I was wondering what I would do if I saw Mr. Wood again.那天下午走回家时，我感觉到了父亲的宽慰，也觉得自己保护了他免受某种可怕事情的伤害。但我已经在想，如果再见到伍德先生，我该怎么办。

The following morning, the stack of newspapers was waiting at the end of the driveway. I carried them inside and read the front page:第二天早上，成堆的报纸放在车道尽头。我把它们搬进屋里，读了头版：

ARGENTINES SINK BRITISH DESTROYER阿根廷击沉英国驱逐舰
COLUMBIA MAN DIES IN 2-TRUCK COLLISION NEAR PRATHERSVILLE哥伦比亚市男子在普拉瑟斯维尔附近的双卡车碰撞事故中丧生
EX-CITY CLERK CHARGED WITH SODOMY前城市书记官被控鸡奸罪
阿根廷击沉英国驱逐舰哥伦比亚市男子在普拉瑟斯维尔附近的双卡车碰撞事故中丧生前城市书记官被控鸡奸罪

There was a photograph of Mr. Wood from before his arrest. The story said that he had taken a job in retirement as a school-bus driver, and one day a parent became suspicious.上面有一张伍德先生被捕前的照片。故事说他退休后找了一份校车司机的工作，有一天一位家长产生了怀疑。

The parent claimed to have seen Wood, who had been driving a bus for Rustman Bus Co., and a boy go to the back of the bus and disappear, said Sgt. Dale Richardson, who led the investigation.负责调查的戴尔·理查森警官说，该家长声称看到为Rustman巴士公司开车的伍德和一个男孩走到车后部并消失了。
Police said when officers confronted the juvenile, he admitted to having oral sex with Wood. Police did not say whether the act took place in the bus.警方表示，当警官与这名少年对质时，他承认与伍德发生了口交。警方没有说明该行为是否发生在车内。
Richardson said the boy also named five other juveniles, ranging in age from 13 to 16 years, involved with Wood. Police have interviewed the six boys and their parents, he said.理查森说，该男孩还指出了其他五名年龄在13至16岁之间涉及伍德的少年。他说，警方已经采访了这六名男孩及其父母。
Police believe Wood first became involved with boys at the International Order of Odd Fellows Lodge, of which he has been a member since 1933. Many of the alleged sex acts occurred at the lodge after meetings, Richardson said.警方认为伍德最初是在“奇人团”开始接触男孩的，他自1933年以来一直是该组织成员。理查森说，许多所谓的性行为发生在会议后的会所里。
负责调查的戴尔·理查森（Dale Richardson）警官说，该家长声称看到为Rustman巴士公司开车的伍德和一个男孩走到车后部并消失了。警方表示，当警官与这名少年对质时，他承认与伍德发生了口交。警方没有说明该行为是否发生在车内。理查森说，该男孩还指出了其他五名年龄在13至16岁之间涉及伍德的少年。他说，警方已经采访了这六名男孩及其父母。警方认为伍德最初是在“奇人团”开始接触男孩的，他自1933年以来一直是该组织成员。理查森说，许多所谓的性行为发生在会议后的会所里。

I folded all the papers and went outside. The closer I got to 110 South Garth Avenue, the more nervous I felt. But the lights were off at the house. I threw the paper onto the porch and continued down the silent street.我折好所有的报纸走了出去。越靠近南加斯大道110号，我就越感到紧张。但屋里的灯是关着的。我把报纸扔到门廊上，继续沿着寂静的街道走去。

Throughout summer and fall, reports about Mr. Wood’s case appeared in the Missourian and the Tribune. My parents didn’t discuss these articles with me or my sisters, and I was careful to read them only when I was alone.整个夏天和秋天，《密苏里人报》和《论坛报》上都出现了关于伍德先生案件的报道。我的父母没有和我或姐妹们讨论这些文章，我小心翼翼地只在独自一人时才去读它们。

On June 21, 1982, in a federal court in Washington, D.C., John Hinckley, Jr., was found not guilty by reason of insanity. The following morning, that story appeared on the Missourian’s front page, and a headline on page 7 read “MENTAL EXAM OK’D FOR WOOD伍德获准进行精神检查.” Wood’s lawyer seemed to be attempting the strategy that had worked for Hinckley, entering a plea of not guilty on account of “mental disease or defect.” At the time of the arrest, Wood had admitted to Detective Dale Richardson that he had abused boys repeatedly since 1938, and that pedophilia “was something he couldn’t control.” One Missourian article quoted the officer:1982年6月21日，在华盛顿特区的一家联邦法院，小约翰·欣克利（John Hinckley, Jr.）因精神错乱被判无罪。第二天早上，这个故事出现在《密苏里人报》的头版，第7版的一个标题写着“伍德获准进行精神检查”。伍德的律师似乎试图采用欣克利那套策略，以“精神疾病或缺陷”为由提出无罪辩护。在被捕时，伍德曾向侦探戴尔·理查森承认，自1938年以来他反复猥亵男孩，而且恋童癖“是他无法控制的事情”。《密苏里人报》的一篇文章引用了这位警官的话：

Richardson said Wood had cooperated during the entire questioning procedure. The only thing Wood seemed to worry about, Richardson said, was the “welfare of the boys.”
理查森说，伍德在整个审讯过程中都很配合。理查森说，伍德唯一担心的似乎是“男孩们的福利”。

The detective seemed to downplay the crimes. A story in the Tribune noted:这位侦探似乎在淡化这些罪行。《论坛报》的一篇报道指出：

The boys said Wood would perform oral sex on them, then they would reciprocate, Richardson said. One boy said Wood paid him $1 at each session.理查森说，男孩们表示伍德会给他们口交，然后他们会回馈。一个男孩说伍德每次给他们1美元。
Wood never forced the boys to participate, Richardson said, and he never harmed any of the youths. He added that police have encouraged the parents to seek counseling for the boys.理查森说，伍德从未强迫男孩们参与，也从未伤害过任何青少年。他补充说，警方已鼓励家长为孩子们寻求心理咨询。
理查森说，男孩们表示伍德会给他们口交，然后他们会回馈。一个男孩说伍德每次给他们1美元。理查森说，伍德从未强迫男孩们参与，也从未伤害过任何青少年。他补充说，警方已鼓励家长为孩子们寻求心理咨询。

There were many references to Wood paying his victims and buying them gifts. The boys were not named, but I believed that some of them had sold drinks alongside me at M.U. games. With each story, I felt a rush of guilt. I had no word for what I had experienced—in those days, grooming was something that happened to dogs and horses. All I knew was that my mother and Matthew had been right. Greed was weakness, and Mr. Wood had exploited it; he had given me quarters because I had wanted them desperately. I believed that I was partly at fault for what had happened.文中多次提到伍德付钱给受害者并买礼物给他们。男孩们没有被点名，但我相信其中一些人曾在密苏里大学的比赛中和我一起卖过饮料。每读一篇报道，我就感到一阵内疚。我没有词汇来描述我的经历——在那个年代，“诱导”（grooming）只是发生在狗和马身上的事情。我只知道我母亲和马修是对的。贪婪是一种弱点，而伍德先生利用了这一点；他给我硬币是因为我迫切地想要它们。我相信对于发生的事情，我也有部分责任。

I also knew that I should have told my father the truth. But the stories in the paper convinced me that I had done the right thing. I didn’t want to talk to those police; I didn’t want to stand in that courtroom; I didn’t want to appear in these articles:我也知道我本该告诉父亲真相。但报纸上的故事让我确信我做的是对的。我不想和那些警察谈话；我不想站在那个法庭上；我不想出现在这些文章里：

LAWYER IN SODOMY CASE QUIZZES YOUNG WITNESSES
鸡奸案律师盘问年轻证人

Representing former City Clerk Glenn Wood, Columbia attorney John Schwabe yesterday insinuated at a court hearing that at least one boy Wood is accused of molesting encouraged the 67-year-old man’s sexual advances. . . .代表前城市书记官格伦·伍德的哥伦比亚律师约翰·施瓦贝昨天在听证会上暗示，伍德被控猥亵的至少一名男孩鼓励了这位67岁老人的性挑逗。……
Wasn’t it so, Schwabe probed in a slightly different tone, that the boy asked Wood to perform oral sex on him? “I don’t remember,” was the youth’s reply. When Schwabe restated the question, the youngster flared: “I said I don’t remember, so don’t ask.” . . .“难道不是这样吗？”施瓦贝用一种略有不同的语气盘问，“是那个男孩要求伍德对他进行口交的？”“我不记得了，”少年的回答。当施瓦贝重述问题时，少年发火了：“我说我不记得了，所以别再问了。”……
Then, Schwabe elicited confirmations from the boys that Wood helped them with school lessons, coached baseball in volunteer work at the Odd Fellows Lodge in Columbia and had been a friend.接着，施瓦贝引出男孩们的确认，即伍德曾帮助他们学习学校功课，在哥伦比亚的“奇人团”做志愿者时担任棒球教练，并且一直是个朋友。
“You don’t hate Mr. Wood, do you?” Schwabe asked each boy. All but one replied negatively. The dissenting youth said, “A little.”“你不恨伍德先生，对吧？”施瓦贝问每个男孩。除一人外，所有人都回答没有。那个持不同意见的少年说：“有一点。”
Tense and dwarfed by the witness stand, the boys answered the questions with a few stammers and only an occasional nervous laugh. Their eyes rested only fleetingly on Wood, who wore a coat and tie and frequently cradled his face in his hands.男孩们紧张地站在证人席上，显得很渺小，他们用结结巴巴的回答和偶尔紧张的笑声回应这些问题。他们的目光只是短暂地落在伍德身上，伍德穿着西装打着领带，经常用双手捧着脸。
代表前城市书记官格伦·伍德的哥伦比亚律师约翰·施瓦贝（John Schwabe）昨天在听证会上暗示，伍德被控猥亵的至少一名男孩鼓励了这位67岁老人的性挑逗。……“难道不是这样吗？”施瓦贝用一种略有不同的语气盘问，“是那个男孩要求伍德对他进行口交的？”“我不记得了，”少年的回答。当施瓦贝重述问题时，少年发火了：“我说我不记得了，所以别再问了。”……接着，施瓦贝引出男孩们的确认，即伍德曾帮助他们学习学校功课，在哥伦比亚的“奇人团”做志愿者时担任棒球教练，并且一直是个朋友。“你不恨伍德先生，对吧？”施瓦贝问每个男孩。除一人外，所有人都回答没有。那个持不同意见的少年说：“有一点。”男孩们紧张地站在证人席上，显得很渺小，他们用结结巴巴的回答和偶尔紧张的笑声回应这些问题。他们的目光只是短暂地落在伍德身上，伍德穿着西装打着领带，经常用双手捧着脸。

Wood’s lawyer asked the judge to dismiss the charges because the youths were “accomplices in the very crime.” This motion was considered but then denied. Eventually, a number of the charges were dropped, as part of a plea bargain, and Wood’s lawyer pushed for no jail time. Wood had been evaluated by a psychiatrist who had been a professor at the university’s medical school, and the psychiatrist testified that Wood should not pose a threat to the community. “Taking into account human error, the chances are there should be no repetition of this behavior,” he said. He also told the court that young boys who engage in voluntary homosexual acts with adults usually recover, and that such contacts are often “loving, caring, positive relationships.”伍德的律师要求法官驳回指控，因为这些少年是“该罪行的共犯”。这一动议经过考虑后被驳回。最终，作为认罪协议的一部分，多项指控被撤销，伍德的律师力争免除监禁。伍德接受了一位曾任大学医学院教授的精神病医生的评估，该医生作证说伍德不应对社区构成威胁。“考虑到人为错误，这种行为应该不会再发生，”他说。他还告诉法庭，与成年人进行自愿同性行为的年轻男孩通常会恢复，而且这种接触通常是“充满爱、关怀和积极的关系”。

A number of prominent citizens appeared as character witnesses. H. Clyde Wilson, Jr., a former mayor, testified about Wood’s contributions to city government, and he said that no “useful purpose” would be served if he were incarcerated. The Missourian described the defense lawyer’s closing statement:许多知名人士出面担任品格证人。前市长小H·克莱德·威尔逊（H. Clyde Wilson, Jr.）为伍德对市政府的贡献作证，并表示如果将他监禁，不会有任何“有益的目的”。《密苏里人报》描述了辩护律师的结案陈词：

Schwabe asked Judge Conley to allow him to “indulge in symbolism” as he compared Wood’s life to a “flower garden” with an ugly weed in it. “The flowers need not be thrown in the garbage can,” Schwabe said. “To even give Glenn Wood county jail time would be to sign his death warrant.”
施瓦贝请求康利（Conley）法官允许他“沉溺于象征主义”，将伍德的生活比作一个有丑陋杂草的“花园”。“花朵不必被扔进垃圾桶，”施瓦贝说。“即使判处格伦·伍德入狱，也等于签署了他的死刑判决书。”

From the day I learned of the arrest, I sensed that Mr. Wood would find a way to see me again. In the end, it happened under cover of a heavy storm. On rainy mornings, I couldn’t ride my bike, and neighbors were much less likely to be outside.从得知他被捕的那天起，我就预感到伍德先生会想办法再见到我。最终，这件事发生在一场暴雨的掩护下。在雨天，我不能骑自行车，邻居们也更不可能在外面。

That day, I placed the paper onto his porch, and suddenly he was behind me; I hadn’t seen him in the downpour. “I’m sorry,” he said.那天，我把报纸放在他的门廊上，他突然出现在我身后；我在倾盆大雨中没看见他。“对不起，”他说。

“I’m not supposed to see you!” I said, but my voice sounded childlike in the storm. I saw that he was weeping, and suddenly my body went limp and I began to sob. He wrapped his arms around me, repeating those two words over and over. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry对不起，对不起，对不起. The interaction probably lasted less than a minute, but it felt like forever. Finally, I pulled away and ran.“我不应该见你！”我说，但我的声音在暴雨中显得很幼稚。我看到他在哭泣，突然我的身体瘫软下来，开始抽泣。他用双臂抱住我，一遍又一遍地重复那两个词。对不起，对不起，对不起。这次互动可能持续不到一分钟，但感觉就像永远。最后，我挣脱开跑了。

At the end of the street, I huddled beneath a tree until my breathing was under control. When I returned home, I made sure that my face betrayed nothing.在街道尽头，我蜷缩在一棵树下，直到呼吸平复。当我回到家时，我确保自己的脸上没有流露出任何痕迹。

On the morning of September 28, 1982, before folding the papers, I found the headline, on page 8:1982年9月28日早上，在折报纸之前，我在第8版发现了这个标题：

UNIVERSITY JOBS LOST DUE TO SALARY RAISES STILL UNDETERMINED大学因加薪而裁减的职位仍未确定
TEACHERS’ PAY HIKE UNDECIDED教师加薪未定
PROBATION PLEA DENIED; WOOD GETS PRISON TERM缓刑请求被拒；伍德被判入狱
大学因加薪而裁减的职位仍未确定教师加薪未定缓刑请求被拒；伍德被判入狱

The article quoted the circuit judge Frank Conley. “I don’t think there is a case that has cost me more personal anguish as a judge than this case,” he told the defendant. “I’ve seen a lot of the good that you have done.” He continued, “But so much of the good has been ruined by that which is bad.” He referred to the psychiatrist’s characterization of Wood’s contact with the boys. “This court is not of the opinion that this was a loving, caring relationship,” he said. “It was a very vile relationship.” The judge issued a sentence of ten years in prison, for five counts of sodomy.文章引用了巡回法官弗兰克·康利（Frank Conley）的话。“我认为没有哪个案件比这个案件更让我作为一名法官感到个人痛苦，”他告诉被告。“我看到了许多你所做的善事。”他继续说道，“但这么多善事都被那些坏事毁了。”他提到了精神病医生对伍德与男孩们接触的描述。“本法庭不认为这是一种充满爱、关怀的关系，”他说。“这是一种非常卑劣的关系。”法官因五项鸡奸罪判处他十年监禁。

Judge Conley’s mother lived on my route, and I threw the paper onto her porch. For the first time in months, I didn’t feel nervous on South Garth. At 110, the house was dark, the way it had been every morning since the arrest.康利法官的母亲住在我的路线上，我把报纸扔到了她的门廊上。几个月来我第一次在南加斯街不再感到紧张。在110号，房子是黑的，正如他被捕后的每天早上一样。

Beginning that fall, a number of terrible stories about boys appeared in the paper. In southern Missouri, a woman and her boyfriend were arrested after locking her seven-year-old son in the basement for three months. When authorities found the boy, he weighed thirty-two pounds. The Missourian quoted the woman’s explanation for her boyfriend’s treatment of the child. “He didn’t like him,” she said. “He didn’t want him to come out of the basement.” Another local court case involved two adult Boy Scout troop leaders who, during a camp-out, branded their Scouts on the buttocks with a red-hot coat hanger that had been shaped like male genitals. A college student in Columbia was arrested and sentenced to prison after shooting his former foster father in the back of the head. For years, the man had taken in multiple foster children, always boys, and he repeatedly paddled them, took nude photographs, and administered enemas, which he tape recorded so that he could replay the children’s moans. The college student had complained to a family-services agency and received no response, so he used a .22-calibre pistol that had been borrowed from a neighbor. If you have a problem, fix it yourself. After he was sentenced to five years, the young man told the Missourian, “I always figured I’d spend some time.”从那个秋天开始，报纸上出现了许多关于男孩的可怕报道。在密苏里州南部，一名女子和她的男友在将她七岁的儿子锁在地下室三个月后被捕。当当局发现这个男孩时，他只有32磅重。《密苏里人报》引用了该女子对男友虐待孩子行为的解释。“他不喜欢他，”她说。“他不想让他走出地下室。”另一个地方法院案件涉及两名成年童子军领队，他们在露营期间，用烧红的、形状像男性生殖器的衣架在童子军的臀部烙印。哥伦比亚市一名大学生在枪杀其前养父后被捕并被判入狱。多年来，该男子收养了多名养子，总是男孩，他反复鞭打他们，拍摄裸照，并进行灌肠，还录下磁带以便反复播放孩子们的呻吟声。这名大学生曾向家庭服务机构投诉但未得到回应，于是他使用了一把从邻居那里借来的.22口径手枪。如果你有问题，自己解决。在被判五年监禁后，这名年轻人告诉《密苏里人报》：“我一直觉得我会坐牢的。”

These stories prompted anguished letters and editorials. Citizens wondered if something was wrong with society, and they debated whether Glenn Wood had deserved to go to jail. The husband of one of Wood’s daughters wrote to the Tribune:《论坛报》：这些故事引发了痛苦的信件和社论。市民们想知道社会是否出了问题，并争论格伦·伍德是否罪有应得。伍德的一位女婿写信给《论坛报》：

There’s a story that never appeared in any page or in any newscast about the Glenn Wood case. . . . It’s a story of that home shattered, but through faith in a God of love and mercy and grace, holding firmly to one another. . . . It’s a story of unbelievable courage, of fighting back against immeasurable odds. . . . We’ve had to live with judgement and criticism and prejudice.
有一个关于格伦·伍德案的故事从未出现在任何版面或任何新闻广播中。……这是一个家庭破碎的故事，但通过对爱、怜悯和恩典之神的信仰，彼此紧紧相依。……这是一个令人难以置信的勇气的故事，是在不可估量的困难中反击的故事。……我们不得不忍受审判、批评和偏见。

Richardson, who had helped conduct the initial investigation, published a response. In earlier stories, the detective had seemed to minimize the impact of Wood’s crimes. But now he set the record straight:曾参与初步调查的理查森发表了回应。在早期的报道中，这位侦探似乎淡化了伍德罪行的影响。但现在他澄清了事实：

When talking with these boys, they expressed guilt, shame and just as much, if not more trauma than we see in rape victims. Some told of how they were first approached by Wood, how he physically jerked their trousers down. . . . Wood told me that for the past 30 years, he has had an obsession for little boys. I can’t help but feel that, during that long period of time, some of his friends and relatives must have suspected some of his actions. Why didn’t they help him then? I also wonder how many other young boys were victims in those 30 years.
当与这些男孩交谈时，他们表达了内疚、羞耻，以及与我们在强奸受害者身上看到的同样多、甚至更多的创伤。一些人讲述了伍德是如何第一次接近他们的，他是如何粗暴地扒下他们的裤子的。……伍德告诉我，在过去的30年里，他一直对小男孩有痴迷。我不禁感到，在那漫长的时间里，他的一些朋友和亲戚肯定怀疑过他的一些行为。为什么他们当时不帮他？我也想知道在过去的30年里，还有多少其他年轻男孩是受害者。

Recently, when reviewing these articles, I recognized many phrases and details, because I had read them so obsessively as a thirteen-year-old. Another Missourian story appeared on September 8, 1982, under the headline “IOWA NEWSBOY VANISHES; SEARCH PARTY STUMPED爱荷华报童失踪；搜救队束手无策.” A paperboy named John Gosch, who was my age, had disappeared on a Sunday morning. Gosch became one of the first missing children to be featured on milk cartons.最近，在回顾这些文章时，我认出了许多短语和细节，因为我十三岁时曾如此痴迷地阅读它们。《密苏里人报》在1982年9月8日刊登了另一则报道，标题为“爱荷华报童失踪；搜救队束手无策”。一个和我同龄的叫约翰·高什（John Gosch）的报童在一个周日早晨失踪了。高什成了第一批出现在牛奶盒上的失踪儿童之一。

He also became one of the reasons that children stopped working as carriers. Last year, I met with Bruce Moore, who had started working at the Missourian in 1982, eventually becoming circulation manager. “You were one of the last kids to deliver the newspaper by bike,” Moore told me. “It happened not because the Missourian didn’t want to hire kids. It was because society dictated it was unsafe for kids to be delivering at that time in the dark.”他也成了孩子们停止做投递员的原因之一。去年，我见到了布鲁斯·摩尔（Bruce Moore），他于1982年开始在《密苏里人报》工作，最终成为发行经理。“你是最后一批骑自行车送报的孩子之一，”摩尔告诉我。“这并不是因为《密苏里人报》不想雇佣孩子。而是因为社会认为在那个时候天黑送报对孩子来说不安全。”

Nearly forty-four years after Gosch disappeared, his case remains unsolved. When I read the old Missourian story, one detail echoed in my memory. On the morning the boy vanished, his parents found the wagon that he used to haul the heavy Sunday edition of the Des Moines Register《纪事报》. Gosch’s mother was quoted: “Every single paper was in his wagon.”在高什失踪近四十四年后，他的案件仍未破获。当我阅读《密苏里人报》的那篇旧报道时，一个细节在我的记忆中回荡。在那男孩失踪的早晨，他的父母找到了他用来运送沉重的周日版《得梅因纪事报》（Des Moines Register）的货车。高什的母亲被引用说：“每一份报纸都在他的车里。”

I never won Carrier of the Year. By the final stage of my career, I knew that it wouldn’t happen, because I had recognized patterns. Children tended to win early—that was why I was named Carrier of the Month when I was only ten. My analysis was that the Missourian wanted to encourage younger carriers, and by the time they got older they were probably on the way out, so it wasn’t worth wasting awards on them. This was a good life lesson, one that would have made sense to Thorstein Veblen: the longer you work for a company, the less you are valued.我从未赢得过年度最佳投递员。到我职业生涯的最后阶段，我知道那不会发生，因为我已经认清了模式。孩子们往往在早期获奖——这就是为什么我才十岁就被评为月度最佳投递员的原因。我的分析是，《密苏里人报》想要鼓励年轻的投递员，而当他们长大时，可能已经准备离开了，所以不值得在他们身上浪费奖项。这是一个很好的生活教训，对索尔斯坦·凡勃伦来说很有道理：你在一家公司工作的时间越长，你的价值就越低。

My last day on the job turned out to be Wednesday, August 22, 1984. On that morning, the top headline read “GOP CONVENTION PASSES BATTLE PLAN: FORD UNLEASHES ON MONDALE共和党大会通过作战计划：福特对蒙代尔发起猛烈抨击.” The paper was sixty-two pages, with a price of twenty-five cents, and it weighed 15.4 ounces. The size was significant because, while carrying an unusually heavy bag and taking a tight turn on my bike in a parking lot, I skidded out and fractured my left tibia. I lay in the parking lot shouting until somebody called an ambulance.我最后一天上班是1984年8月22日，星期三。那天早上，头条新闻是“共和党大会通过作战计划：福特对蒙代尔发起猛烈抨击”。报纸有六十二页，售价二十五美分，重15.4盎司。这个尺寸很重要，因为在停车场骑车带着一个异常沉重的袋子并急转弯时，我滑倒并骨折了左胫骨。我躺在停车场大喊大叫，直到有人叫了救护车。

Before the accident, I had already been thinking about quitting. On the next International Newspaper Carrier Day, when the Missourian announced its Carrier of the Year, it also ran a small notice:在事故发生前，我就已经在考虑辞职了。在下一个国际报童日，《密苏里人报》宣布其年度最佳投递员时，也刊登了一则小公告：

SPECIAL RECOGNITION TO PETER HESSLER WHO BROKE HIS LEG WHILE ON THE JOB
特别表彰在工作中骨折的彼得·赫斯勒（Peter Hessler）

Two other mornings from that final period remain vivid in my mind. One was when the S.A.E. house caught fire. On a bitterly cold January morning in 1984, I approached the house through the back lawn and saw that the porch had burned and been gutted. Firefighters had recently left; water from their hoses had frozen into beautiful icy tendrils that ran along the pillared porch.那段最后时期的另外两个早晨在我脑海中依然清晰。一个是S.A.E.房子着火的时候。在1984年一个寒冷的1月早晨，我从后草坪接近房子，看到门廊已经被烧毁并掏空了。消防员刚离开；他们软管喷出的水结成了美丽的冰丝，顺着有柱子的门廊垂下。

The other morning was at some point after Glenn Wood went to prison. I never saw him again, but once, while delivering the papers, I encountered his wife on the sidewalk. She was walking the dog, and I said hello.另一个早晨是在格伦·伍德入狱后的某个时候。我再也没见过他，但有一次，在送报时，我在人行道上遇到了他的妻子。她正在遛狗，我打了声招呼。

The woman said nothing. Our eyes met, and I saw that her face was full of cold fury. A wave of guilt and shame washed over me, and I hurried past. Along with the last time I saw her husband, that encounter remains one of my most awful memories from childhood.那个女人什么也没说。我们的目光相遇，我看到她的脸上充满了冰冷的愤怒。一阵内疚和羞耻感涌上心头，我匆匆走过。连同我最后一次见到她丈夫的经历，那次相遇依然是我童年时代最糟糕的记忆之一。

After turning sixteen, I used my paperboy savings to buy a 1974 Dodge Dart. The car was Mississippi brown and as long as a city block; in high school, I loved its absolute uncoolness. The fact that my parents never saved a cent paid off when I was admitted to Princeton University. I qualified for Pell grants and large amounts of financial aid, and I entered the university determined to become a writer. For the first three semesters, I applied to the introductory course in creative writing, submitting short stories, but each time I was rejected. I felt hopelessly provincial: nothing important or interesting had ever happened to me. I never considered writing about Mr. Wood, because the memory was too painful.十六岁那年，我用送报攒下的钱买了一辆1974年产的道奇达特（Dodge Dart）。这辆车是密西西比棕色的，车身长得像一个街区；高中时，我非常迷恋它那种彻头彻尾的“土气”。父母从未存下一分钱，这一点反而在我被普林斯顿大学录取时显出了优势。我获得了佩尔助学金（Pell grants）和数额可观的经济援助，怀着成为作家的决心进入了大学。前三个学期，我每次都申请选修创意写作入门课并提交短篇小说，但每次都被拒绝了。我感到自己无可救药地狭隘：我的人生中从未发生过任何重要或有趣的事情。我从未想过写写伍德先生，因为那段记忆太过痛苦。

My parents still live in the house where I grew up. They must be among a minuscule number of octogenarians in this country who subscribe to two daily papers in print. Columbia is now the second-smallest community in America with separately owned competing newspapers. The Tribune, like many papers, has suffered after corporate buyouts and staff reductions. But the Missourian thrives, because it is subsidized by the university. Last year, I met with Elizabeth Conner Stephens, the executive editor, in the paper’s spacious offices, at the edge of campus. It felt like a vibrant, old-fashioned newsroom; even in summer, fifty student reporters were busy on staff. “The reason it works for us is we’ve been doing it since 1908,” Stephens said. “It’s been baked into our curriculum.”我的父母至今仍住在我就长大的那栋房子里。在这个国家，他们一定是极少数仍订阅两份纸质日报的八旬老人之一。哥伦比亚市如今是美国仅存的两个拥有独立竞争报纸的社区中规模较小的一个。《论坛报》和许多报纸一样，在经历了企业收购和裁员后元气大伤。但《密苏里人报》却蓬勃发展，因为它得到了大学的资助。去年，我在校园边缘该报宽敞的办公室里见到了执行主编伊丽莎白·康纳·斯蒂芬斯（Elizabeth Conner Stephens）。那里感觉像是一个充满活力、老派的新闻编辑室；即使是在夏天，也有五十名学生记者在忙碌工作。斯蒂芬斯说：“它之所以能行得通，是因为我们从1908年就开始这么做了，这已经融入了我们的课程体系。”

Recently, when I talked with other former carriers, they all mentioned how the job had shaped their adult selves. At the age of twenty-four, Eric Neuner founded NuShoe, which eventually grew to become one of the largest shoe-repair companies in the world. Eric believed that his paperboy obsession with efficiency was one reason he had been good at organizing factories in San Diego and Mexico. He often meets other C.E.O.s from our generation who delivered newspapers as children. Eric also remarked that such a job is impossible to imagine today. “I wouldn’t let my kids go out at five in the morning,” he said.最近，当我与其他前送报员交谈时，他们都提到了这份工作是如何塑造了他们成年后的性格。埃里克·诺伊纳（Eric Neuner）在二十四岁时创立了NuShoe，该公司最终发展成为全球最大的鞋类维修公司之一。埃里克认为，他当送报员时对效率的执着，是他后来能够擅长管理圣地亚哥和墨西哥工厂的原因之一。他经常遇到我们这一代同样在童年时期送过报纸的首席执行官。埃里克还感叹说，今天已经无法想象还有这样的工作了。他说：“我不会让我的孩子凌晨五点就出门。”

Like Eric and many other former carriers, I have never been able to sleep late. To this day, I am uncomfortable around dogs. I am good with money. I fulfilled my parents’ dreams by joining the Peace Corps, but after returning and writing a book about the experience I took the first advance check, called a college friend at Credit Suisse, and started learning how to invest. I know the verse: It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a freelance writer to survive if he can’t manage his finances骆驼穿过针眼比自由撰稿人如果不善理财却能生存下来还要容易. I retain an appetite for silence and solitude, and I can keep a secret. I never told a soul about Mr. Wood until I was thirty years old. I still feel an occasional twinge of guilt, because my life and my marriage have gone well, and I suspect that this might not be true for others who were harmed. For more than four decades, I have saved one of the Missourians《密苏里人报》 I was carrying when I broke my leg. Now the pages are yellowed; the rubber band rotted away years ago. I placed the newspaper on my desk when I began to write this story. ♦像埃里克和许多其他前送报员一样，我从来没能养成睡懒觉的习惯。直到今天，我对狗仍然感到不适。我擅长理财。我通过加入和平队（Peace Corps）实现了父母的梦想，但在回国并写了一本关于这段经历的书后，我拿到第一笔预付款支票，给在瑞士信贷工作的一位大学朋友打了电话，开始学习如何投资。我记得那句经文：骆驼穿过针眼比自由撰稿人如果不善理财却能生存下来还要容易。我依然渴望安静与孤独，并且能够守口如瓶。直到三十岁，我从未向任何人提起过伍德先生的事。我偶尔仍会感到一丝愧疚，因为我的生活和婚姻都很美满，而我怀疑那些曾经受过伤害的人可能并非如此。四十多年来，我一直保留着摔断腿那天我正在派送的一份《密苏里人报》。如今，报纸的页面已经泛黄，橡皮筋多年前也已腐烂。当我开始写这个故事时，我把这份报纸放在了我的书桌上。♦