《紙上染了 藍》周耀輝

紀念母親的兩年24篇專欄，讀完了竟然眼濕濕。畢竟是真的。而那最終以信件出現的老父親簡直無敵。不禁讓你懷疑或許一路錯的是母親？然而也不重要了。重要的是活下來了 - 感慨萬千都成一句活著就好。


我現在住的家附近有個小公園，每逢星期天，跟香港很多公共地方一樣，坐滿了菲律賓女傭，她們休假一天，都與同鄉聚聚。她們當時的歸屬，大抵就是那個小公園，但我看到她們，聽到她們，卻總會想起水房，想起許許多多至少聚在一起沒有那麼辛苦那麼寂寞的女人。我想起一種屬於女人的活潑，和喜慶。我也好奇，那麼多女人離開了自己的國家，留下來的街區多是男人吧，而在一個多是男人的街區成長，將會成就怎樣的一段童年。

*

我喜歡碌柚葉的氣味。我媽去世不過幾天後的除夕，我姐繼續了這個習俗。我拿起還站著泥土的葉，聞著它的氣味，小小的浴室很快都是蒸汽，升著升著長著長著，浴室長滿幾十年來的碌柚葉。從此，我用碌柚葉洗澡，一半為了迎接新一年，一半為了喚回舊世界。

在新舊之間，我感覺存在。

感覺存在，不容易啊。在我的經驗裡，很多人千方百計或者只用一個輕蔑的眼神或者毫不自覺地叫我們覺得自己不存在。

*

我媽買字花六合彩，也打麻將。她說，做人求生，必須懂游兩種水，濕水和乾水。所以，在我還唸小學的時候，她送我去參加游泳班，也教我打麻將。

《The Blue Hour》陳玉慧

筆觸老讓你想到另一個你認識的人。也不是好看也不是不好看。每個人都有自己的盲點。


Munich, Jan 6th

凌晨三時，我躺在黑暗中，腦中許多畫面不斷更換，像小偷闖入空房後，迅速檢視他想要的東西（我所知道的電影或電視片中的小偷）。

也像流浪漢檢視垃圾堆，或者像大拍賣場的少女挑選衣服，像小孩翻著他們所獲贈的禮物。我檢視自己的內在。像撿骨人開棺撿骨。像妓女清算嫖客留給她的鈔票。

Munich, Jan 8th

牙醫在替我看牙時，他的護士走進房間。她問：診所來了一個失業的女人，問你可不可以援助她？牙醫停下工作，做了一個奇怪的回答：我已經把錢寄去援助印度了。

Munich, Jan 9th

E 的一句話讓我嚇一大跳：非洲人太多了，餓死一些沒關係。而我從未看過任何積極援助非洲的人如她。

Munch, Jan 10th

1
我已經一個月沒打電話給什麼人，一種慶幸感正如及時登上火車，坐在窗前看著火車開動，不禁鬆一口氣。我不需要跟別人聯絡，是這樣嗎？至少，今天二次想打電話給 H，卻打消了念頭。和她沒關係，而是我不想隨便破壞這個新養成的好習慣。有時我會在不對的時候和不對的人聯繫，甚至違反初衷把我的事情告訴別人。

為了怕重複這個行為，我逐不打電話給 H。我現在想像幾個月都不跟任何朋友聯絡。我不知這個想法從何而來，但我的確有這個想法。

III
B 有一隻假眼，這使他的笑容顯得誠懇但不快樂。B 說，他已找到一個更適合他的人。我想像 B 以他的一隻假眼看著那位更適合他的女人。

VII
昨晚在印度餐廳吃 Tandoori 烤雞時，想及去年夏天與父親二度在北京重逢，他請我與他的職員去餐廳用餐，點菜時，我的父親說，“什麼都可以點，但我女兒不吃雞。”

父親記錯了，我並非不吃雞肉，只是十歲那年我不吃。那年，母親在後院養雞，我看著長大的雞被殺時，突然對家人宣布我不吃雞肉了。但那個想法只維持了幾個星期，而父親在三十年後仍然以為如此。

IV
住在漢堡的 K 來拜訪我，她說她剛剛認識一個男人，一切猶如童話故事。我記得她上次也認識一個男人，她也說出同樣的字：童話故事。

V
只有更大的不幸才能讓此時的不幸完全消失。

Munich, May 22nd

一位台灣駐外的外交官以賓士車載我們去用餐，我說，車內氣味很友善（我其實並不喜歡芬芳劑），他答以：台灣外交處境雖困難，個人處境則可以隨時改善。

《邱妙津日記》

1989.6.10

三島啊，告訴我哪裡是我文字的領域，指給我一張地圖吧，我的文字是越來枯澀庸俗了，我什麼也看不到感受不到，我的眼什麼也透視不了，只是兩窪空洞的凹坑罷了。我無法在愛裡發現什麼新意，一切是如此虛妄和無聊，重複的演繹，欺騙的醜陋，我用力把悲傷向上推，然而我還是很容易悲傷，很容易被悲傷壓住，我不知道我又能信任誰。鳥人又在呼喚我，不要跟世界有任何關係，不要承擔任何責任，不要讓自己被任何不願的事扭曲，不要被任何人所沾惹，當猛然清醒停止幻想時，才發現愛是自己投射上去的幻影，只因飢餓。悲傷和絕望的狂暴。

日記只是寂寞的補白，除了重疊無創意的情緒外，就是無數生活裡的噪音，更像個垃圾桶，只是我需要收藏大量的垃圾才能為我活過的生命壓榨出幾張乾燥的標本。但這些都是垃圾，當我發現它們確實無能幫我生活得好時，我認同三島最後把它們通通燒掉。

過了二十歲，我反而渾渾噩噩起來，二十歲前生命是要瞬間燃盡的短暫存在，每一日的灼痛都值得吼出最知名的哀嚎。但二十歲後，我不再是主人，而淪為時間的奴隸，一個必須推著時間磨子的奴隸，要收斂起我的每一聲哀嚎，攢進肚皮底下，“推動磨子”是我的全部形貌和存在的代表符號，二十歲之後我只是一個奴隸編號。時間，它在大笑它的勝利，我再也沒有機會打敗它，它有無數個士兵，我這個鬥士根本砍不完，只有放棄當個憤怒的鬥士，乖乖地被編入無言的檔案裡。

6.13

“無能創造生活”這句話很可怕，我也許有能，但卻不知要創造什麼樣的生活。金錢、時間、感情這三樣東西都被我漫無節制地拋擲到創造生活的偉大工程裡，生活是被三樣東西堆疊出的，但我真的擁抱住我的生活創造物了嗎？我的懷裡好空虛，笑聲眼淚都好虛妄，我過的是一個沒有真實感的生活，我所擁有的全是會瞬間幻滅的東西，我努力地想去創造出真實感來，但仍然紮不進真實裡，總是浮在生活的上空，像被永遠放逐的人。三島的渴望死是因為“從沒真實地存在過”，毛姆說“他一生都像在另一個地方觀看著自己在一座海市蜃樓裡演出”，我不知我們這群族類為什麼會這樣，但卻只有當我和他們緊緊貼著心時我才能不寂寞，只有我深浸溺在他們深窪於一般人的內心世界時才覺得滋潤，所以我也願獻出我的一小窪內心世界，參與這族群類的遊戲。

7.12

C:

......靠著專注於讀書和創作，我拯救了自己，真慶幸我有這兩樣法寶，我的這兩個月暑假我為自己排了慢慢的讀和寫的功課，沒有回員林，每天都很嚴格地逼自己去讀和寫，幹勁十足，滿腦子無論走到哪兒裝的都是我正在寫的東西，那種充實和幸福，真的是我所能過最好的生活了。

你呢？你過得怎麼樣？這一個月裡我反省了很多很多，千言萬語都不用講了，那些都各自埋在心裡就好，我像是千錘百鍊，面對這樣的遭遇已能有一套不自己傷害自己的解釋，但我擔心你很難。答應我，把這樣的遭遇看淡，把發生的任何事歸諸於外在，一點點責任都不要擔，把自己從判刑裡釋放出來，去創造屬於你未來的幸福。我們之間從來沒有誰真的對不起誰，你已經盡力了，請為我這樣告訴你自己。這是我所要說的全部。

7.23

坐在老家朝著大草原的窗口前念書、寫作，是一項彷彿亙古不變的姿勢，這個房間裡的大床和書桌是屬於我的真正地方。把自己的世界限在這房間裡是太枯燥，但把自己從這裡放逐出去卻太孤寂，從這個姿勢放逐出去最後再回到這個姿勢，這一生的線條就是這麼簡單。

1990.4.19

我們是該分開的，我想了這麼久，這樣想已越來越肯定了，因為分離或許不是最美的但卻是最善的，那時的我即使現在的我也不能使你獲得生活的平安充實，我們的相愛雖然美但對我們的生活卻具太強的殺傷力，不是嗎？或許由於我長大的還不夠，仍然承受不了“大愛一個人”但我漸漸地了解“過分愛一個人”和“與那個人生活在一起”是注定相剋的，在愛情裡被激發出一種對於彼此完全結合的美的想像後，若是這種想像的熱情和願望非常強烈，則對於兩人間裂縫的容忍力就相對的非常低，在這種“狂愛”裡人會毫無抵抗力地變成一個狂烈的完美主義者，任何破壞那份至美想像的因子都會被放大到難以忍受的地步，我笑自己說：除了分離外一根針都忍受不起，分離似乎是保存那份至美愛戀想像的最安全方法了。我長大得不夠的地方或許就在於“不懂得若要和你生活在一起就要降低對妳的熱情，就要放棄早先我們彼此激發的關於愛情結合的浪漫幻想。

5.27

跟妹妹說：只要自己長到夠堅強，不怕被你瓦解，隨時都可以回去看你，但是氣度要夠大，大到可以讓你去結婚、去生子、去愛別人、去屬於別人、去過你自由自在的生命，要提升自己有那樣的氣度。

然後我們提到包容，我們說除了兩人之間有明顯的差異可預先排除外，任何一個對象的相處都必須面對個性、價值觀、生活方式的差異，最重要的是熱情要夠，熱情不夠就很容易暴露出你對他的厭惡，之後就是要不斷地提昇自己的氣度，胸襟要夠寬闊，足以離開用偏狹的相對價值觀去批判對方，而是站在愛的態度上，先跳出來客觀地了解對方實實在在是什麼樣子，然後進入愛裡用有益於他的方式對待他。

我們說：心靈的相通是更高、更抽象的相通，是能霸氣地說：“他就是這樣”，這樣的相通是奠基於愛對方更根本的本質。

6.25

愛一個人這件事實在太恐怖了，那樣傾家蕩產地去愛，然後一無所得，然後回復到毫無關聯，彷彿什麼也不曾發生過。但是唯心論說：愛過就是愛過，所有的東西你都不可能佔有，所以人與人的相處無論瞬間或永恆，記憶無論長或短，都一樣存在也都一樣不存在。

7.13

這一陣子過得太動亂了，太多訊息進來又出去，太多人進進出出，什麼也來不及感覺、什麼也來不及留住，卻沒有時間照料到原來已經擁有的，這樣的生活像空架子，我像是穿越一連串時間粒子，就我一個人在穿越，非常寂寞。

我的求知欲真會讓我這一輩子受苦，我像一隻貪婪的知識怪獸，不停歇地學習、吞嚥，讓自己膨脹、肥腫到消化不良，我似乎迷戀於這種累積財富的方式。為了這求知欲，我幾乎不再眷顧什麼，每天啃噬著這個慾望，也讓這個慾望啃噬我，眼裡再也正視不了其他東西，結果太專注在征服知識，變得狹隘且僵硬。我這一輩子不知道還要為這種追求失去多少寶貴東西。

又變得無法感覺了，每天接觸這麼多人，進來這麼多關於人的訊息，但我卻沒有任何美好或感動，我知道我只是機械性地在應付這些人，我聽他們講、對他們微笑、說笑、耍寶、分析、歸納、探索、同理，做盡善盡美的演出，但演出完之後對我竟沒留下任何意義，我只是在上緊我自己的發條並且嗒嗒嗒擺動罷了。所以這些關於人的訊息其實是壓迫的、痛苦的，我不要這種不像活著的感覺，這些人、這些訊息對我更產生隔離、更令我寂寞，像走在沙漠裡見到滿地的骷髏一樣，我在他們身上浪費我的生命。

1995.3.30

有時候你想，無論如何還是活下去吧，雖然你不知道下一步要往哪裡走，但你知道你必須改變你的人生，必須改變你的生活條件，讓自己往一個離瘋狂與死亡較遠的地方走去。

從前所讀塔可夫斯基說的：古代日本的宮廷藝術家等到藝術臻於一個境界時他們就遠走他鄉，改換一個身分，改換一個名字，改換一個人生，重新去創作一種新的藝術。我想人生元素沒什麼是不能轉換的，這才是在自我生命中的獨立。

4.15

三十五歲時我希望擁有自己的講堂、研究室，我希望我有一間簡單、樸素、寫意，擁有小花園的小平房在濱海，我要在那裡過著勞動、栽種的鄉村生活，學習與大自然相處的道理，每天可以到海邊散步、寫信給朋友親友們。這之間若有能與我感通、美麗的靈魂願意走進我的生命一段、給予我什麼，我就接受這些不同經歷的贈與，朝向這些經常會有的幸福和美開放。我要經常去旅行，去和不同的朋友過完全不同的生活，去完全不同的時空裡學習體驗不同的生活方式。我要過一種對世俗、對物質、對喧囂、對人群要求很少的生活，很簡單的生活，只要去創作更多文學、認識更多激動我的靈魂，愛更多，經驗更多朋友的生命，投入更多生命體驗的冒險。當我可以在我的海邊小木屋看海，安靜創作時，若有一個女人自然而然在本性、時機和生活方式上都適合和我共同生活，那就讓她住在小木屋裡的另一個房間吧，隨她要住多久。

...... 或許我根本不必要過分要求一個女人，每個女人都給予她們所能給予我且願意給予我的那部分，我就會很豐足了；我也根本不必要過分愛一個女人，我以我所能的不同深淺度及方式去愛她們就夠了，適度地愛之於維持關係反而更好。既然沒有一個女人能滿足我，那就讓我所愛的這些女人一起滿足我吧。直到有一個女人能完全深愛我到我們能深證完全彼此身身心心相屬，彼此都在那個“獻身”的深深體驗裡，而那個深深的體驗有多深，我們之間的相屬就自然會展開多久。關於“獻身”的體驗需要很深它所包含的內容很廣，是需要很長時間的考驗的，如果那個決定要彼此“獻身”的點真正到來時，我們彼此都會直到的。既然我的熱情如此強大，需要如此之劇烈，就把我全部的愛、美、熱情與需要發洩、寄託在四個我能愛的女人身上吧。但我一個也不會去傷害她們，我會無限溫柔，我會對我的語言、行為、身體和承諾負責的，我會知道我愛她們每個人的深度及各自該如何愛她們的。性不是重要的，能不能碰一個女人或熱情之有無都沒有關係，能不能共同生活在一起或專屬也不是重點。而是我要學習與人生活，給予她們我的靈魂。

《愛的變奏曲 Enigma Variations》Andre Aciman

深刻而錯綜複雜的五段情感故事：在小島與木匠的初戀。目睹女友外遇當晚暗潮洶湧的晚餐派對。暗戀同網球場的曼佛瑞兩年。與曼佛瑞在一起時和大學沒有在一起卻不斷靠近分開的女友，現已結婚生子的克蘿伊。與年輕作家海蒂的黃昏之戀 - 然而已經娶了在晚餐派對遇上的女性克萊兒。

初戀

我以為我哭是因為疼痛，或者因為我開始慌了，但其實我知道還有另一個原因，雖然我摸不清這個原因，或者這原因為什麼會讓我落淚。禮拜堂裡和我心裏有著悲哀，海對岸的大陸有著悲哀，我的身體裡面有更多的悲哀，因為我不懂我的身體以及那個時刻我所需要的很單純的事。我想到了等在我面前的許多歲月，知道這種感覺永不會消失，就算這炙痛消退了，我也沒法忘掉這種羞恥，原諒自己或他讓我做出這種事。將來的歲月裡，我會坐在同一地點，並記得之前我這輩子從來不懂得那種會讓你真的去撫摸自己身體的寂寞。我把破布扔在地上，進家門之前，用園丁的水龍頭和他那塊骯髒的肥皂洗淨了手、手臂和膝蓋。

無論我走到哪裡，每個我見到並渴慕的人，到頭來我都免不了會用你發出的光芒去測量他們。若說我的人生像一條船，你就是那個上了船、開了它的航行燈之後，從此就沒了消息的人。這一切不妨還是擱在我的腦海吧，也只停留在我的腦海裡。可是我一直自己活在你的光芒中被愛著。在公車上，在繁忙的街上，在課堂上，在擁擠的音樂廳裡，一年裡總有一、兩次，不管對方是男是女，每次我瞥見有點像你的人時，心還是會猛然一跳。我們一輩子只愛一次，父親曾經說過，有時太早，有時太遲，而其他時候則總是有幾分蓄意的。

春睏

我跟那個男人道別，他以沮喪、垂頭喪氣的神情點頭回應我，意思是，他們太年輕，所以不懂得老婆、癌症，還有家鄉。不知道怎麼搞的，但我在跟手上的熱狗、公事包和健怡可樂奮戰時，我但願自己停下來，坐在長椅上，並且告訴那個希臘人，我也失去了某個人。他會懂得的。

但就在我繼續朝球場走去時，我醒悟到自己並沒有他的那份絕望。想到茉德跟她的花花公子一路寬衣解帶上到他位於中城摩天大樓不知第幾層的公寓時，我一點也不感到心煩。我可以相見他們倆走在長廊裡，直到終於抵達他的公寓門口，有點尷尬和猶豫，但很感激他們的腳步聲被厚地毯淹沒掉了。袖扣、領帶、她的大腿圈住他赤裸腰部的景象，也不會讓我心煩。我會去打網球，他們會去做愛。我們之中誰是比較快樂的？誰知道呢？

...... 我想著那個整天在賣熱狗的可憐男人，已經在計畫著要打包什麼，要送掉些什麼，要記得什麼，要放手什麼，東西、地方、人，一輩子。也許我也該想想整理一下我的東西。似乎沒有一樣讓我心煩。比起害怕茉德跟別的男人找到了幸福，我更害怕被逮到我看到這對鴛鴦的可能性。她看來如此感情奔放、洋溢、癡迷，我很久沒見過她像這樣了。有部分的我甚至很高興見到她的微笑，摸他頭髮時，一肘漫不經心地擱在支撐他們背後大鏡子的薄邊架上。看起來就像是莫布森珠寶公司手鐲廣告的模特兒。她很美，可是為什麼我不吃醋呢？

這是因為事情來的太快了 - 這不是震驚，甚至不是震驚的開始？還是因為要是你不准許、不逼、不討論，甚至是跟你自己討論，這些都不應該擾亂到宇宙？真的能不想這件事嗎？茉德在欺騙我，我的茉德和別的男人上床，做那些她不跟我做、不能跟我做、不會跟我做的事，因為他懂得怎麼把她帶到那裡，茉德騎著我，當我往上看著她時，她閉著雙眼，而我則完全在她裡面，只不過那不是我，而是別人。

過不久，我知道，我就回去搜遍我臥室裡她放東西的那個抽屜，我以前對別人做過，現在還會再做，雖然我已經知道這缺乏原則，不是因為我需要知道，或者甚至因為我在乎。我可能會落得吃醋的下場，因為我就是得這樣。

《Learning to Live Finally》Jacques Derrida

Eurocentrism 

Since the very beginning of my work - and this would be "deconstruction" itself - I have remained extremely critical with regard to Europeanism or Eurocentrism, especially in certain modern formulations of it, for example, in Valery, Husserl, or Heidegger.  I have written a great deal on this subject and in this direction. Deconstruction in general is an undertaking that many have considered, and rightly so, to be a gesture of suspicion with regard to all Eurocentrism.

Secularism and Marriage

It is not about the veil at school but about the veil of "marriage." I unhesitatingly supported and endorsed with my signature the welcome and courageous initiative taken by Noel Mamere, even though same-sex marriage is an example of that great tradition inaugurated by Americans in the nineteenth century under the name of civil disobedience: not defiance of the Law but disobedience with regard to some legislative provision in the name of a better or higher law - whether to come or already written into the spirit or letter of the Constitution. And so I "signed" in this current legislative context because it seems to me unjust for the rights of homosexuals, as well as hypocritical and ambiguous in both letter and spirit. If i were a legislator, I would propose simply getting rid of the word and concept of "marriage" in our civil and secular code. "Marriage" as a religious, sacred, heterosexual value - with a vow to procreate, to be eternally faithful, and so on - is a concession made by the secular state to the Christian church, and particularly with regard to monogamy, which is neither Jewish (it was imposed upon Jews by Europeans only in the nineteenth century and was not an obligation just a few generations ago in Jewish Maghreb), nor, as is well known, Muslim. By getting rid of the word and concept of "marriage,"and thus this ambiguity or this hypocrisy with regard to the religious and the sacred - things that have no place in a secular constitution - one could put in their place a contractual "civil union," a sort of generalized pacs, one that has been improved, refined, and would remain flexible and adaptable to partners whose sex and number would not be prescribed. As for those who want to be joined in "marriage" in the strict sense of the term - something, by the way, for which my respect remains totally intact - they would be able to do so before the religious authority of their choosing. This is already the case in certain countries where religiously consecrated same-sex marriages are allowed. Some people might thus unite according to one mode or the other, some according to both, others according to neither secular law nor religious law.

War with oneself

I am at war with myself, it's true, you couldn't possibly know to what extent, beyond what you can guess, and I say contradictory things that are, we might say, in real tension; they are what construct me, make me live, and will make me die. I sometimes see this war as terrifying and difficult to bear, but at the same time I know that that is life. I will find peace only in eternal rest. I thus cannot really say that I assume this contradiction, but I know that it is what keeps me alive, and makes me ask precisely the question you recalled earlier, "how dose one learn to live?" 

《Love》Jeanette Winterson

I MISS God. I miss the company of someone loyal. I don't think of God as my betrayer. I miss God who was my friend. I don't know if God exists but I know that if God is your emotional role model, few human relationships will match up. I have an idea that it might be possible. I thought once it had become possible, and that glimpse of something has sent me wandering, trying to find the balance between earth and sky.

I can't settle. I want someone who is fierce and who will love me unto death and know that love is as strong as death and be on my side for ever and ever. I want someone who will destroy and be destroyed by me. There are many forms of love and affection; some people can spend their whole lives together without knowing each other's names. Naming is difficult and time-consuming; it concerns essences and it means power.

*

When we are in love we have the feeling of being understood. The feeling of things being simultaneously settled and disturbed. Hands and voices rummage through us.

*

The Powerbook

"You lost her?"
"Of course I did."
"Have you got over it?"
"It was a love affair, not an assault course."
"Love is an assault course."
"Some wounds never heal."
"I'm sorry."

She put out her hand. "I want to rescue you."
"From what?"
"From the past. From pain."
"The past is only a way of talking."
"Then from pain."
"I don't want a wipe-clean life."
"Don't be so prickly."
"I'm sorry."
"What do you want? Tell me."
"No compromises."
"That's impossible."
"Only the impossible is worth the effort."
"Are you a fanatic or an idealist?"
"Why do you need to label me?"
"I need to understand."
"No, you want to explain me to yourself. You are not sure, so you need a label. But I'm not a piece of furniture with the price on the back."
"This is a heavy way to get some sex."

*

She drank her coffee.  A couple walked by fighting about the dry-cleaning. You meet someone and you can't wait to get your clothes off. A year later and you're fighting about the dry-cleaning. The imperfections are built into the design. 

《On The Move》Oliver Sacks

Jerry has been a good friend and, at one level and another, a sort of guide and implicit mentor. There seem no limits to his curiosity and knowledge. He has one of the most spacious, thoughtful minds I have ever encountered, with a vast base of knowledge of every sort, but it is a base under continual questioning and scrutiny. (I have seen him suddenly stop in mid-sentence and say, "I no longer believe what I was about to say.") At ninety-nine, his remarkable powers seems undiminished.

Mel

In fact, Mel and I kept in touch for another fifteen years, although there were always troubling undercurrents beneath the surface - even more so, perhaps, with Mel, for he was not fully at ease with his own sexuality and longed for physical contact with me, where I had, so far as sex was concerned, given up m illusions and hopes about him.

Our last meeting was no less ambiguous. I was visiting San Francisco in 1978, and Mel arranged to come down from Oregon.  He was curiously and uncharacteristically nervous and insisted we go to a bathhouse together. I have never been to a bathhouse; San Francisco's gay bathhouses were not to my taste. When we stripped off, I saw that Mel's skin, so milky and flawless before, was now covered with brownish "cafe au lait" patches. "Yes, it's neurofibromatosis," he said. "My brother has it too. I thought you should see it," he added. I hugged Mel and wept. I thought of Richard Selig showing me his lymphosarcoma - were the men I loved fated to get terrible diseases? We said goodbye, shaking hands rather formally when we left the bathhouse. We never met or wrote to each other again.

I had had dreams, in our "honeymoon" period, that we would spend our lives together, even into a happy old age; I was all of twenty-eight at the time. Now I am eighty, trying to reconstruct an autobiography of sorts. I find myself thinking of Mel, of us together, inthose early, lyrical, innocent days, wondering what happened to him, whether he is still alive (neurofibromatosis, von Recklinghausen's disease, is an unpredictable animal). I wonder if he will read what I have just written and think more kindly of our ardent, young, very confused selves.

Migraine

"We can give you something for the asthma," I suggested.
"No," he replied, "I'll just get something else..."
"Do you think I NEED to be ill on Sundays?"

I was taken aback at his words, but i said, "Let's discuss it."

We then spent two months exploring his putative need to be ill on Sunday. As we did, his migraines got less and less intrusive and finally more or less disappeared. For me, this was an example of how unconscious motives may sometimes ally themselves to physiological propensities, of how one cannot abstract an ailment or its treatment from the whole pattern, the context, the economy of someone's life.

40 years birthday

July 9, 1973, was my fortieth birthday. I was in London, Awakenings had just been published, and I was having a birthday swim in one of the ponds on Hampstead Heath, the pond in which my father had dunked me when I was a few months old.

I swam out to one of the buoys in the pond and was clinging to it, taking in the scene - there are few more beautiful places to swim - when I was groped underwater. I started violently, and the groper surfaced, a handsome young man with an impish smile on his face.

I smiled back, and we got talking. He was a student at Harvard, he told me, and this was his first time in England. He especially loved London, had been "seeing the sights" of the city every day and going to plays and concerts every evening. His nights, he added had been rather lonely. He was due to return to the States in a week. A friend, now out of town, had lent him his flat. Would I care to visit?

I did so, happily, without my usual cargo of inhibitions and fears - happy that he was so nice looking, that he had taken the initiative, that he was so direct and straightforward, happy, too, that it was my birthday and that I could regard him, our meeting, as the perfect birthday present.

We had a joyous week together - the days full, the nights intimate, a happy, festive, loving week - before he had to return to the States. There were no deep or agonized feelings; we liked each other, we enjoyed ourselves, and we parted without pain or promises when our week was up.

It was just as well that I had no foreknowledge of the future, for after that sweet birthday fling I was to have no sex for the next thirty-five years.

Larry

He had no intention of ever getting a job, and this, I thought, took a special sort of integrity. He was determined to avoid a meaningless busyness; he was frugal, and he could live and even save on his modest pension.

《The Last Interview》Oliver Sacks

ASHBROOK: I mean, you tell this wonderful story, I guess it all depends what frame of mind you bring to it, of Samuel Beckett in Paris with a friend of yours, and your friend saying to him, "Doesn't a day like this make you glad to be alive?" and Beckett answered...

SACKS: "I wouldn't go as far as that."

_

SACKS: I was just joining the faculty at Columbia, and I was having a sort of a... an interview. And at one point, the interviewer said to me, she said, "I have something rather private to ask you. Would you like Ms. Edgar, your assistant, to leave?" And I said, "No, she's privy to all my affairs." And I then said, thinking she was going to ask me about sex, I said, "I haven't had any sex for thirty-five years." I mean, in fact, she was going to ask me my social security number! And she burst into laughter, and she said, "Oh, you poor thing! We must do something about it."

Well, the truth is, Oliver didn't do anything about it because he didn't think he could. I mean, he had chosen Richard, lost Richard. Chosen Mel, lost Mel. What was the point, he was thinking. And then, finally, and who knows when or why these things happen to people, but a man came along who, for the first time, chose Oliver.

SACKS: I had met Billy as I meet a number of people, because I'd been sent a manuscript or a proof for a book. And, um, an intimacy grew between us. I don't think I quite realized how deep it was, but then there was a particular episode in Christmas of '09, when he came up. And in a sort of serious way he has, a serious, careful way, he said, "I have conceived a deep love for you."

《Insomniac City》Bill Haynes

12-26-09:

O, on the phone from NY, stutters to speak: "I know that I put up all kinds of restrictions. Barriers. And was reluctant to go places with you in public. I now want to say that I love you, too, and I would be happy to go anywhere with you."

I am smiling broadly on the other side of the country.

"And I, with you, young man," I tell him.

3-17-12:

O: "I don't know if a passion for symmetry is an intolerance of asymmetry. Do you?"

I: "I think one can be passionate about both. I think one can embody both."

O: "Good. Very good."

Undated Note - 2012:

O: "I sometimes think things are not enough until they are too much. There is no in between for me."

Kr

Rb

Sr

Y

Z

When I ask, he names each of them, following my finger as I go down the list. He interrupts himself at one point: "They like to be remembered and recited like this."

"They?"

O nods.

He could not look more delighted and it's no because of the alcohol.

Listed separately, under the heading, "No or infinitesimal," are the exceptions. He does on to explain the difference between organic and nonorganic chemistry. I do not - and expect I never will - understand half of what he is saying.

7-22-14:

I was standing in the kitchen last night making dinner for the two of us and a thought came to me: This is the happiest I've ever been.

I stopped myself: Is that true?

I kept doing what I was doing, making dinner, sort of testing the feeling; O was talking all the while; and I thought, Yes, yes, it is true. 

5-6-15:

At lunch, the husband of O's niece tells me how he first met Oliver, some forty years ago, at the home of his future father-in-law, O's older brother David: Nicky looked out the window, where he saw a large, bearded man lying on the grass in the garden. "What were you doing?" Nicky asked once he came indoors.

"I was wondering what it is like to be a rose," replied Oliver.

《十二女色》黃碧雲

桃花紅

趙得人立在客廳裡，抬頭是盞老舊的水晶燈，水晶已經發黃，一套褪色的仿路易十五金沙發，牆上掛著老虎皮，一支長銀劍，一副武生行頭：龍頭繡金高靴，金黃班雉尾，蟠龍雙鳳吉祥如意繡金袍甲，銀槍一支。下面擱一個二十八吋大電視機連卡拉OK音響系統，旁邊開一張麻將台，散了一地的菸灰。趙得人覺得像走進什麼精神分裂的病人的牢房；有什麼不協調的，激烈的，虛假造作的情感，正待發作；便不由得心裏發毛，跟細月說：“這屋子好冷呢。” 在客廳裡織襪子的年輕女子，冷冷的看他一眼，便去將電視的聲浪扭得挺高，電視裡正播著獅子獵殺綿羊的紀錄片，綿羊的骨頭在陽光下發亮，獅子將綿羊一直拖回窩裡去，血路在雪地裡緩緩展開，廣播員說：“快樂，幸福，充滿愛的啤啤世界。” 原來已經在賣嬰兒奶粉廣告。細月去將電視聲浪調低，對女子說：“這是你未來的姐夫。” 又對趙得人說：“不要怪她。她是細眉。” 細眉將織針刺到手心去，流了血。

*
......細月無法想像老伯有這樣憤怒的蠻力，一下一下的拍打在計算機上，顯示螢幕跳上系列無意義的數字來，好像進行什麼嚴肅的計算。細月滿嘴腥甜，和老伯撕打起來，高跟鞋一下一下的敲他的頭。待他們拉開他時，她摸一摸門牙，已經鬆了。

他們要了她一隻門牙，或許有點不好意思，便升她值，加了還不錯的薪水。宣布當日小秘書開始給她倒咖啡，叫她“經理”。原來升值也像吸毒，開始了，心裏老蠢蠢欲動。

開始了，就是登了高速賊車，不由自主的轟轟前進。在公共事業公司沒兩年，便給黑社會上市公司高薪挖角，老闆是個城中皆知的黑社會。因為是個黑社會，愛名如命，告報章毀謗的官司以打計，律師們見他便眉開眼笑。也因為是個黑社會，特別崇拜學歷，身邊的助手不是牛津劍橋便是哈佛，細月不過是倫敦商管碩士，只有當助手的助手的份兒。黑社會也不是盞省油的燈，公司業務從飲食地產到化工原料勘探石油都有，當個助理的助理也非樣樣皆通不可，害得細月晚上要上學學化工，上班前要去學德文，好跟德國的工程師打交道。做做做做做，如此十年，成了黑社會裡唯一一個不是出身於牛津劍橋哈佛的私人顧問，在半山買了兩套房子，一間自住，一間炒賣，長了白髮，而且不知何時，染上了哮喘病。為黑社會賣命六年，就得到這些。哮喘病發作時想到了死，或愛情。天天上班十二小時，下班要陪客唱卡拉 OK，吃魚翅，他們上舞廳她才可以脫身，此時她慶幸自己不是男人，不用陪嫖陪睡。然而也因此沒找到可以戀愛的對象，日對夜對，對老闆的頭號陪嫖助手生了情。她哮喘發作他送她回家，當夜便發生了性，然而午夜二時他爬起來回家。 “好男人是無論遇到什麼豔遇都會回家。” 他吻吻她說。“你應該慶幸你遇到個好男人。” 他走後她便換了床單，一直咳嗽，咳出眼淚來。她可沒告訴他這是她的第一次。

*
“我懶惰，迷信活得比較容易。”

*
細涼看著細月臉上細細的皺紋，想念她的種種委屈，只是表面看不出來，她也不會問，但她想她明白，因為她們是姐妹，許多事情，不必問，不必講，就有同情與明白。她伸手撫她臉上的細紋，道：“越來越多了。” 細月撥開她：“別攪。是不是要推銷什麼青春胎盤素，不要跟我來這一套。” 細涼笑：“何止要推銷胎盤素，還要推銷野山參去老人斑霜呢。” 細涼挽住了身邊的細眉，說：“一場姐妹。真是一件奇妙的事。” 再抱住了細月：“你且當我喝醉了。”

這樣溫暖動人，她錯以為幸福。生存感覺，何等虛幻。有這麼一時一刻，她無法分辨什麼是真，什麼是幻。

*
這一年細細升上中學，理科成績特別好：她看不起所有與感情有關的事物，譬如愛，譬如文學。李紅和細青走後周秋梨登時沒有了靠山，沒有收入又沒有照顧，便將房子拿去抵押，拿一點錢度日。細細身世襤褸，穿一條過短的校服裙，一雙襪子穿完洗洗完穿，經常還未乾透便得穿上腳，沒腕錶，老問人：“現在幾點了。幾刻了。” 也就成了她一天會說的話。晚上和老夫吃極鹹極鹹的小菜：“鹹便少吃些。” 周秋梨說。一碟小鹹魚可以吃五天，好像在五十年代，吃得細細臉如菜色，神情又冷靜，益發像小尼姑。周秋梨時好時壞，沒病的時候就問她：“大姐有沒有來看你。” 心絞痛的時候便怨天怨地：“女人都是賤貨。” 將全屋可摔之物摔過稀爛。細細也學會了泰山崩於前而色不變，老是目無表情的將一屋碎片收拾，給周秋梨吃藥，然後回房間計算幾何三角。

十二女色 岸芷汀蘭

這麼一個微涼的晚上，不大冷也不大熱，不像冬天，也不像夏天，月是陰灰的，不亮也不黑，岸芷夜歸。在家門等她回來的是三個男子連三把牛肉刀。男子用刀擱在她的頭上：要錢定要命。要命的話，開門。岸芷慌亂中答她心裏所想的：我不知道我要錢還是要命。這是觀點與角度的問題。

岸芷這樣的人應該死於非命。但世界不是這樣的。她沒事，在拉扯沈吟間，鄰居報了警。

活得最久的就是像岸芷這樣的人。像皇帝企鵝一樣，她什麼都不是，為此可以非常驕傲。