读者文摘:我不知道自己还能活多久(5)

Less than five minutes later, he pulled off Highway 16 at the farm and ran directly for the hopper,

不到5分钟后，他在农场旁的16号公路旁停下车，直接朝着装料斗跑去，

but his father wasn't there and the auger¹ was silent—the truck and the tractor too.

但他的父亲不在那里，螺旋钻、卡车和拖拉机也都安静下来。

The picture didn't reconcile. No blood. No painful cries. No droning auger.

这景象一点也不和谐。没有血，没有痛苦的哭声，没有嗡嗡作响的螺旋钻。

He then noticed the open door to the garage, and inside, his father splayed out on the floor in a dusty shirt and baseball cap,

然后，他注意到车库的门开着，父亲仰着躺在里面的地板上，他穿着一件满是灰尘的衬衫，戴着棒球帽，

legs hidden by the office wall, smoking perhaps the last cigarette of his life.

两条腿被办公室的墙挡住了，他抽着或许是生命中的最后一支烟。

"How bad is it?" Adam asked.

“情况有多糟？”亚当问。

Kurt looked up from the floor, smoke trailing from his lips. "I messed up big-time," he said.

库尔特从地板上抬起头来，烟从他的嘴唇中飘出。他说，“我把大日子给搞砸了。”

Strangely, there was virtually no blood.

奇怪的是，几乎没有血。

(His doctor would later guess this was due to Kurt's decades of heavy smoking.)

（他的医生后来猜测，这是因为库尔特几十年来大量吸烟所致。）

Nevertheless, his foot was missing and his leg was horribly mangled², dusted with dirt and debris³, the bones protruding⁴ beyond his calf⁵ muscle.

然而，他的脚不见了，腿被严重撕裂，沾满了灰尘和碎片，骨头从小腿肌肉处突出。

Though he'd already called 911 from the road, Adam now called the chief of his rescue squad⁶,

虽然亚当已经在路上打过911，他现在又打电话给他的救援队队长，

told the squad to "kick it into overdrive," that his father had severed⁷ his foot and would likely need an air ambulance.

让他们“加速赶来”，说他的父亲把脚割断了，可能需要一辆救护直升机。

Adam then snapped into "firefighter mode," as he calls it.

亚当随即进入他所说的“消防员模式”。

He started asking his father questions, keeping him lucid⁸ until the roughly 12-person team arrived a few minutes later.

他开始询问父亲问题，让他保持清醒，随后大约12人的小组在几分钟后到达。

The rescue squad carefully loaded Kurt onto a stretcher and into the ambulance, then raced back to Pender Community Hospital.

救援队小心地把库尔特抬上担架，上了救护直升机，然后赶回彭德社区医院。

Kurt doesn't remember much of the ride,

库尔特对去医院的路途没有太多记忆，

but he does recall the helicopter flight to Bryan Medical Center in Lincoln and all that sodden⁹, muddy farmland below.

但他确实记得直升机飞到林肯布莱恩医疗中心，还有下面那片湿漉漉、泥泞不堪的农田。

After two surgeries, a week at Bryan Medical, and two more at Madonna Rehabilitation¹⁰ Hospital,

布莱恩接受了两次手术，他在布莱恩医疗中心住院一周，

Kurt returned to the farm, the stump¹¹ of his left leg wrapped in a clean elastic¹² bandage just below the knee.

然后又在圣母马利亚康复医院待了两周后，返回农场。他左腿的残肢被一条干净的弹性绷带包裹在膝盖以下。

For a while, he was stuck inside with a pair of crutches¹³ and a walker and too many get-well-soon cards to read in one sitting,

有一段时间，他不得不待在家中，拄着拐杖和助行器走路，还一口气读了好多祝愿他康复的卡片。

just another one of the hundred or so agricultural workers who sustain a lost-work-time injury every day.

他只是每天遭受工伤的大约一百名农业工人中的一个。

"It's frustrating¹⁴. But," Kurt says, "it's just the nature of a farmer. Don't think. Gets in a hurry. Gets tired. Whatever."

库尔特说，“这令人沮丧，但当农民本来就是这样，什么都不要想，匆匆忙忙的，疲惫不堪，诸如此类的事”

Four months after the accident, Kurt received his prosthetic leg, and soon the farmer was back to doing what he loves.

事故发生四个月后，库尔特装了假肢，很快这位农民又开始做他喜欢做的事情。

Strong-willed, as his family has always known him to be, he helped with the harvest last fall,

他还是像家人熟知的那样意志坚强，在去年秋天帮忙秋收，

even ran that same leg-chewing auger as he unloaded corn into grain bins¹⁵.

他甚至还在把玉米卸到谷仓中时，操作那台把他的腿截掉的螺旋钻。

"When we went down to the hospital to see him, first thing out of his mouth was 'Why are you guys not working?'" farmhand Tyler Hilkemann told KCAU in Sioux City.

我们去医院看他时，他说的第一句话就是‘你们为什么不去工作？’”农场工人泰勒·希尔克曼在爱荷华州苏城告诉KCAU。

"Ever since he got his leg, you can't stop him. One of these days we might steal it from him."

“自从他有了假腿，你就没法让他停下来。总有一天我们可能会把他的假腿偷过来。”

1 auger   

n.螺丝钻，钻孔机

参考例句：

• We make a hole in the ice with an auger.我们用螺旋钻在冰上钻洞。
• Already the Snowblast's huge auger blades were engorging snow.扬雪车上庞大的钻头叶片在开始大量吞进积雪。

2 mangled   

vt.乱砍（mangle的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• His hand was mangled in the machine. 他的手卷到机器里轧烂了。
• He was off work because he'd mangled his hand in a machine. 他没上班，因为他的手给机器严重压伤了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 debris   

n.瓦砾堆，废墟，碎片

参考例句：

• After the bombing there was a lot of debris everywhere.轰炸之后到处瓦砾成堆。
• Bacteria sticks to food debris in the teeth,causing decay.细菌附着在牙缝中的食物残渣上，导致蛀牙。

4 protruding   

v.（使某物）伸出，（使某物）突出( protrude的现在分词 )；凸

参考例句：

• He hung his coat on a nail protruding from the wall. 他把上衣挂在凸出墙面的一根钉子上。
• There is a protruding shelf over a fireplace. 壁炉上方有个突出的架子。 来自辞典例句

5 calf   

n.小牛，犊，幼仔，小牛皮

参考例句：

• The cow slinked its calf.那头母牛早产了一头小牛犊。
• The calf blared for its mother.牛犊哞哞地高声叫喊找妈妈。

6 squad   

n.班，小队，小团体；vt.把…编成班或小组

参考例句：

• The squad leader ordered the men to mark time.班长命令战士们原地踏步。
• A squad is the smallest unit in an army.班是军队的最小构成单位。

7 severed   

v.切断，断绝( sever的过去式和过去分词 )；断，裂

参考例句：

• The doctor said I'd severed a vessel in my leg. 医生说我割断了腿上的一根血管。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• We have severed diplomatic relations with that country. 我们与那个国家断绝了外交关系。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 lucid   

adj.明白易懂的，清晰的，头脑清楚的

参考例句：

• His explanation was lucid and to the point.他的解释扼要易懂。
• He wasn't very lucid,he didn't quite know where he was.他神志不是很清醒，不太知道自己在哪里。

9 sodden   

adj.浑身湿透的；v.使浸透；使呆头呆脑

参考例句：

• We stripped off our sodden clothes.我们扒下了湿透的衣服。
• The cardboard was sodden and fell apart in his hands.纸板潮得都发酥了，手一捏就碎。

10 rehabilitation   

n.康复，悔过自新，修复，复兴，复职，复位

参考例句：

• He's booked himself into a rehabilitation clinic.他自己联系了一家康复诊所。
• No one can really make me rehabilitation of injuries.已经没有人可以真正令我的伤康复了。

11 stump   

n.残株，烟蒂，讲演台；v.砍断，蹒跚而走

参考例句：

• He went on the stump in his home state.他到故乡所在的州去发表演说。
• He used the stump as a table.他把树桩用作桌子。

12 elastic   

n.橡皮圈，松紧带；adj.有弹性的；灵活的

参考例句：

• Rubber is an elastic material.橡胶是一种弹性材料。
• These regulations are elastic.这些规定是有弹性的。

13 crutches   

n.拐杖, 支柱 v.支撑

参考例句：

• After the accident I spent six months on crutches . 事故后我用了六个月的腋杖。
• When he broke his leg he had to walk on crutches. 他腿摔断了以后，不得不靠拐杖走路。

14 frustrating   

adj.产生挫折的，使人沮丧的，令人泄气的v.使不成功( frustrate的现在分词 )；挫败；使受挫折；令人沮丧

参考例句：

• It's frustrating to have to wait so long. 要等这么长时间，真令人懊恼。
• It was a demeaning and ultimately frustrating experience. 那是一次有失颜面并且令人沮丧至极的经历。 来自《简明英汉词典》

15 bins   

n.大储藏箱( bin的名词复数 )；宽口箱（如面包箱，垃圾箱等）v.扔掉，丢弃( bin的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• Garbage from all sources was deposited in bins on trolleys. 来自各方的垃圾是装在手推车上的垃圾箱里的。 来自辞典例句
• Would you be pleased at the prospect of its being on sale in dump bins? 对于它将被陈列在倾销箱中抛售这件事，你能欣然接受吗？ 来自辞典例句