My mother called this summer to stage an intervention.
今年夏天，我妈妈打电话来，想要为我安排介入治疗。
She'd come across a few snippets of my memoir, which wasn't even out yet, and she was concerned. It wasn't the sex.
她看了我的回忆录中的一些片段，这本回忆录甚至还没出版，而她很忧心。并不是性的问题。
It was the language that disturbed her.
是语言风格让她不舒服。
For example: "I have been so many things along my curious journey:
比如：“在我的好奇之旅上，我扮演过好多角色：
a poor boy, a nigger, a Yale man, a Harvard man, a faggot, a Christian,
一个可怜的男孩、一个黑鬼、一个耶鲁人、一个哈佛人、一个基佬、一个基督徒、
a crack baby, alleged, the spawn of Satan, the Second Coming, Casey." That's just page six.
据称是一个毒瘾婴儿、撒旦的崽子、基督复临、卡西。”那不过是书的第六页。
So you may understand my mother's worry. But she wanted only to make one small change.
你们可能可以了解我妈妈的担忧。但她只想要做一个小改变。
So she called, and she began, "Hey, you are a man.
所以她打电话来，开始说：“嘿，你是个男人。
You're not a faggot, you're not a punk, and let me tell you the difference.
你不是基佬，你不是小混混，让我告诉你差别在哪里。
You are prominent. You are intelligent. You dress well. You know how to speak.
你很卓越。你很聪明。你衣着得体。你知道如何说话。
People like you. You don't walk around doing your hand like a punk.
大家喜欢你。你不会像小混混一样游手好闲。
You're not a vagabond on the street. You are an upstanding person who just happens to be gay.
你不是街头的流浪汉。你是堂堂正正的人，只是刚好是同志而已。
Don't put yourself over there when you are over here."
别把你自己置身在那里，因为你是在这里的。”
She thought she'd done me a favor, and in a way, she had.
她以为她是在帮我忙，在某种意义上，的确是。
Her call clarified what I am trying to do with my life and in my work as a writer,
她的电话让我更清楚知道我要拿我的人生做什么，以及身为作家，工作上要做什么，
which is to send one simple message: the way we're taught to live has got to change. I learned this the hard way.
即传递出一个简单的信息：我们被教导的“过日子的方式”必须要改变。我吃了不少苦头才明白这一点。
I was born not on the wrong side of the tracks,
我并没有生在城市中贫民区，
but on the wrong side of a whole river, the Trinity, down in Oak Cliff, Texas.
却是在德州奥克利夫的特里尼提的河边。
I was raised there in part by my grandmother who worked as a domestic, and by my sister,
在那里养育我的人包括我的祖母，她的工作是佣人，还有我姐姐，
who adopted me a few years after our mother, who struggled with mental illness, disappeared.
她领养了我，时间是在我们受心理疾病所苦的妈妈消失之后几年。
And it was that disappearance, that began when I was 13 and lasted for five years,
她的失踪，从我十三岁开始共五年，
that shaped the person I became, the person I later had to unbecome.
造就了我后来的样子，但后来我又变了，脱离那个样子。
Before she left, my mother had been my human hiding place.
但在我妈妈离开之前，她一直是可以让我躲藏的庇护所。
She was the only other person who seemed as strange as me, beautifully strange,
她是唯一一个跟我一样奇怪的人，一种美丽的奇怪，
some mix of Blanche DuBois from "A Streetcar Named Desire" and a 1980s Whitney Houston.
像是《欲望街车》中的布兰奇·杜波依斯与80年代的惠特妮·休斯顿的混合。
I'm not saying she was perfect, just that I sure benefited from her imperfections.
我并不是说她很完美，只是说，我肯定从她的不完美中受惠。
And maybe that's what magic is, after all: a useful mistake.
也许，归根结底，那就是魔法：一个有用的错误。
So when she began to disappear for days at a time, I turned to some magic of my own.
当她开始会一次就消失好几天时，我便转而仰赖我自己的魔法。
It struck me, as from above, that I could conjure up my mother just by walking perfectly
我突然有个天外飞来的想法，有个方法可以让我妈妈魔法般出现，就是要完美地行走，
from my elementary school at the top of a steep hill all the way down to my grandmother's house,
从陡丘顶上我就读的小学，一路向下走到我祖母的房子，
placing one foot, and one foot only, in each sidewalk square.
一次只能把一只脚踏在一个人行道方块中。
I couldn't let any part of any foot touch the line between the square, I couldn't skip a square,
不能让脚的任何一部分碰触到方块间的界线，不能跳过任何一个方块，
all the way to the last square at the last blade of grass that separated our lawn from our driveway.
一路走到最后一个方块，走到将我们的草皮和我们的车道分开的最后一片草叶。
And I bullshit you not, it worked -- just once though.
我没有唬你们，真的有用--不过，只有一次有用。
But if my perfect walk could not bring my mother back, I found that this approach had other uses.
但就算我的完美走路法无法把我妈妈带回来，我发现这个方法还有其他的用途。
I found that everyone else in charge around me loved nothing more than perfection, obedience, submission.
我发现我身边每个负责的人都只爱完美、服从、归顺。
Or at least if I submitted, they wouldn't bother me too much.
或至少，如果我归顺了，他们就不太会找我麻烦。
So I took a bargain that I'd later see in a prison, a Stasi prison in Berlin, on a sign that read,
所以我做了协议，后来，我在柏林一个国家安全部的人所带的标语上看到这种协议：
"He who adapts can live tolerably."
“适应的人能够过得去。”
It was a bargain that helped ensure I had a place to stay and food to eat;
这项协议协助确保我有地方待、有食物吃；
a bargain that won me praise of teachers and kin, strangers; a bargain that paid off big time, it seemed,
是让我赢得老师、亲戚、陌生人称赞的一项协议；似乎后续有很大回报的一项协议，
when one day at 17, a man from Yale showed up at my high school to recruit me for Yale's football team.
我十七岁时有一天，有一个来自耶鲁的人来到我的高中，招募我加入耶鲁的足球队。
It felt as out of the blue to me then as it may to you now.
我当时感意外的程度和你们现在差不多。
The Yale man said -- everybody said -- that this was the best thing that could ever happen to me,
这个耶鲁人说--大家都说--这是我能遇到最棒的事，
the best thing that could happen to the whole community.
这是整个社区能遇到最棒的事。
"Take this ticket, boy," they told me. I was not so sure.
他们告诉我：“把握这张门票，孩子。”但我没有这么肯定。
Yale seemed another world entire: a cold, foreign, hostile place.
耶鲁似乎是全然不同的世界：冰冷、陌生、有敌意的地方。
On the first day of my recruiting visit, I texted my sister an excuse for not going.
在我招生参访的第一天，我用信息传了一个不去的借口给我姐姐。
"These people are so weird." She replied, "You'll fit right in."
“这些人好奇怪。”她回：“那你会如鱼得水。”
I took the ticket and worked damn hard to fit right in.
我用了这张门票，非常尽力去融入。
When my freshman advisor warned me not to wear my fitted hats on campus ...
当我的新生指导顾问警告我，在校园不要戴我那些棒球帽...
"You're at Yale now. You don't have to do that anymore," she said.
她说：“你现在在耶鲁了。你不需要再那么做了。”
I figured, this was just one of the small prices that must be paid to make it.
我想，这是要成功所必须要付出的小代价之一。
I paid them all, or tried, and sure enough they seemed to pay me back:
我全都付了，至少试着付了，当然，我似乎有得到回报：
made me a leader on the varsity football team;
让我成了足球校队的队长；
got me into a not-so-secret society and a job on Wall Street, and later in Washington.
让我进入了个不怎么秘密的兄弟会，在华尔街得到一份工作，后来到华盛顿工作。
Things were going so well that I figured naturally I should be President of the United States.
一切都很顺利，让我觉得若再这样自然发展下去，我就会变成美国总统。
But since I was only 24 and since even presidents have to start somewhere, I settled instead on a run for Congress.
但因为我只有二十四岁，且即使是总统也得有个起步点，我就妥协退一步，去竞选国会。
Now, this was in the afterglow of that great 2008 election:
这是2008年选举的余辉：
the election during which a serious, moderate senator stressed,
在该选举中，一位严肃、温和的议员指出：
"The message you've got to send more than any other message is that Barack Obama is just like us."
“你最应该要传递出来的信息就是奥巴马和我们没两样。”
They sent that message so well that their campaign became the gold standard of modern politics, if not modern life,
他们把这个信息传递得真好，以致于他们的的竞选活动变成了现代政治的黄金标准，甚至是现代生活的黄金标准，
which also seems to demand that we each do whatever it takes
它似乎也要求我们每个人都要不计代价做到，
to be able to say at the end of our days with peace and satisfaction, "I was just like everybody else."
能够在我们生命的尽头时，带着祥和与满足说：“我和所有其他人一样。”
And this would be my message, too.
这也是我的信息。
So one night, I made one final call to my prospective campaign manager.
有一天晚上，我打了最后一通电话给我未来的竞选活动经理。
We'd do the things it'd take to win, but first he had one question: "Is there anything I need to know?"
我们会做胜选需要的事情，但首先，他有一个问题：“有什么我需要知道的吗？”
I held the phone and finally said, "Well, you should probably know I'm gay." Silence.
我拿着电话，终于说：“嗯，你可能应该要知道，我是同性恋。”沉默。
"Hmm. I see," he nearly whispered, as if he'd found a shiny penny or a dead baby bird.
他用近乎耳语的声音说：“嗯，我知道了。”说得好像他发现了发光的一分钱或是一只死掉的小鸟。
"I'm glad you told me," he continued. "You definitely didn't make my job any easier.
他继续说：“很高兴你告诉我。”“你肯定没有让我的工作更轻松。
I mean, you are in Texas. But it's not impossible, not impossible.
我的意思是，你在德州。但不是不可能，不是不可能。
But Casey, let me ask you something: How are you going to feel when somebody, say, at a rally, calls you a faggot?
但卡西，让我问你一件事：在集会上若有人称你为基佬，你会有什么感觉？
And let's be real, OK? You do understand that somebody might want to physically harm you.
咱们实际点，好吗？你应该知道，有人可能会想要对你做出人身伤害。
I just want to know: Are you really ready for this?"
我只想知道：你真的准备好面对这些了吗？”
I wasn't. And I could not understand -- could hardly breathe or think, or say a word.
我没准备好。并且我无法了解--几乎无法呼吸，或思考，或说出一个字。
But to be clear: the boy that I was at that time would have leapt at the chance to be harmed,
但让我说清楚：当时还是个男孩的我，会愿意一赌冒着被伤害的险，
to sacrifice everything, even life, for a cause.
愿意为理想牺牲一切，甚至生命。
There was something shocking, though -- not that there should have been, but there was
不过，有一点很让人震惊--并不是说本来应该要有，但就是有，
in the notion that he might be harmed for nothing more than being himself,
就是这个概念：他可能只因为做自己就被伤害，
which he had not even tried to do in the first place.
并且他甚至一开始都没有打算要做自己呢。
All that he -- all that I -- had tried to do and be was what I thought was asked of me.
所有他--所有我--试着要做的，就是我认为别人要我做的。
I was prominent for a 24-year-old: intelligent, I spoke well, dressed decent; I was an upstanding citizen.
就二十四岁的人来说，我很突出：聪明、很会说话、仪容得体；我是堂堂正正的公民。
But the bargain I had accepted could not save me after all, nor can it save you.
但我所接受的协议，终究还是无法拯救我，它也无法拯救你。
You may have already learned this lesson, or you will, regardless of your sexuality.
你可能已经学到这一课了，或者将来才会学到，不论你的性别是什么。
The queer receives a concentrated dose, no doubt, but repression is a bitter pill that's offered to us all.
无疑的，剂量会集中在同性恋身上，但“打压”是一种很苦的药丸，每个人都有领到。
We're taught to hide so many parts of who we are and what we've been through: our love, our pain, for some, our faith.
我们被教导要把我们部分的自己及我们部分的经历给隐藏起来：我们的爱、我们的痛苦，对一些人来说，还有我们的信念。

So while coming out to the world can be hard, coming in to all the raw, strange magic of ourselves can be much harder.
所以，虽然出柜面对世界是很困难的事，入柜躲到我们自己那不成熟、奇怪的魔法中，可能会更困难。
As Miles Davis said, "It takes a long time to sound like yourself." That surely was the case for me.
迈尔斯·戴维斯说过：“要花很长的时间，才能听起来像你自己。”我肯定就是他说的那样。
I had my private revelation that night at 24, but mostly went on with my life.
二十四岁的那个晚上，我得到了我自己私人的启示，但我大致上还是继续过我的人生。
I went on to Harvard Business School, started a successful nonprofit,
我去读了哈佛商学院，成立了成功的非营利机构，
wound up on the cover of a magazine, on the stage at TED.
最终也上了杂志的封面，上了TED的舞台。
I had achieved, by my late 20s, about everything a kid is supposed to achieve.
我还不到三十岁，就几乎达成了一个孩子应该要达成的一切。
But I was real cracked up: not exactly having a nervous breakdown, but not too far off, and awful sad either way.
但我真的要碎裂了：还没到精神崩溃，但也不远了，不论哪一种，都很悲哀。
I had never thought of being a writer, didn't even read, in earnest, until I was nearly 23.
我从来没有想过要当作家，说真的，近二十三岁时我才开始热切地阅读。
But the book business is about the only industry that will pay you to investigate your own problems, so...
但图书业似乎是唯一会付钱让你探究自身问题的行业，所以...
So I decided to give it a try, to trace those cracks with words.
所以我决定一试，用文字来追踪那些裂缝。
Now, what came out on the page was about as strange as I felt at that time, which alarmed some people at first.
呈现在页面上的成果，和我当时的感受一样奇怪，一开始，这点让一些人感到不安。
A respected writer called to stage his own intervention after reading a few early chapters,
一位受敬重的作家，在读了前面几章之后，打电话来干预，
and he began, much like my mother, "Hey, listen. You've been hired to write an autobiography.
他用和我妈妈很像的方式开始讲电话：“嘿，听着。你是受雇写一本自传。
It's a straightforward exercise. It's got a beginning, middle and end, and is grounded in the facts of your life.
自传是很直截了当的东西。它有开端、中间和结尾，并且以你人生中的事实为基础。
And by the way, there's a great tradition of autobiography in this country,
顺便一提，在这个国家，自传有一项很伟大的传统，
led by people on the margins of society who write to assert their existence.
它是由社会边缘的人所领导，写自传是为了维护他们的存在。
Go buy some of those books and learn from them. You're going in the wrong direction."
去买一些那种书，向他们学习。你走错方向了。”
But I no longer believed what we are taught -- that the right direction is the safe direction.
但我不再相信别人教导我们的--正确的方向就是安全的方向。
I no longer believed what we are taught -- that queer lives or black lives or poor lives are marginal lives.
但我不再相信别人教导我们的--同性恋、黑人，或穷人所过的生活是边缘的生活。
I believed what Kendrick Lamar says on "Section.80."
我相信肯德里克·拉马尔在《Section.80》上说的：
"I'm not on the outside looking in. I'm not on the inside looking out.
“我并不是身在外面向内看。我并不是身在里面向外看。
I'm in the dead fucking center looking around."
我就在他妈的中心向四周看。”
That was the place from which I hoped to work, headed in the only direction worth going, the direction of myself,
我就是希望能够从这个地方开始努力，朝向唯一值得去的方向前进，我自己的方向，
trying to help us all refuse the awful bargains we've been taught to take.
试着协助我们所有人，去拒绝以前我们被教导要接受的协议。
We're taught to turn ourselves and our work into little nuggets that are easily digestible;
我们被教导要将我们自己和我们的行为转变成好消化的小鸡块；
taught to mutilate ourselves so that we make sense to others,
我们被教导要肢解我们自己，以让他人觉得合理，
to be a stranger to ourselves so the right people might befriend us and the right schools might accept us,
要远离真实的自己，对的人才会和我们做朋友，对的学校才会接受我们，
and the right jobs might hire us, and the right parties might invite us,
对的工作才会雇用我们，对的党派才会邀请我们，
and, someday, the right God might invite us to the right heaven and close his pearly gates behind us,
有一天，对的神才可能邀请我们进入对的天堂，关上我们背后的天堂之门，
so we can bow down to Him forever and ever.
这样我们才能永远对他臣服。
These are the rewards, they say, for our obedience: to be a well-liked holy nugget, to be dead.
他们说，这些就是我们顺从的奖励：成为非常讨喜的神圣小鸡块，变成跟死了一样。
And I say in return, "No, thank you." To the world and to my mother.
我回说：“不了，谢谢你。”对世界以及对我妈妈说。
Well, to tell you the truth, all I said was, "OK, Mom, I'll talk to you later."
老实告诉各位，我说的只有：“好，妈，我晚点再跟你说。”
But in my mind, I said, "No, thank you." I cannot accept her bargain either. Nor should you.
但在我心中，我说了：“不了，谢谢你。”我也无法接受她的妥协。你们也不应该。
It would be easy for many of us in rooms like this to see ourselves as safe, to keep ourselves over here.
对在像类似这间房间里的许多人来说，很容易就认为我们自己是安全的，让我们自己一直置身在这里。
We speak well, we dress decent, we're intelligent, people like us, or act like they do.
我们很会说话，我们的衣着得体，我们很聪明，大家喜欢我们，至少表面上是这样。
But instead, I say that we should remember Lot's wife.
但反之，我说我们应该要记得罗得的妻子。
Jesus of Nazareth said it first to his disciples: "Remember Lot's wife."
这句话，拿撒勒的耶稣最早是对他的弟子说：“要记得罗得的妻子。”
Lot, in case you haven't read the Bible recently, was a man who set his family down in Sodom,
如果你最近没在读圣经，罗得把家人安置在所多玛，
in the midst of a wicked society that God decided he had to destroy.
而当时上帝决定要摧毁那个邪恶的所多玛城。
But God, being cruel, yet still a sap in part,
但神虽然很残酷，有时候还是像个傻瓜，
rushed two angels out to Sodom to warn Lot to gather up his folks and get out of Dodge.
他派两个天使赶到所多玛去警告罗得聚集他的人，离开道奇市。
Lot heard the angel's warning, but delayed.
罗得听到了天使的警告，却延迟了。
They didn't have all day to wait, so they grabbed Lot's hands and his two daughters' hands,
天使不可能等上一整天，所以他们抓了罗得的手，以及他两个女儿的手，
and his wife's hands, and hurried them out of Sodom.
还有他妻子的手，要他们赶紧离开所多玛。
And the angels shout, "Escape to the mountain. Whatever you do, don't look back,"
天使大喊：“逃到山中。不论如何，都不要回头看。”
just as God starts raining down fire on Sodom and Gomorrah.
此时神也开始在所多玛和蛾摩拉降下火雨。
I can't figure out how Gomorrah got dragged into this.
我想不透蛾摩拉城为什么被卷入。
But Lot and his folks are running, fleeing all that destruction, kicking up dust while the Lord rains down death,
但罗得和他的人正在逃跑，逃离那毁灭，当主正在让死亡随火雨降临，
and then, for some reason, Lot's wife looks back.
接着，基于某种理由，罗得的妻子回头看了。
God turns her into a pillar of salt. "Remember Lot's wife," Jesus says.
神将她变成盐柱。耶稣说：“要记得罗得的妻子。”
But I've got a question: Why does she look back?
但我有一个问题：她为什么要回头看？
Does she look back because she didn't want to miss the mayhem, wanted one last glimpse of a city on fire?
她回头看是因为她不想错过这场骚乱？想看火中的城市最后一眼？
Does she look back because she wanted to be sure that her people were far enough from danger to breathe a little easy?
她回头看是因为想要确定人们是不是离危险够远，还能稍微喘一口气？
I'm so nosy and selfish sometimes, those likely would have been my reasons if I'd been in her shoes.
有时我很好奇且自私，如果我是她，上述那些就会是我回头看的理由。
But what if something else was going on with this woman, Lot's wife?
但如果这个女人，罗得的妻子，有别的想法呢？
What if she could not bear the thought of leaving those people all alone to burn alive, even for righteousness's sake?
会不会是她无法忍受想到这些人被抛下且活活烧死，即使这是为了公义？
Isn't that possible? If it is, then this backward glance of a disobedient woman may not be a cautionary tale after all.
那不可能吗？如果是的话，归根结底，这个不顺从的女人回头看的那一眼可能并不是一种警世故事。
It may be the bravest act in all the Bible, even braver than the act that holds the whole Book together, the crucifixion.
反而是圣经中最勇敢的行为，甚至胜过连结整本圣经的举动：钉死于十字架。
We are told that up on Calvary, on an old rugged cross, Jesus gave his life to save everybody:
我们听到的是，加略山上，在一个古老粗糙的十字架上，耶稣奉献了他的生命来拯救世人：
billions and billions of strangers for all time to come.
包括后世的数十亿陌生人。
It's a nice thing to do. It made him famous, that's for sure.
他做的是件好事。可以肯定这件事也让他成名了。
But Lot's wife was killed, turned into a pillar of salt, all because she could not turn her back on her friends,
但罗得的妻子被杀了，被变成盐柱，全都因为她无法抛弃她的朋友们，
the wicked men of Sodom, and nobody even wrote the woman's name down.
所多玛的恶人，甚至没有人把这位女子的名字记载下来。
Oh, to have the courage of Lot's wife. That's the kind of courage we need today.
喔，要有罗得之妻的勇气。那就是我们现今需要的勇气。
The courage to put ourselves over there.
让我们自己置身在那里的勇气。
The courage that says that either all of us have to be faggots, or none of us can be faggots, for any of us to be free.
说出“要么大家都是基佬，要么就没有人是基佬”，来让我们所有人能够自由的勇气。
The courage to stand with other vagabonds in the street, with all the wretched of the earth,
和其他流浪汉及地球上所有不幸的人一起站在街上的勇气，
to form an army of the least of these, with the faith that from the naked crust of all we are,
用地位最低的人来形成一支军队，带着信念，相信我们可以从我们所有人赤裸裸的外壳
we can build a better world. Thank you.
建立起一个更好的世界。谢谢。