Nineteen eighty was a big year for us. We were new parents, and Bill was running for reelection.

1980年对我们来说可是个大年。我们初为父母，比尔又要竞选连任。

Bill's Republican opponent, Frank White; began running negative ads.

比尔的共和党对手弗兰克·怀特开始大做负面宣传。

Exit polls showed Bill winning by a wide margin, but he lost, 52 to 48 percent. He was devastated.

选举前最后一次民意测验，仍显示比尔将以较大差距胜出，结果却以百分之四十八对百分之五十二败北。比尔伤心欲绝。

Bill had now lost two elections―one for Congress, one as an incumbent Governor―and many wondered whether this defeat would break him.

比尔已经输过两次选举——一次是进军国会，这次是州长连任——很多人都想知道，这场失利是否会将他击垮。

Before the week was out we found an old home to buy in the Hillcrest section of Little Rock, near where we had lived before. On two lots, it had a converted attic that we used for Chelsea's nursery.

这一周尚未过去，我们便在小石城的希尔克雷斯特区距我们旧居不远处，买了一处旧屋，将阁楼改装成切尔西的卧房。

Chelsea was the only bright spot in the painful months following the election.

选举后那痛苦的几个月中，切尔西是我们生活惟一的亮点。

It was in our new house that Chelsea celebrated her first birthday, learned to walk and talk and taught her father a lesson in the perils of multitasking. One day Bill was holding her while watching a basketball game on television, talking on the phone and doing a crossword puzzle. When she couldn't get his attention, she bit him on the nose!

我们在新家为她欢度了一岁生日，她正是牙牙学语、蹒跚学步的阶段，很让她爸爸尝到“多任务作业”的苦头。有一次，比尔一边抱着她，一边盯着电视上的橄榄球赛，一边还打着电话，同时玩填字游戏。她看爸爸不理她，居然狠狠咬了他的鼻子！

Bill took a job at Wright, Lindsey and Jennings, so a Little Rock law firm. He was unofficially campaigning to get his job back as governor .

比尔在小石城的一家名叫“赖特、林赛与詹宁斯”的律师事务所找了一份差事。比尔就开始非正式地急着找与政治相关的工作了。

The pressures on me to conform had increased dramatically when Bill was elected Governor in 1978.

自从比尔1978年当选州长，我被迫妥协的压力与日俱增。

Because I knew I had my own professional interests and did not want to create any confusion or conflict of interest with my husband's public career, it made perfect sense to me to continue using my own name. Bill didn't mind, but our mothers did. Virginia cried when Bill told her, and my mother addressed her letters to "Mr. and Mrs. Bill Clinton." Brides who kept their maiden names were becoming more common in some places in the mid-1970s, but they were still rare in most of the country. And that included Arkansas.

我有自己的专业兴趣，并不想介入丈夫的政治生涯，这也使我继续用自己的姓并感觉良好。比尔从不在意，我们的母亲却不然。当比尔告诉弗吉妮亚时，她居然失声尖叫，而我的母亲一向在信封上写寄给“比尔·克林顿夫妇”。从７０年代中期开始，妻子维持本姓在某些地区逐渐普遍，但在大多数地区还很罕见，阿肯色州也不例外。