这是 一直夫妇 的第 篇文章

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你关注的这位答主栗之，周一会虐狗，周三、四或五晚上十点会写干货类文章~

没人会摆脱孤独，所以我们常常希望找到另一半，从半圆变成一个完整的圆。但，不是每个人都如此幸运。

有些人没有遇到中意的另一半，有些人与另一半相遇，却发现二人的结合是个错误。好在，世界为失意的人准备了另一份别致的温暖。

Modern Love 是《纽约时报》最受欢迎的专栏之一，译名是《现代爱情》或者《摩登情爱》，但其实这里的 love 并不仅仅是指恋人间的爱。

这个专栏中的故事不是编辑创作的，而是选自读者们的投稿，因为真实，所以更打动人。最近，这个专栏被改编成同名电视剧，每一集都是一个独立的故事。

这篇文章选自第一个故事的第一部分。标题是 When the Doorman Is Your Main Man。main man 有多个意思， 比如，它可以指一个人最好的男性朋友，也可以指机构、队伍中的「主力选手」。

所以，标题可以译为：《我的门卫，我的至交》，如果更感性一点，还可以译为《我的门卫，我的守护者》。

It was summertime in Manhattan, dark and balmy, almost midnight, on the Upper West Side. He and I rounded the corner from Amsterdam. Drinks had gone well. Walking me home, he held my hand. Tipsy, I said, “You can’t come up,” and stopped near a stoop.

故事发生在 a balmy midnight，balmy /'bɑmi/ 是指 ( of the air, weather, etc. )warm and pleasant（空气、天气等）温暖惬意的。

我的 date （正在约会的对象，文章中的两人还没有确定关系） 送我回家，刚走过拐角 round the corner，尽管酒醉微醺 tipsy，但我还是理智地说：“You can’t come up.”

男生送喜欢的女生回家，希望关系进一步发展或者起了色胆，会在楼下试探问道：「能不能上楼坐坐」，这个「上楼坐坐」在英语中就是 come up。

不过 come up 还有另一个意思，是指「往前走」。因为这句话有两层意思，所以，男生误会了女主——

“I don’t want to,” he said coyly, placing his hands on my waist, drawing me close. “But I do want to see you again.” He smiled.

男生搂着女主的腰，有些羞涩，「人家没想去你家。」哼，鬼才信呢。coyly 的形容词是 coy，有两种意思，一是 （对爱情或性）害羞的，二是，假装害羞的。A coy person is shy, or pretends to be shy, about love and sex.

要形容一个人露出「羞涩的微笑」，我们可以说 gave sb. a coy smile。

She gave me a coy smile. 她羞答答地对我笑了笑。

I smiled. “What I mean is, if you want to kiss me good night, it has to be here.” We weren’t even close to my building.

女主微笑脸：那啥，我的意思是，如果我们要亲亲告别的话，咱们就不能往前走了。

“But I thought you lived in ——” he said, craning his neck to look for street signs “——the 90s?”

crane /kren/ 的动词和名词含义之间的联系很有意思，crane 是「鹤」，鹤的脖子很长，所以 crane 作动词指：伸长（脖子）看; 探头看

“I do.” I started to stammer, to try to explain. “I do, but see, he knows we’re on our first date, and there’s a window he can see out of onto the sidewalk, and sometimes he’s waiting. If I’m too late, he can get worried.”

女主开始 stammer （口吃，结结巴巴地说）：有人能看见我们，如果我回家太晚，他会担心的。

“Who?” my date asked, looking concerned. “Who can see us?” “Um,” I hedged. “Your boyfriend?” “No.” “Your dad?” “No, no. It’s hard to ——” “Your husband? You’re married?”

这句话吓到了女主的男伴，「他是谁，你男票？老爸？你你你该不会结婚了吧？」女主刚开始 hedged （闪烁其词，欲言又止），不过人家都问到这份上了，也只好老实交代。

hedge /hed/

英文释义：to avoid giving a direct answer to a question or promising to support a particular idea, etc. 闪烁其词；拐弯抹角

I sighed and shrugged, flying my freak flag, ruining the moment. I took a deep breath. “My doorman.”

fly my freak flag 是个俚语。如果从来没有当众唱歌的你在新年晚会上高歌一曲，就可以说 You fly your freak flag，「释放自我」，打破了别人对你的固有印象。

在另一种带贬义的语境下，可以翻译成「放飞自我」。

在文章中，fly my freak flag 是指作者原本不想说门卫的事情，但是男生紧追不舍，打破砂锅问到底，所以这里的意思是「我豁出去了」。

ruin the moment 煞风景，扫兴

跟 ruin 这里的用法很相似的是 spoil，英文释义：to change sth good into sth bad, unpleasant, useless, etc. 破坏；搞坏；糟蹋

I don&#;t want to spoil your fun. 我不想扫你的兴。

Guzim was my doorman, and ours was a common and unsung friendship, that between women living in New York, single and alone, and the doormen who take care of them, acting as gatekeepers, bodyguards, confidants and father figures; the doormen who protect and deliver much more than Zappos boxes and FreshDirect, not because it’s part of the job, but because they’re good men.

unsung 原意是指：not praised or famous but deserving to be 被埋没的；未被颂扬的。

在这里是说，作者和门卫之间的友谊普普通通，君子之交淡如水。

在纽约，很多女生独身一人打拼，楼下的门卫成了她们的「护花使者」，不仅帮忙收快递，还变成了女生们的保镖、confidant（好友），甚至还扮演了父亲的部分角色。

几乎每个人都需要有朋友，尤其是那种跟自己无话不谈，你会把小秘密告诉对方的密友，也就是 confidant。

想要表示你和朋友很亲密，还可以说某人是你的 closest buddy，bosom friend/buddy, 《知音》的英文名就是 Bosom Friend。

“I don’t like him,” Guzim said of a new guy I was dating two months later. He whispered this over the intercom. I entered the lobby and saw them outside, my doorman and my date on the sidewalk, laughing and chatting. My date turned to flick his cigarette away, and Guzim took the moment to shoot me a look: He had gotten the scoop and was already wary. I waved goodbye as my date and I walked off. When I glanced back, Guzim shook his head. I rolled my eyes. What did he know? What could he tell from a -minute talk? My date turned out to be sexy and funny, spoke gorgeous Hebrew and partied too much. And so I agreed to a second drink and saw him again, and again, as autumn drew on. I was always attracted to bad boys.

两个月后，我跟另一个男生开始交往，Guzim 跟男生聊了一会儿，打门禁电话跟我说：我不喜欢这家伙。

于是我下楼找他们，趁男生 turned to flick his cigarette away 弹烟灰的功夫，Guzim 给了我一个眼神，「这人不行」。

flick 是另一个我们经常会用到的动词，「弹」。大拇指和食指来个慢动作，弹弹弹，弹走鱼尾纹，biu~~

文章中有好几个跟「眼睛」相关的动作，我们一起来看一下。

shoot me a look，shoot 在这里的意思不再是「射击」，而是「看」。

英文释义：look at sb. quickly and briefly, often in a way that expresses your feelings 迅速地看某人一眼

glance back：回看

roll my eyes：「翻白眼」就是它了，用来表示我不开心或认为某事有些蠢

scoop 是指「最新消息，内幕消息」。如果八卦的你要是挖到了某人的「料」，就可以这样说：

I got the inside scoop on his new girlfriend.

我有他新女友的最新内幕消息。

Guzim wasn’t a bad boy. He was kind and well mannered, a gray-haired cross between Cary Grant and George Clooney. Born in Albania in the mid-1940s, he hailed from an educated military family; his father had been an army general. When Guzim was , the communist leader Enver Hoxha’s secret police arrested and interned his family, accusing them of treason.

Guzim 其实是个好人。关于他的长相，作者是这么描述的 a cross between Cary Grant and George Clooney。

cross 这里的释义很有意思，cross 可以用来指（动植物的」杂交，混血儿。在本句中的意思和这个义项很接近，不过肯定不是「混血」啦，而是指 Cary 和 George 的「综合体」。

如果你想说某个人既像刘亦菲又有点像刘诗诗，就可以用上 cross。

For years, he lived in a labor camp, forced to farm in a remote area, not unlike Stalin’s gulags. “My whole life as a young man,” he said to me once. He never married. Never had children. At , he was finally released, and the United States granted his family asylum. He found a job as a white-glove doorman in New York. Whenever I asked him how he was, on any day, at any hour, he always said, “No complaints.” This was his mantra.

Guzim 在 岁时就被关了起来，直到 岁才被释放，他所有的青春都在劳改农场度过，没有结婚，也没有孩子。

grant his family asylum 是指向他们一家提供政治庇护

asylum /'salm/ （政治）庇护，避难

mantra 是「口头禅」的意思，Guzim 的口头禅是 No complaints. 「不抱怨」，你的 mantra 是什么呢？

On Halloween night that same year, I walked home again, this time alone, from the -hour CVS. I couldn’t sleep. In pajama bottoms, T-shirt and Uggs, I skipped up the steps into the lobby, a white paper bag clenched in my hand. A pregnancy test was hidden inside.

同年的万圣节晚上，我从 CVS 药店（美国最大的药品零售商）回来，穿着 pajama bottoms 睡裤，拎着一个塑料袋。

塑料袋里的东西是验孕棒，女主发现自己怀孕了。

接下来发生什么事了呢？

作者选择留下这个孩子，还是放弃了呢？

孩子的爸爸出现了吗？

下期栗之小电台揭晓答案。

欢迎转发、评论，你们的支持对我很重要~