容下万物

〈美〉马丽.洛奇

阿罗 译

我们正身处全国性的追求容器的狂热中。我们有“托普尔容器”和“橡胶帮手”这样的容器名店；也有“容纳万物”和就叫“容器商店”的连锁店。也许不久，地球也需要一个特殊的罐子来放置这些容器连锁店吧。

      这便让家里滋生着一种矛盾，我们并不需要矛盾，因为家里已没地儿放置它们了。我的丈夫爱德是那种总为扔东西发愁的人，想想要有一天需要自从1979年以来的银行月结单或者一个为淘汰已久的电器而设计的插头怎么办（每个人都在存着插头“adapter”，想着他们可以派上别的用场——因为，“插头”的英语顾名思义就是“可改造”adaptable的意思，但是这种用场从它诞生之晨以来就没派上过。所以，还是扔了他们吧）

     容器店只是鼓励了像我丈夫爱德那样的人，好让他们可以煞有其事地为自己的杂乱忙活。他们可以把插头放进一种特殊的毫无用途的“插头箱”中，他们可以宁愿整理他们的杂物，也不愿做一些明智之举而丢弃这些垃圾。

     上一周，爱德从容器店买回一个专门装各种塑料容器盖儿的容器，为什么我们不丢掉一些装食品的塑料容器呢？我问道，向他泼冷水是尽我人妻的责任。因为，在那时，哦，我的上帝，我们已经有345个容器了。但依爱德的原则，你是不能扔掉好的食物的，你应当把所有的剩余食物装进塑料容器中，直到有天它们发臭，你才可以扔掉，因为，那样它们才不算好的食物。所以可以说，我们的冰箱其实不是用来装食物而是用来冻僵食物的，那里有可追溯到插头诞生之晨的鸡蛋饼粉。

       只有一种情形能让爱德在容器问题上变得温和，那就是我答应陪他一起去逛容器商店。因为他深谙我所不知的这种商店诱惑客人的经商之道：不久，我也会跟他一样着迷这种商店的。我会发现自己先被一种装内衣的透明盒子吸引，是的，我会想，我需要一瞥间，所有内衣尽受眼底。我的眼睛也许还会停留在丙烯酸（类）树脂的咖啡过滤器支架上，想想，便利，漂亮，并且才8.49美元，但再往前想，我已经有一个咖啡过滤器的支架了，那咖啡过滤器的盒子正是。

     我们最后一次一起逛容器商店，爱德爱上一个可放在储藏室的鞋架——一个好主意，只是爱德的鞋子很少放进储藏室。爱德有种类似宗教的信仰，那就是相信一切特殊的储藏设计的整理功效。如果你买了鞋架，鞋自然就会出现。

      容器商店一楼的一半都在卖与“可走入的储藏室”相关的东西。谢天谢地，我们没有“可走入的储藏室”，所以我们无须为此而花费心思。虽然有人会置疑，说其实我们有“可走入的储藏室”，只是我们将之用成了卧室而已。我的继女最近告诉我们，马利亚.凯丽的储藏室跟我们的房子一样大，“那我们的房子只是一个储藏室的大小了？”，我说，听起来很受伤。

      “不”，她讲得很含蓄，“我是指马利亚.凯丽的储藏室的大小而已”，谈话在这种情绪下持续了一会儿。

       我告诉爱德，我想一早起来发现马利亚.凯丽身著内衣孤零零地游走在饭厅，他扬起了眉头，“一定要叫醒我哦！”

        回到容器商店上来，我已经放弃不再考虑“自给式罐头架”了，等我再回来，发现爱德在“置入式储藏室整理柜”边看得入迷，我可以想见他是多么渴望拥有它们，一个专为爱整洁的，讲究色彩搭配的男人以及只是身著套装和软底鞋的妻子的设计。“他们的运动鞋呢？”我问道，“他们的运动衫呢？他们的东西呢”

      此外，我说，我们也承受不起像这样整理东西，因为只是一面墙的储藏设施就价值400美元，我告诉爱德我爱他本来的样子，不管他的体恤堆积在椅子上，还是鞋杂乱地散在地毯上，我告诉他我不想要容器商店目录上那些穿着挂得整洁的棕褐色套装的无趣的男人，不管他收藏了多少箱银行的月结单，我对他的爱会如海洋一样深广，或者，一如马利亚.凯丽的储藏室一样宽广。

                                                                                    译自“读者文摘”2003年7月号

Hold Everything

By MARY ROACH

We are in the grip of a nationwide container mania. We have Tupperware and Rubbermaid.  There’s Hold Everything and a chain called The Container Store. Soon the earth will need a special caddy to organize its container franchises.

This is creating conflict in our home. We don’t need conflict in our home, as we’ve got nowhere to put it. My husband, Ed, is one of those people made nervous by the thought of throwing things away. There may come a day when he’ll need bank statements from 1979 and adapters for long-extinct electronics goods. (Everyone saves adapters, thinking they will work on other gadgets-that they’re adaptable-but this has never happened since the dawn of adapters. Go and throw them away.)

Places like The Container Store only encourage people like Ed. Now the can pretend to be doing something about their clutter. They can put adapters in a special Useless Adapter Bin. They can organize their junk rather than doing the sensible thing and junking it.

Ed came home from The Container Store last week with a Pull-Out Lid Organizer for all our plastic container lids. Why don’t we just get rid of some of our plastic food containers, I said, raining on his parade, as is my wifely wont. At the moment, we’ve got, oh , 345 of them. But according to the Ed system, you can’t throw away perfectly good food. You must put all leftovers in plastic containers until the smell, whereupon you may throw them away, because they’re no longer perfectly good. So it is that our refrigerator does not contain food, but variously sized petridishes. There’s waffle batter in there dating back to the dawn of adapters.

Ed relented on the plastic containers, on one condition: I’d agree to come with him to The Container Store. For he knew what I did not: These stores cast a spell on people. Soon I would be just like him. I’d find myself entranced by a Clear Panty Box, thinking, yes, I need to see my undergarments at a glance. I would catch myself eyeing an acrylic Coffer Filter Holder, thinking ,Handy, attractive, only $8.49. were I thinking straight, I would realize that I already own a coffee filter holder, because the filter came in a box, and the box was free.

 The last time we were there, Ed fell for an in-closet shoe rack - a good idea, except Ed’s shoes rarely make it into a closet. Ed has a near-religious belief in the tidying power of special storage devices. If you buy the rack, the shoes will come.

Half of the first floor of The Container Store is devoted  to walk-in closet systems. Thankfully, we have no walk-in closets, so we didn’t have to fight about this. Though some people would argue we do have a walk-in closet, and we’ve chosen to use it as a bedroom. My stepdaughter recently informed us that Mariah Carey’s closet is as big as our house. “so our house is the size of a closet?” I said, sounding hurt.

“no.” she gave me the implied duh. “I mean it’s the size of Mariah Carey’s closet.” The conversation went on in this vein for a while.

 I told Ed I expected to get up in the morning and find Mariah Carey wandering forlornly through the dining room in her underwear. He raised a brow. “wake me, will you?”

Getting back to The Container Store. I had gone away to ponder Gravity-Feed Can Racks, and when I returned, I found Ed by the built-in closet organizer, looking wistful. I could tell he aspired to be the owner of this system, the tidy, color-coordinated man with the wife who wears only suits and pumps. “where are their sneakers?” I said. “their sweatshirts? Where’s their stuff?”

Besides, I said, we can’t afford to be this organized. One wall of the closet system costs $400. I told Ed I loved him the way he was, with his T-shirts heaped on a chair and his shoes willy-nilly on the rug. I told him I didn’t want the dull man with the well-hung tan suits in The Container Store catalog. That no matter how many boxes of bank statements he kept, my love for him would remain as wide and deep as an ocean. Or anyway Mariah Carey’s closet.

                                                                     Reader’s Digest ,July 2003