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Unit 8 Housewifely Arts
第八单元 家庭主妇的艺术
Megan Mayhew Bergman
梅根·梅休·伯格曼
I am my own housewife, my own breadwinner. I make lunches and change light bulbs. I kiss bruises and kill copperheads from the backyard creek with a steel hoe. I change sheets and the oil in my car. I can make a pie crust and exterminate humpback crickets with a homemade glue board, though not at the same time. I'd like to compliment myself on these things because there's no one else around to do it.
我一个人又当爹、又当妈。我自己做饭、换灯泡，自己清理伤口，自己用锄头杀死从后院爬进来的铜头蝮，自已换车坐垫、换车油。我能自己做饼皮用自家做的粘板消灭蟋蟀。我之所以这么贤惠是因为周围真的没有任何人能帮我分担。
Turn left, Ike says.
左转，艾克说。
There is no left-only a Carolina road that appears infinitely flat, surrounded by pines and the occasional car dealership billboard. I lost my mother last spring and am driving nine hours south with 7-year-old so that I might hear her voice again.
左边根本就没有路。面前只有一条直得不能再直的卡罗琳娜路。路两边种着松树，偶尔有一些汽车经销商的广告牌。去年春天我妈妈去世了，在为了再听一次她的声音，我带着7岁的儿子要往南开9个小时的车。
Do you need to pee? I ask. We could stop for lunch.
你想尿尿吗？我问。我们正好找个地方停下吃午餐。
Chicken nuggets? He asks.
鸡块吗？他问。
If I were a better mother, I would say no, there would be bread, carrot, and seedless grapes. If I were a better daughter, Ike would have known his grandmother, spent more time in her arms.
如果我是个好妈妈，我会说坚决说不行，他得吃面包、胡萝卜、无籽葡萄。如果我是个好女儿，艾克就应该知道他的姥姥，多在姥姥怀里待一会。
How much longer? Ike asks.
还有多久？艾克问。
Four hours.
四个小时。
Four hours till what?
四个小时到哪？
You'll see, I say.
到了你就知道了。
What I'm having trouble explaining to Ike is this. We're driving to a small roadside zoo outside of Myrtle Beach so that I can hear my mother's voice ring through the beak of thirty-six-year-African gray parrot, a bird that I hated, a bird that could beep like a microwave, ring like a phone, and sneeze just like me.
我总是不愿意跟儿子解释这些问题。我们要去在美尔特沙滩外的一个小型路边动物园。在那我能从一只36岁的灰色非洲鹦鹉嘴里听见妈妈的声音。我曾经那么恨这只鹦鹉，他能学微波炉的声音、电话的声音，还能生动地学我打喷嚏的声音。
In moments of profound starvation, the exterminator told me, humpback crickets may devour their own legs, though they cannot regenerate limbs.
清除害虫的工人告诉我，蟋蟀在快饿死的时候会吃自己的腿，虽然吃了就再也长不回来了。
Our house has been for sale for a year and contract has finally come in, contingent on a home inspection. The firm I work for has offered to transfer me to Connecticut-in a state where Ike has a better chance of escaping childhood obesity, God, and conservative political leanings. I can't afford to leave until the house sells. My realtor has tried scented candles and apple pies in the oven, but no smokescreen will detract from the cricket infestation.
我们的房子已经挂牌出售一年了。终于有人打算买但是还得取决于最后的房屋验收。我所在的那个公司提出来要将我调到康涅狄格州去工作，那个州里，艾克会有更好的机会避免得儿童肥胖症，也能避免受宗教的控制，以及保守的政治倾向的影响。但是除非我把这个房子卖了，否则我们都搬不起家。房产经纪人已经尝试在我家放香味的蜡烛，在烤箱里放苹果派，但是这些根本不能摆脱那些横行的蟋蟀。
They jump, the realtor said before I left town with Ike. Whenever I open the door to the basement, they hurl themselves at me. You'll never pass a home inspection, he said. Do something.
在我们走之前经纪人还说：“蟋蟀跳得到处都是。每次我打开地下室的门，这些该死的蟋蟀都向我扑过来。你要是再不做点什么就永远都不可能通过房屋验收。”
