美国国家公共电台 NPR For A Garbage Man In Minnesota, 'Trash Tells A Story'

 

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

DAVID GREENE, HOST: 

It is time now for StoryCorps. And today we'll meet a man who performs two very essential, very different jobs. John Marboe is a Lutheran pastor¹ who grew up admiring his local garbage collectors in Alexandria, Minn. And when times were lean for his family, he decided² to take on some shifts hauling trash.

He came to StoryCorps with his 13-year-old daughter Charlie to talk about his work as a pastor and garbage man.

JOHN MARBOE: I've been hauling trash probably since you were about 8 years old. And I brought the truck to your school, didn't I?

CHARLIE: Yeah, you decided to pick me up in the garbage truck. Then I hopped³ in reluctantly. I was kind of like, this is my last day of fifth grade...

MARBOE: Right in front of your friends.

CHARLIE: Right in front of my friends.

MARBOE: Did I ever tell you the story about when I pulled up to an intersection⁴ and there was a mother and her little children? And her littlest boy just started waving, and I was waving. And the mother looked up at me with this kind of concerned look and then grabbed her son. It was almost as though, no, that's not something you're going to want to be.

CHARLIE: I think to me as your kid, I'm not embarrassed when people say like, oh, what does your dad do? And I'm like, oh, he's a pastor, he's a garbage man.

MARBOE: I keep doing it because it's, I don't know if I want to say it's more important but it's differently important. You're doing something for people, and I think especially I'm aware of that when it's hot out, when it's really smelly, when there are a lot of maggots. But as a garbage man, I probably know more about people on my route than their pastor does because their trash tells a story.

Charlie, do you remember the note that was written on the back of this envelope? I've tried and I've tried and I've tried and I just can't stand the pain anymore. I looked at it and I thought, you know what? I'm paid here to take out the trash, not to intervene in people's lives based on what I find. But as a pastor, all I could do was say a prayer. It's similar to the way I feel about doing funerals, though it's not usually as intense.

But it puts me in touch with that side of life which is about loss, that everything is temporary. And I love remembering the things that you said when you were, like, really little. Your first sentence was what?

CHARLIE: It all goes.

MARBOE: It all goes. And to do the trash, it's sort of a reminder⁵ that every small thing that we ever do for other people is valuable, even though it might be really small and unnoticed.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

GREENE: John Marboe with his 13-year-old daughter Charlie at StoryCorps in Minneapolis, Minn. Their interview was recorded in partnership⁶ with Georgetown University's American Pilgrimage Project that gathers stories about the role of faith in everyday life. That interview will also be archived at the Library of Congress

1 pastor   

n.牧师，牧人

参考例句：

• He was the son of a poor pastor.他是一个穷牧师的儿子。
• We have no pastor at present:the church is run by five deacons.我们目前没有牧师：教会的事是由五位执事管理的。

2 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

3 hopped   

跳上[下]( hop的过去式和过去分词 )； 单足蹦跳； 齐足（或双足）跳行； 摘葎草花

参考例句：

• He hopped onto a car and wanted to drive to town. 他跳上汽车想开向市区。
• He hopped into a car and drove to town. 他跳进汽车，向市区开去。

4 intersection   

n.交集，十字路口，交叉点；[计算机] 交集

参考例句：

• There is a stop sign at an intersection.在交叉路口处有停车标志。
• Bridges are used to avoid the intersection of a railway and a highway.桥用来避免铁路和公路直接交叉。

5 reminder   

n.提醒物，纪念品；暗示，提示

参考例句：

• I have had another reminder from the library.我又收到图书馆的催还单。
• It always took a final reminder to get her to pay her share of the rent.总是得发给她一份最后催缴通知，她才付应该交的房租。

6 partnership   

n.合作关系，伙伴关系

参考例句：

• The company has gone into partnership with Swiss Bank Corporation.这家公司已经和瑞士银行公司建立合作关系。
• Martin has taken him into general partnership in his company.马丁已让他成为公司的普通合伙人。