A temporary Haven

A temporary haven

It was heavily rainy dusk. The twilight was dimmed and mingled with the rain, and the blast of wind crazily blew to every one of the pedestrians. I was on my way to the appointed restaurant for meeting my friends. Under such that weather, I didn’t think my umbrella could protect me utterly from the dreadful weather while my shoes started to get moistened. Then, I hastened my steps in order to leave this terrible condition as soon as possible. Yet a traffic light stopped me. I gave up to hurry and make peace with the fierce rain. I tried to distract my attention to Facebook instead of the awful weather. But I felt bored in social media soon. I raised my head and looked around. At the corner of the sidewalk, everyone waiting for the traffic light were phubbing with the incidental music that the rain performed, but a woman was exclusive. The woman sitting on her bicycle next to me caught my attention. She looked so cold as she was shivering and repeating wiping the raindrops on her eyebrow. She’s wearing an earphone with no emotion and expression, and she had nothing to block the pitiless rain. Out of intuition, I asked her “ would you?” and then handed my umbrella closer to her without hesitation. She looked at me and said “thank you” with a slight voice. The subtle atmosphere under the umbrella is filled with extremely silence, both of us were voiceless, and it seemed the fierce rain was coming to be mute.

In that time, I was pondering whether what I did was helpful or it was just self-satisfied and useless. Even though I knew she would get wet and cold after the time she left the haven of umbrella and started riding her bicycle to the next stop, I thought it is the best answer for us to share the umbrella together. At least she may not be colder in that one minute for waiting. I think I have done my best, at least, it’s what I thought. We are on a different way to go; it’s a one-minute accompanying for two of us. I can’t cover the entire journey for her just like nobody can be the cover for anyone in our life voyage. What a mimicking of life! One minute passed, she nodded slightly to me for appreciation and rode her bike away. The rain was still arrogant and unstoppable, but I felt a little bit warm in my heart.

Photo credit: Emil Pakarklis on VisualHunt /CC BY

中文翻譯

那是一個滂沱雨下的黃昏，暮色與雨滴結合而顯得晦暗，陣陣狂風吹向路上每一個人，而我當時正在前往和朋友約好的餐廳的路上。那種天氣侵擾之下，我不覺得我的雨傘可以完全地保住我免於受雨水之難，因為我的鞋子已經開始被雨水浸濕了，我決定加快腳步以逃離這糟糕的雨天，但一個紅燈擋住了我，使我放棄趕路任由風雨肆虐。於是我試著轉移我的注意力到手機上，但很快地意識到社群媒體的無趣，我抬起頭，左看看右看看。在人行道的角落，幾乎所有在等待紅綠燈的人們都低頭滑著手機，搭配著雨水奏起的滴答聲，一切是這般的稀鬆平常。這時一個女生引起了我的注意。她蜷縮在腳踏車上，看起來非常的冷，哆嗦發抖，因為沒有撐傘，她不停的用手抹去眉毛上滴下來擋住視線的雨滴，面無表情的她戴著耳機，看來有些狼狽。這時，我不假思索地問她：「你要一起撐嗎?」，還沒等她答覆就直覺性的把傘湊過去幫她撐著。她看著我小聲地說道：「謝謝」。傘下的微妙氣氛盡是沉默，我們都沒說話，似乎連雨都變得安靜。

那時候，我思考著，我這麼做是真的對她有幫助，還是只是出於自發性的感到想做點甚麼，即使我知道下一分鐘她在離開這把傘的庇護之後，她仍然會騎向滂沱大雨，雨滴會一直追著她直到下一站，但我仍覺得這是對我們倆而言最好的答案，至少她在這等待的一分鐘之內，她不會再感到更冷，而我也做了我能做的了。我們各自有各自的路，這只是我們互相陪伴的一分鐘，我沒辦法替她撐完整段路途，就像沒有人能夠成為另一個人永遠的庇護一樣，這就是人生的寫照呀！一分鐘過去了，她向我點點頭，表示感謝然後騎走，雨依舊下得猖狂，但我心卻感到一點點溫暖。

Chuck Chang

審稿/修改/翻譯
Lily Wang
說故事的人英語工作室

老師對文章評論解析

這篇生活創意書寫，文字清雅溫柔，寫者捕捉了生活中的微小片段，他讓我們有機會透過他的生命鏡頭去觀看在我們生活中也曾出現的片羽時光 - 微小卻彌足珍貴。整個畫面都因文字的生動而在我們眼前鮮活了起來。就如同故事之於人的原初價值，寫出生活中的喜、怒、哀、樂，從中學會珍惜擁有與感到幸福。