《美食祈祷和恋爱》Chapter 54 (118):外甥尼克

Nick, my nephew, is an eight-year-old boy, skinny for his age, scarily smart, frighteningly astute, sensitive and complex. Even minutes after his birth, amid all the squalling newborns in the nursery, he alone was not crying, but looking around with adult, worldly and worried eyes, looking as though he'd done all this before so many times and wasn't sure how excited he felt about having to do it again. This is a child for whom life is never simple, a child who hears and sees and feels everything intensely, a child who can be overcome by emotion so fast sometimes that it unnerves us all. I love this boy so deeply and protectively. I realized—doing the math on the time difference between India and Pennsylvania—that it was nearing his bedtime back home. So I sang the Gurugita to my nephew Nick, to help him sleep. Sometimes he has trouble sleeping because he cannot still his mind. So each devotional word of this hymn, I dedicated to Nick. I filled the song with everything I wished I could teach him about life. I tried to reassure him with every line about how the world is hard and unfair sometimes, but that it's all OK because he is so loved. He is surrounded by souls who would do anything to help him. And not only that—he has wisdom and patience of his own, buried deep inside his being, which will only reveal themselves over time and will always carry him through any trial. He is a gift from God to all of us. I told him this fact through this old Sanskrit scripture, and soon I noticed that I was weeping cool tears. But before I could wipe the tears away the Gurugita was over. The hour and a half was finished. It felt like ten minutes had passed. I realized what had happened—that Nicky had carried me through it. The little soul I'd wanted to help had actually been helping me.

我的外甥尼克，就八岁男孩来说，长得很瘦，聪明过人，精明得可怕，又敏感又复杂。甚至出生后短短几分钟，在育婴室大声嚎哭的新生儿当中，只有他没哭，而是用一双成熟、世故、担忧的眼睛四下打量，神情犹如这些事他已做过多次，不清楚再做一次的感觉有何兴奋。对这个孩子来说，人生永远不是简单的事，他激烈地听、看、感受一切，有时他很快陷入伤感，使每个人感到气馁。我深爱这孩子，保护着他。我发现——计算着印度和宾州之间的时差——此时接近他那边的就寝时间。于是我为外甥尼克吟唱古鲁梵歌，帮助他入睡。他有时难以入眠，因为他的脑子静不下来。因此这首颂歌的每一个祷词，我都献给尼克。我为颂歌注入我想教导他有关人生的一切。我想用每个句子向他保证，世界有时虽冷酷不公，但没有关系，因为他拥有许多爱。他身边的人愿意做任何事来帮助他。不仅如此——他有智慧与耐心深藏在自己内心，将随着时间展现出来，带着他通过任何考验。他是神送给我们每个人的礼物。我通过古梵语经文告诉他这件事，不久，我发现自己流下清凉的泪水，还没来得及擦眼泪，古鲁梵歌已结束。一个半小时唱完了，感觉像过了十分钟。我意识到发生了什么事——尼克帮助我唱完它。我想帮忙的小孩儿居然反过来帮了我的忙。

I walked to the front of the temple and bowed flat on my face in gratitude to my God, to the revolutionary power of love, to myself, to my Guru and to my nephew—briefly understanding on a molecular level (not an intellectual level) that there was no difference whatsoever between any of these words or any of these ideas or any of these people. Then I slid into the meditation cave, where I skipped breakfast and sat for almost two hours, humming with stillness.

我走到寺院前，磕头感谢神，感谢革命性的爱的力量，感谢自己，感谢我的导师以及我的外甥——在分子层面上（而非知识层面上）概略地获知，这些词语、这些想法，或者这些人之间并无任何差异。而后我溜进禅坐洞里，未吃早点，坐了近两个钟头，幽静地哼唱。

Needless to say, I never missed the Gurugita again, and it became the most holy of my practices at the Ashram. Of course Richard from Texas went to great lengths to tease me about having jumped out of the dormitory, being sure to say to me every night after dinner, "See you at The Geet tomorrow morning, Groceries. And, hey—try using the stairs this time, OK?" And, of course, I called my sister the next week and she said that—for reasons nobody could understand—Nick suddenly wasn't having trouble falling asleep anymore. And naturally I was reading in the library a few days later from a book about the Indian saint Sri Ramakrishna, and I stumbled upon a story about a seeker who once came to see the great master and admitted to him that she feared she was not a good enough devotee, feared that she did not love God enough. And the saint said, "Is there nothing you love?" The woman admitted that she adored her young nephew more than anything on earth. The saint said, "There, then. He is your Krishna, your beloved. In your service to your nephew, you are serving God."

不用说，我不再错过古鲁梵歌，它成为我在道场最神圣的修行。当然啰，德州理查竭尽所能拿我从宿舍跳出窗外这件事取笑我，每天晚餐过后，总不忘对我说：“食品杂货，明早声乐课见。嘿——这回可要走楼梯，好吧？”而当然，我在一个星期后打电话给我姐姐，她说，没有人了解为什么，尼克不再有难以入睡的问题。几天后，我在图书馆很自然地读了一本关于印度圣人罗摩克里希纳（SriRamakrishna）的书，意外地读到一则故事，叙述一名信徒有一回前来见上师，向他透露她担心自己不够虔诚，担心自己不够爱神。圣人说：“没有任何你爱的东西吗？”女子承认她爱外甥胜过世间的一切。

But all this is inconsequential. The really amazing thing happened the same day I'd jumped out of the building. That afternoon, I ran into Delia, my roommate. I told her that she had padlocked me into our room. She was aghast. She said, "I can't imagine why I would've done that! Especially because you've been on my mind all morning. I had this really vivid dream about you last night. I haven't been able to stop thinking about it all day."

圣人说：“这就是了。他是你的克里希纳，你心爱的人。你对他履行职责，就是对神履行职责。”但这一切都无关紧要。最让人惊奇的事发生在我跳出窗外的同一天。当天下午，我碰见我的室友黛莉亚。我跟她说她把我锁在房间里，她吓呆了。她说：“我想象不出自己干嘛这么做！尤其我一整个早上都惦记着你。昨晚我梦见你，一个生动的梦，让我一整天想个不停。”

"Tell me," I said.

“告诉我那个梦。”

"I dreamt that you were on fire," Delia said, "and that your bed was on fire, too. I jumped up to try to help you, but by the time I got there, you were nothing but white ash." Eat, Pray, Love

“我梦见你身上着火，”黛莉亚说，“你的床也着火。我跳起来想帮你，但还没到你那里的时候，你已成了白色的灰烬。”