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Faster instead of slower: Not only do we want it now; we don't even want to be kept waiting for it. This general impatience, the "I-hate-to-wait" attitude, has infected every level of our lives. Instead of standing in line at the bank, we withdraw twenty dollars in as many seconds from an automatic teller machine. Then we take our fast money to a fast convenience store (why wait in line at the supermarket?), where we buy a frozen dinner all wrapped up and ready to be put into the microwave... unless we don't care to wait even that long and pick up some fast food instead. And if our fast meal doesn't agree with us, we hurry to the medicine cabinet for — you guessed it — some fast relief. We like fast pictures, so we buy Polaroid cameras. We like fast entertainment, so we record our favorite TV show on the VCR. We like our information fast, too: messages flashed on a computer screen, documents faxed from your telephone to mine, current events in 90-second bursts on Eyewitness News, history reduced to "Bicentennial Minutes". Symbolically, the American eagle now flies for Express Mail. How dare anyone keep America waiting longer than overnight?

Superficially instead of thoroughly: What's more, we don't even want all of it. Once, we lingered over every word of a classic novel or the latest best seller. Today, since faster is better, we read the condensed version or put a tape of the book into our car's tape player to listen to on the way to work. Or we buy the Cliff's Notes, especially if we are students, so we don't have to deal with the book at all. Once, we listened to every note of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. Today, we don't have the time; instead, we can enjoy 26 seconds of that famous "da-da-da-DUM" theme — and 99 other musical excerpts almost as famous — on our "Greatest Moments of the Classics" CD. After all, why waste 45 minutes listening to the whole thing when someone else has saved us the trouble of picking out the best parts? Our magazine articles come to us pre-digested in Reader's Digest. Our news briefings, thanks to USA Today, are more brief than ever. Even our personal relationships have become compressed. Instead of devoting large parts of our days to our loved ones, we replace them with something called "quality time", which, more often than not, is no time at all. As we rush from book to music to news item to relationship, we do not realize that we are living our lives by the iceberg principle — paying attention only to the top and ignoring the 8/9 that lies just below the surface.

When did it all begin, this urge to do it now, to get it over with, to skim the surface of life? Why are we in such a hurry to save time? And what are we going to do with all the time we save besides, of course, rushing out to save some more? The sad truth is that we don't know how to use the time we save, because all we're good at is saving time... not spending time.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying we should go back to growing our own vegetables or making our own clothes. I'm not even advocating a mass movement to cut all our credit cards into little pieces. But I am saying that all of us need to think more seriously about putting the brakes on our "we-want-it-all-and-we-want-it-now" lifestyle before we speed completely out of control. Let's take the time to read every word of that story, hear every note of that music, and enjoy every subtle change of that countryside. Let's rediscover life in the slow lane.

参考译文

宁快勿慢：我们不仅想现在拥有，甚至想等一会儿。缺乏耐心变得极为普遍，这种“我讨厌等待”的态度影响了我们生活的方方面面。我们会在20秒内从自动取款机内取出同样数目的钱，而不会去银行排队等待。然后拿着快速取出的钱去一家便利店（为什么要在超市里排队呢？），在便利店里我们买已包好的，只需在微波炉里热一下就可以了的冰冻晚餐...如果我们确实连那点时间也懒得等的话，可以用一些快餐来代替晚餐。如果我们吃了晚餐后感觉不舒服，我们赶紧去医药柜找--你猜对了--一些可以快速缓解痛苦的药。我们喜欢快照，因此我们买宝丽来一次成像照相机。我们喜欢快捷的娱乐，因此我们把最喜爱的电视节目用录像机录下来。我们也喜欢信息传递快捷：信息在电脑屏幕上闪烁，文件从你的电话传真到我的电话上，时事浓缩到90秒钟的“目击新闻”栏目中，历史被概括成“200周年难忘的瞬间”。具有象征意义的是，美国秃鹰现在成了邮政速递的标志，有谁敢让美国等到第二天？

不求透彻，只需浅薄：还有，我们甚至懒得知道全部信息。过去，我们对古典小说或最新的畅销书上的每一个字都是想了又想。现在，既然越快越好，我们就读浓缩版，或者在去工作的途中，在车上听这本书的录音磁带。我们，尤其是学生，会买克利弗的评述，而不去读整本的书。过去，我们会听贝多芬的《第五交响曲》的每一个音符。现在，我们没有那个时间了；我们会买《经典作品精华片段》CD来听，上面就有26秒长的著名的“哒-哒-哒-嘟”乐曲主旋律，还有其他99首同样著名的音乐片段。毕竟，既然有人已经为我们摘出精华部分，我们为什么还要浪费45分钟去听整首曲子呢？我们所读的《读者文摘》中的文章是预先筛选好了的。因为有了《今日美国》这份报纸，我们的简明新闻比以前更简明了。甚至我们的人际关系也变得简单了。我们不是花大部分时间和亲人相处，而是代之以所谓的“专门时间”；而这“专门时间”往往是没有时间。当我们忙着阅读书籍、欣赏音乐、收听新闻、忙于应酬时，我们没有意识到我们正在过一种“冰山准则”式的生活--只注重表面，忽视了表面下面8/9的内涵。

这种操之过急、急于求成、不求甚解的态度是从什么时候开始的？我们这样匆匆忙忙节省时间到底是为了什么？在省出更多的时间的同时，我们又会怎样利用节省下的时间？令人感到悲哀的是：我们不知道怎样利用节省下来的时间，因为我们只擅长节省时间...却不擅长利用时间。
请不要误会我的意思。我并不是说我们应该回到过去去过那种自给自足的生活，也不提倡毁掉所有的信用卡；我要说的是，在我们还没对这种“我们都想要，并且马上要”的生活方式完全失控之前，我们有必要认真地考虑抑制一下。让我们逐字逐句地阅读一个故事，细细品味一首音乐的每一个音符，慢慢领略乡村的每一个细微变化，让我们把生活的直通车开到慢车道上重新寻找生活的乐趣吧！

词汇释义

1.automatic a. 自动的, 机械的, 必然的, 无意识的

例句：

The heating system in the hotel has an automatic temperature control.
旅馆里的取暖系统是自动调温的。

2.wrap vt. 包装, 卷, 缠绕, 包, 裹, 覆盖, 遮蔽, 隐藏, 掩护

例句：

The affair is wrapped in mystery.
这件事真相不明。

3.bicentennial adj.二百年之久的; 每二百年发生一次的

例句：

It is right that the memory of Washington be with us today, not only because this is our Bicentennial Inauguration, but because Washington remains the father of our country.
我们今天怀念华盛顿是很合适的，不仅因为这是第一届总统就职的二百周年纪念，而且因为华盛顿一直是我们的国父。

4.thoroughly adv.彻底地；完全地

例句：

This paper covers sports thoroughly.
这家报纸对体育消息报导详尽。

5.advocate v. 主张,提倡

例句：

He advocates reducing military spending.
他主张削减军费开支。