You’d have thought I’d have cracked it by now. After three years as a fashion editor, someone who spends about four months a year on the road, in every kind of climate and condition, I should be a packing ninja: the kind of person who can throw together a carry-on case to cover every occasion without a moment’s hesitation.
你们可能觉得我肯定是收拾行李箱的老手了。我当了三年时装编辑，每年近四个月风尘仆仆奔波于世界各地，应是准备行囊的行家里手：能即刻备好随身行李，立马投入工作的“大拿”。
And yet. Still, I fail to pack well. Work or play I can’t quite get it right. On arrival, I find myself with shoes that have become strangely ill-fitting in transit and must be abandoned, throwing every outfit planned around them out of kilter. I bring too many white T-shirts, or too few, or things that need ironing after 10 minutes wear. I pack ribbed knitted tops without remembering to bring the specific undergarment required to make them fall flatteringly. I am cursed to forget fundamentally important items, like sleep wear, or toothpaste, or the hair unguent that daily saves me from looking like a Brian May tribute act.
非也。我至今仍无法收拾妥当自己的行囊。不管是工作还是休闲，我总是“丢三落四”。抵达目的地后，发现自己带的鞋在旅途中不知怎么就变得不合脚了，于是只得把所有与之搭配的行头都忍痛割爱掉；白衬衫这类穿了10分钟就得熨烫的衣服我不是多带就是没带。我带了罗纹针织上衣，却忘了“相得益彰”的内衣。该死的，我总是忘带必备行头，如睡衣、牙膏或是每天都要用的焗油膏（抹了它，不至于象布赖恩?梅(Brian May)的乐队队员的头发模样）。
Rather than packing the things I might need, I find myself weighed down with an excess of options that all seem quite useless on arrival. Travel brings out my worst fantasist tendency to prepare for the life I imagine I lead rather than the one I actually do. The life in which I need to walk further than 20 steps a day, and require some comfortable clothes. Instead, I pack piles of cripplingly high heels and strangely directional daywear that makes me feel weird and self-conscious. Despite my obsessive study of the weather in the run-up to a trip, I seem incapable of bringing clothes that quite correspond to the climate I will arrive in: for Paris couture week, under sweltering skies, I packed a heavy linen trenchcoat and a tweed jacket. I went to Galway, in the rain-sodden west of Ireland, without a waterproof.
我没有备足所需要的行头，相反，抵达目的地后，总是发现无用的东西带得太多。一出差，自己就会不由自主、无可救药地幻想着憧憬中的而非真实的生活：每天需要散步（超过20步），因此需要准备些舒适衣服。而与之相反的是，我装了一大堆超高跟鞋以及怪异的时尚潮装（让我颇为另类与不自在）。尽管出行前自己会再仔细研究出差地的天气，但所带衣服似乎总是牛头不对马嘴：赴巴黎女装周时，巴黎的天气燥热气闷，自己却拿了厚实风衣与粗花呢短上衣；去阴雨绵绵的爱尔兰西部城市戈尔韦(Galway)出差时，我却没带防雨外套。
But I am learning. I understand now why every fashion editor wears black; everything goes with everything and no one knows you’ve worn the same thing every day for a month. I always bring sneakers, a navy sweater and a pair of boyfriend jeans. I’ve also finally acknowledged that, having holidayed with the same partner for 20 years, I will never, ever wear that rather ostentatious designer dress — or two — I always pack in case I feel like glamming up of an evening. Extra footsie socks for the trainers maybe? A treaty new pack of Sunspel knickers? But the Saint Laurent Seventies-style silk-crepe folk dress with a balloon sleeve and a piecrust collar? Forget it. It’s just not going to happen.
但我会吃一堑长一智。我如今理解为何时装编辑都爱穿黑色了。黑色是“百搭”，而且没人知道自己一个月天天穿的都是同一件衣服。如今出差，我总会带上运动鞋、深蓝色运动衣以及阔腿牛仔装(boyfriend jeans)。我最终也承认：与老公（20年没换）度假时，自己从未穿过所带的花哨潮装（以防晚上应酬）。也许我会为运动鞋另带一双踩脚袜(footsie socks)或是带一包新潮的Sunspel内裤。那么我会带上圣洛兰(Saint Laurent)70年代风格、宽松灯笼袖与派酥领(piecrust collar)的真丝绉民间款裙子吗？算了吧，这种情况肯定不会发生。
Like The Karate Kid, however, my training is far from complete. Every time I step into an airport terminal I am haunted by the words of my friend and fellow fashion editor, the inestimably chic Sarah Harris. Sarah is my Mr Miyagi. The master packer. She only ever travels with hand luggage; each trip meticulously prepared for, no detail ill-considered. She recalls Grace Kelly, in Rear Window, as the glacially elegant socialite who magics her overnight kit from a miniature Mark Cross handbag measuring only 13 inches wide. But Sarah is generous with her wisdoms. “Well, of course, you must only bring one pair of shoes to the shows,” she will say from our seats on the front row. “Always wear an old T-shirt under a shirt so that you can get another day’s wear out of it,” she once pronounced: an edict I have lived by ever since.
但是，与《小子难缠》(The Karate Kid)里的空手道小孩一样，我的打包“修炼”依然任重道远。每次步入机场，耳边老是闺蜜兼同行、时尚女魔头莎拉?哈里斯(Sarah Harris)的诤诤良言。萨拉就好比《小子难缠》里的东方武术大师Mr. Miyagi，她是准备行装的“大师”：每次出行只拿件手提行李；每次行程都精心准备，但事无巨细。她回忆格蕾丝?凯丽(Grace Kelly)在影片《后窗》(Rear Window)中饰演的那位极度优雅的社交名媛，竟然能把全部行头装入13英寸宽的Mark Cross迷你手提包内。萨拉会无私地分享打点行装的心得。“当然，参加时装发布会，你只能带一双鞋。”我们在商务座坐定后她会这样说道：“每次穿衬衫时，里面穿件T恤，这样第二天的衣服就有了。”她曾这样声称道。我从此以后对她的“圣旨”言听计从。
It was Sarah who, while I was tending an especially nasty new-shoe bite one season, enquired as to why I hadn’t “broken them by wearing them around the house in advance?” The query was more incredulous than imperious; surely everyone must schedule such activities to fill their spare time?
有一次，我在处理因为穿了某季新鞋，脚上磨出的大水泡时，萨拉质问我为何“没有预先穿它在家里转悠，把这个水泡提前在家里处理好？”如此质疑，与其说是咄咄逼人，倒不如说是令人难以置信。很显然，每个人都得在业余时间预先筹划好这些事。
To travel with only hand luggage is to enter the realm of the super human. Show me your packing proficiency and I will offer you my utmost respect. And I’m not talking, by the way, about those men who just throw a load of crap into a bag in 10 seconds and then find themselves shivering on a mountainside in Dunton, Colorado, wearing a pair of disintegrated Birkenstocks and a towelling bathrobe. (You know who you are.)
出差只带个手提包，那是“超人”。对于准备行李箱有超凡能力的人，我都是佩服得五体投地。顺便说一下，我指的并非那些匆忙之中胡乱塞一些行装的“理工男”：他们会发现自己住在科罗拉多邓顿(Dunton, Colorado)的半山腰冻得瑟瑟发抖，脚上穿着一双穿坏的Birkenstocks凉鞋，身上则披着厚实浴袍。
Meanwhile, my education continues. Marching through the departures lounge en route to France last week (five nights, temperatures variable, high chance of precipitation, nearby beach), I offered myself a smug pat on the back for containing all my clothes, toiletries, chargers and reading requirements in a tiny case that would satisfy the scrutiny of a well-known budget airline that slaps massive surcharges on items that haven’t been sufficiently declared in advance. I had packed ruthlessly, casting out all extraneous items that weren’t deemed essential. And then I had packed again, just to make sure.
与此同时，我仍在行囊准备方面不断栽跟头。不久前，我经由休息室登机前往巴黎参加时装周（在巴黎要住五晚，天气多变，下雨概率大，而且毗邻海滩），我自鸣得意地把所有的衣服、洗漱用具、充电器以及读物放进一个小皮箱，自以为通过英国某知名廉价航空公司的安检肯定不在话下，因为对方对事先未申报的超重行李会征收不菲的费用。我打点行装时手下没留情：把自认为无关紧要的东西悉数剔除。而后我又重新装了一回，确保万无一失。
I was feeling confident. I waltzed through the check in. I sailed through the scanners with my mini liquids, all carefully repackaged, decanted and bagged into their polythene prophylactic. I watched my fellow passengers stumble and scrape with their overladen bags with a gracious but patronising smile.
我感觉信心满满：顺利通过登机手续办理点，所带洗漱液与化妆品（它们都已认真重新包装，倒入瓶子后再装入聚乙烯塑料袋中）也顺利通过安检。看着同机乘客因行囊“超载”不是蹒跚着前行，就是剐剐擦擦，自己得体而又得意地笑了。
But approaching the gate, I was suddenly thwarted. “I’m sorry madam,” intoned a spiffy air steward who stood between myself, the aircraft and my imminent ascent to ninja status. “But the flight is really busy today so I’m going to have to put your bag in the hold.”
但当我来到登机口时，却突然被拦住：“对不起，女士。”站在我与飞机之间的帅气空哥以缓慢而又庄重的口吻对我说，“本次航班人满为患，所以我只得把您的小手提箱搁到货舱。”
I blustered, I prevaricated. I begged to keep the bag on board. “You don’t realise how many useless things I didn’t pack in order to keep this suitcase with me,” I pleaded. But it was not to be. The bag went down below. And the worst thing about it? I should have packed that bloody dress after all.
我先是咆哮叫嚷，然后又闪烁其辞，请求对方允许我随身携带它。“您不知道为了随身携带它，我把多少无关紧要的东西去除掉了。”我央求道。但一切都无济于事。我的手提箱最终放到了货舱。这是最糟糕的境况了吗？奶奶的，我真该带上那件该死的裙子！