Did You Do Something for the Last Time Today?

Mark Mason

人的一生中所擁有的東西不少，無論是幸福還是失意，無論是快樂還是煩惱 ……第一次的印象，你可能永遠都不會忘記：第一次背上新書包，走進校園；第一次拿到大學錄取通知書的欣喜；第一次戀愛；孩子第一次用稚嫩的聲音呼喚你……被人們珍藏在記憶的腦海里，當成人生標志性事件的總是那些“第一次”。然而歷經歲月，當一個個人、一樁樁事在記憶中遠去時，你是否才意識到“最后一次”已經悄然來襲，是否才恍悟到其實有些“最后一次”要遠比“第一次”更深入你心？

The end of the year seems a good time to think about lasts. Not many of us ever do. Firsts are always landmarks: the first time you taste alcohol, drive a car… Then the first time your child talks, walks, goes to school. All are noted at the time, stored away1. store away： 儲存。in the mental file marked “l(fā)ife events”. But when do we ever notice, much less remember, a last? We’re doing them a disservice—in many cases they’re even more poignant than the firsts.2. 我們并沒有認真地重視它們——其實在很多情況下，它們甚至比那些“第一次”更為深刻。 disservice： 傷害；poignant： 深刻的，深深打動人心的。

One problem, of course, is that we often don’t know it’s a last at the time. You’ll register3. register： 〈口〉記住，使留下印象。your last day in a job, or your last exit from a house you’ve owned. Recovering alcoholics note (though only in retrospect4. in retrospect： 回想起來。) the occasion of their last drink. But the last time you go to London? Eat oysters5. oyster： 牡蠣，蠔。? Cry? Only decades later will you realise that a last has occurred,by which time the event itself may well be lost in the fog we call memory.

Someone who was obsessed with6. be obsessed with： 癡迷于……。lasts was Alan Clark. The second volume of his diaries includes an entry about them,focusing on his sons: the last time he read them a bedtime story, kissed them goodnight and so on. The theme highlights why lasts hold such power: they’re a reminder of mortality, of the fact that each one is a step along the road toward the last of all, your final breath.7. 其主題強調了為何那些“最后一次”會擁有如此大的力量：它們暗示死亡，暗示每個“最后一次”都是通往人生之路盡頭的一步。highlight： 強調；mortality： 死亡，下文的immortal意為“不朽的”。We become parents to travel back in time, to attain a proxy8. proxy： 代理的，代替的。state of youth—and then before you know it your children are dragging you forward, reminding you that everything in life changes so quickly. I remember the night before my son’s potty training started, thinking,

‘This will be the last nappy I ever put on him.’9. 我記得在我兒子開始如廁訓練的前一天晚上，我在想“這將是我最后一次給他換尿布?！眕otty training： 如廁訓練，寶寶自主上廁所訓練；nappy： 尿布。Now he’s five: already I’m looking forward (in only one sense of the phrase) to the last time we’ll kiss each other on the lips.

An acceptance of these occasions, surely, is a sign that you’ve accepted you’re not immortal. It’s death by a thousand lasts. A friend of mine has an old squash racquet10. squash racquet： 壁球球拍。which hasn’t seen action for years. He used to play a lot, to a high standard, but now cannot remember his final game: “They just seemed to fizzle out11. fizzle out：〈口〉終于失敗，結果不妙（尤指開始很順利）。.” Instead he sticks to doubles badminton (“much more genteel”).12. doubles badminton： 羽毛球雙打；genteel：文雅的。At least he knows the transition13. transition： 轉變。has been made. Often you don’t. “The last time you don’t know, not really know because there is always hope, until much later.”

Occasionally a last announces itself in a relatively trivial14. trivial： 不重要的，微不足道的。way. Anyone making a purchase late in the afternoon of 31 August 1971, for instance, would have recognised it as their final use of old money, that being the day the penny and threepence departed, ending the transition period to decimal currency.15. threepence：（英國舊時的）三便士；decimal currency： 十進制貨幣。At some point in the next few years, perhaps, when cheques are finally phased out16. phase out： 逐步淘汰。, some of us will be aware of writing our last one. Usually, however, the reason we know a last is a last is the big one, the reason that comes bearing a scythe.17. 但通常來說，我們會意識到某件事是“最后一次”的原因很明顯，那就是死神的降臨。bear a scythe：佩帶一把長柄大鐮刀，喻死神的降臨。This can apply to pets, as with a dog’s final walk before “that” trip to the vet. But when it’s a human approaching the end of their life, occasions carry a real charge.A cousin of mine succumbed to18. succumb to： 死于。illness earlier this year: she and her husband made sure they took one last trip with their teenage children to their beloved Cornwall. It was good that honesty reigned—so often in this country we hide, even in the final days, from the D word, the inevitability that’s clearly so close.19. 坦然面對是很好的——在這個國家，即使是在臨終前的幾天里，我們都會逃避“死亡”這個字眼，逃避這個即將發(fā)生的必然。reign： 統治。At the age of 21 I visited my grandmother in hospital:turning to leave I knew that this would almost certainly be the last time we ever saw each other. Yet still neither of us acknowledged that fact.

More recently I went with a terminally20. terminally： 晚期地，不治地。ill friend to the pub. His death came even more quickly than envisaged, with the result that I’m fairly sure I had Graham’s last pint with him.21. envisage： 設想，預期；Graham： 葡萄牙產的格蘭姆波特酒；pint： [量詞]品脫，主要在英國、美國及愛 爾蘭使用。My partner’s father, meanwhile, has just surrendered to frailty and given up his driving license.22. 同時，我的合伙人的父親也因為身體原因放棄了開車。surrender to： 投降，屈服于；frailty： 虛弱，脆弱，這里指“身體不好”。For anyone, but especially for someone of his generation,driving is a fundamental expression of independence, so the move must have taken courage, and sparked so many memories. The last time he ever drove, we worked out, was to post the application for a renewal of his driving license.