A Letter To Be Opened In The Event Of My Death Uullee

the following is an excerpt from a book called The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.
I am not reading it because I hear that it is a old-fashioned romance wrapped up by SF concept. But guys, the letter is deeply touching, especially the last sentence.

Dearest Clare,

As I write this, I am sitting at my desk in the back bedroom looking out at your studio across the backyard full of blue evening snow, everything is slick and crusty with ice, and it is very still. It's one of those winter evenings when the coldness of every single thing seems to slow down time,
like the narrow center of an hourglass which time itself flows through, but slowly, slowly. I have the feeling, very familiar to me when out of time but almost never otherwise, of being bouyed up by time, floating effortlessly on its surface like a fat lady swimmer. I had a sudden urge, tonight, here in the house by myself ( you are at Alicia's recital at St. Lucy's ) to
write you a letter. I suddenly wanted to leave something, for after. I think that time is short, now. I feel as though all my reserves, of energy, of pleasure, of duration, are thin, small. I don't feel capable of continuing very much longer. I know you know.

If you are reading this, I am probably dead. ( I say probably because you never know what circumstances may arise; it seems foolish and self-important to just declare one's own death as an out-and-out fact. ) About this death of mine- I hope it was simple and clean and unambiguous. I hope it didn't create too much fuss. I'm sorry. ( This reads like a suicide note. Strange.) But you know: you know that if I could have stayed, if I could have gone on, that I would have clutched every second: whatever it was, this death, you know that it came and took me, like a child carried away by goblins.

Clare, I want to tell you again, I love you. Our love has been the thread through the labyrinth, the net under the high-wire walker, the only real thing in this strange life of mine that I could ever trust. Tonight I feel that my love for you has more density in this world than I do, myself: as though it could linger on after me and surround you, keep you, hold you.

I hate to think of you waiting. I know that you have been waiting for me your whole life, always uncertain of how long this patch of waiting would be. Ten minutes, ten days. A month. What an uncertain husband I have been,Clare, like a sailor, Odysseus alone and buffeted by tall waves, sometimes wily and sometimes just a plaything for the gods. Please, Clare. When I am dead. Stop waiting and be free. Of me-put me deep inside you and then go out in the world and live. Love the world and yourself in it, move through it as though it offers no resistance, as though the world is your natural element. I have given you a life of suspended animation. I don't mean to say that you have done nothing. You created beauty, and meaning with your art, and Alba, who is so amazing, and for me: for me you have been everything.

After my mom died she ate my father up completely. She would have hated it. Every minute of his life since then has been marked by her absence, every action has lacked dimension because she is not there to measure against. And
when I was young I didn't understand, but now, I know, how absence can be present, like a damaged nerve, like a dark bird.

If I had to live on without you I know I could not do it. But I hope, I have this vision of you walking unencumbered, with your shining hair in the sun. I have not seen this with my eyes, but only with my imagination, that makes pictures, that always wanted to paint you, shining; but I hope this vision will be true, anyway.

Clare, there is one last thing, and I have hesitated to tell you, because I'm superstitiously afraid that telling you might cause it to not happen ( I know: silly) and also because I have just been going on about not waiting and this might cause you to wait longer than you have ever waited before. But I will tell you in case you need something, after.

Last summer, I was sitting in Kendrick's waiting room when I suddenly found myself in a dark hallway in a house I don't know. I was sort of tangled up in a bunch of galoshes, and it smelled like rain. At the end of the hall I could see a rim of light around a door, and so I went in very slowly and very quietly to the door and looked in. The room was white, and intensely lit with the morning sun. At the window, with her back to me , sat a woman wearing a coral-colored sweater, with long white hair all down her back. She had a cup of tea beside her, on a table. I must have made some little noise, or she sensed me behind her...she turned and saw me, and I saw her, and it was you, Clare, this was you as an old woman in the future. It was sweet, Clare, it was sweet beyond telling, to come as though from death to hold you, and to see the years all present in your face. I won't tell you any more, so you can imagine it, so you can have it unrehearsed when the time comes, as it will, as it does come. We will see each other again, Clare. Until then, live, fully, present in this world, which is so beautiful.

It's dark, now, and I am very tired. I love you, always. Time is nothing.


最挚爱的克莱尔:

当我写这封信的时候,我正坐在后卧室里我的书桌旁,穿过后院夜色中幽蓝的积雪,眺望你的工作室。万物都披上一层光滑的冰衣,寂静无声。这是无数个冬季夜晚中的一个,每一件事物上的严寒,仿佛令时间减缓了速度,仿佛让它们从沙漏狭小的中央穿过,不过,那么缓慢,缓慢。我有种很熟悉的感觉,我被时间托起来,就像一个正在夏日里游泳的肥妇人,轻而易举地漂浮到它的上面,这种感觉只有当我离开正常的时间后,才能体会到。今晚,就我自己一个人(你正在圣路丝教堂,听爱丽西亚的独奏音乐会),我突然有种冲动,向给你写封信。我想为你留下些东西,在之后。我觉得,时间越来越少了。我所有的精力、快乐、耐性,都变细了,变少了,我觉得我无法维持太久。我知道你明白的。

当你读这封信的时候,我可能已经死了(我是说可能,因为谁都不知道还会发生什么,直截了当地宣布死亡,不仅愚蠢,而且狂妄)。关于我的死——我希望它简单明了,干净利索,而且毫无悬念。我不希望它引起太多的纷乱。我很抱歉(这听上去像是自杀留言,真奇怪)。可是你知道的:你知道如果我还有一线希望,还能继续留在这个世界上,我会死死抓住每一分钟的:无论如何,这一次,死亡真的来了,它要带走我,就像妖精要把孩子掳走一样。

克莱尔,我想再次告诉你,我爱你。这些年来,我们之间的爱,一直是汪洋的苦海中指航的明灯,是高空钢索步行者身下的安全网,是我怪诞生活中惟一的真实,惟一的信任。今晚我觉得,我对你的爱,比我自己,更紧紧地抓着这个世界:仿佛在我之后,我的爱还可以留下来,包围你,追随你,抱紧你。

我最恨去想你的等待。我知道,你的一生都在等我,每一次都不知道要等多久,十分钟,十天,还是一整个月。克莱尔,我是个靠不住的丈夫,像个海员,像是那独自一人去远航的奥德赛,在高耸的海浪里饱受蹂躏,有时是狡诈的诡计,有时只是众神的小把戏。克莱尔,我请求你。当我死去以后,别再等我,自由地生活吧。至于我——就把我放进你的深处,然后去外面的世界,生活吧。爱这个世界,爱活在这个世界里的自己,请你自由地穿梭,仿佛没有阻力,仿佛这个世界和你本来就同为一体。我给你的都是没有意识、搁置在旁的生活。我并不是说你什么都没做,你在艺术上创造出美丽,并赋予其意义;你带给我们这么了不起的爱尔芭;对于我,你更是我的一切。

我妈妈去世以后,她把我父亲吞噬成一副空壳。如果她知道,她也会恨自己。他生活中的每一秒都被她的空缺标下印记,他的一举一动都失去了量度,因为她不在那里作他衡量的依据。我小时候并不明白,可是现在,我知道了,逝者未曾去,就像受伤的神经,就像死神之鸟。如果没有你,我也不知道该怎么活。但我希望能看见你无拘无束地在阳光下漫步,还有你熠熠生辉的长发。我没有亲眼见过这样的景致,全凭想象,在脑海中形成这幅图画,我一直想照着它画下你灿烂的样子,但我真的希望,这幅画终能成真。

克莱尔,还有最后一件事情,我一直犹豫是否要告诉你,因为我迷信地担心,泄漏天机反倒会阻碍它的发生(我知道我很愚蠢)。还有一个原因,我刚刚让你别再等待,而这次,恐怕会比你任何一次的等待更加漫长。可是如果那以后,你需要些什么,我还是告诉你吧。

去年夏天,我坐在坎德里克的候诊室里,突然发现自己到了一间陌生的房屋,一处漆黑的过道,我被一小堆橡胶靴子缠住,闻上去有雨的味道。在过道的尽头,我看见门边一圈依稀的微光,于是我非常缓慢、非常安静地走到门边,朝里张望。在早晨的强光下,房间里一片亮白。窗边上,背对我坐着的,是一位女士,她穿着珊瑚色的开襟衫,一头白发披在背上,她身边的桌子上放着一杯茶,一定是我发出了声响,或者她已感觉到我在她的身后……她转过身,看见了我,我也看见了她。那是你,克莱尔,是年迈的你,是未来的你。多么甜美的感觉,克莱尔,比一切我能形容的还要甜美。就好像从死神手里走出来,抱着你,看着你脸上留下的岁月的痕迹。我不能再多说了,你可以去想象,当那一刻到来的时候,你将会有全新的感受,那一定会到来的。克莱尔,我们还会再见面的。在那之前,好好地活在这个世界上,它是多么美丽的啊。

现在天色暗了,我也倦了。我爱你,永永远远。时间没有什么了不起。

亨利


Bonus Letter:

Following is a letter from Persuation by Jane Austen. It is called "The Letter" by we Janeites.

"I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath. For you alone I think and plan. Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes? I had not waited even these ten days, could I have read your feelings, as I think you must have penetrated mine. I can hardly write. I am every instant hearing something which overpowers me. You sink your voice, but I can distinguish the tones of that voice when they would be lost on others. Too good, too excellent creature! You do us justice, indeed. You do believe that there is true attachment and constancy among men. Believe it to be most fervent, most undeviating, in
F. W."

"I must go, uncertain of my fate; but I shall return hither, or follow your party, as soon as possible. A word, a look will be enough to decide whether I enter your father's house this evening or never." -- Ch.23

 

偶不行了,看见猫我的老心都被融化了, please click the images for full-size view.

 

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