One obvious topic still needs to be addressed concerning my whole pursuit of pleasure thing in Italy: What about sex?

关于我在意大利追求快乐一事，显然还有件事得提提：性的问题怎么说？

To answer that question simply: I don't want to have any while I'm here.

为了回答这个问题，我只能说：我人在此地的时候，不想有任何性关系。

To answer it more thoroughly and honestly—of course, sometimes I do desperately want to have some, but I've decided to sit this particular game out for a while. I don't want to get involved with anybody. Of course I do miss being kissed because I love kissing. (I complain about this so much to Sofie that the other day she finally said in exasperation, "For God's sake, Liz—if it gets bad enough, I'll kiss you.") But I'm not going to do anything about it for now. When I get lonely these days, I think: So be lonely, Liz. Learn your way around loneliness. Make a map of it. Sit with it, for once in your life. Welcome to the human experience. But never again use another person's body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilled yearnings.

更彻底、更诚实的回答是——当然，有时我确实很渴望，但我已决定暂时不参加这项特定活动。我不想跟任何人扯上关系。我自然怀念亲吻，因为我喜欢亲吻（有一天我向苏菲滔滔不绝地抱怨起这件事，最后她愤怒地说：“看在老天爷的份儿上，小莉——假如情况太糟，就让我亲你吧。”）但目前我不去做任何事。近来我若觉得寂寞，我就想：那就寂寞吧，小莉。学学处理寂寞，为寂寞做计划。一辈子就这么一次，与它并肩而坐。接受这种人生体验。别再利用他人的身体或感情，来抒发你未满足的渴望。

It's a kind of emergency life-saving policy, more than anything else. I got started early in life with the pursuit of sexual and romantic pleasure. I barely had an adolescence before I had my first boyfriend, and I have consistently had a boy or a man (or sometimes both) in my life ever since I was fifteen years old. That was—oh, let's see—about nineteen years ago, now. That's almost two solid decades I have been entwined in some kind of drama with some kind of guy. Each overlapping the next, with never so much as a week's breather in between. And I can't help but think that's been something of a liability on my path to maturity.

这是一种紧急时期的求生方针，尤甚于其他任何事情。早在人生初期，我即已开始追求性与浪漫之乐。我在交往第一个男友前几乎没有青春期，而打从十五岁起，我一贯有男孩或男人（有时两者）做伴。那大约是——喔，十九年前的事了。足足有二十个年头，我一直与某男子纠结于某场戏剧当中。情事彼此重叠，之间从没有一个星期的喘息时间。我不禁要想，这在我的成熟道路上多少造成阻碍。

Moreover, I have boundary issues with men. Or maybe that's not fair to say. To have issues with boundaries, one must have boundaries in the first place, right? But I disappear into the person I love. I am the permeable membrane. If I love you, you can have everything. You can have my time, my devotion, my ass, my money, my family, my dog, my dog's money, my dog's time—everything. If I love you, I will carry for you all your pain, I will assume for you all your debts (in every definition of the word), I will protect you from your own insecurity, I will project upon you all sorts of good qualities that you have never actually cultivated in yourself and I will buy Christmas presents for your entire family. I will give you the sun and the rain, and if they are not available, I will give you a sun check and a rain check. I will give you all this and more, until I get so exhausted and depleted that the only way I can recover my energy is by becoming infatuated with someone else.

再者，我跟男人之间有分界的问题。或许这么说不公平。照说有分界问题，理当一开始就有“界线”，对吧？但我却是整个消失而成为我爱的那个人。我是可渗透的薄膜。我若爱你，你即可拥有一切。你能拥有我的时间、我的忠诚、我的屁股、我的金钱、我的家人、我的狗、我的狗的金钱、我的狗的时间——一切的一切。我若爱你，我会扛起你所有的痛苦，为你承担所有的债务（就每一种定义而言），我将保护你免于不安，把你从未在自己身上养成的各种优秀品质投射给你，买圣诞礼物给你的全家人。我会给你雨和太阳，假使没办法立刻给你的话，我会改天给你。除了这些，我还会给你更多更多，直到我筋疲力竭，耗尽心力，只能靠迷恋另一个人才能再使我恢复精力。

I do not relay these facts about myself with pride, but this is how it's always been.

我并非引以自豪地说明这些关于我本身的事实，但事情一贯如此。

Some time after I'd left my husband, I was at a party and a guy I barely knew said to me, "You know, you seem like a completely different person, now that you're with this new boyfriend. You used to look like your husband, but now you look like David. You even dress like him and talk like him. You know how some people look like their dogs? I think maybe you always look like your men."

离开我先生一段时间后，在一次派对上，有个我不太熟悉的男子对我说 “你知道吗？现在你跟你的新男友在一起，似乎完全变了个人。从前你跟你先生看起来很像，但现在的你看上去活像大卫。你甚至连穿着、讲话都像他。你知道有些人跟他们养的狗看起来很像吧？我想或许你一向跟你的男人很像。”

Dear God, I could use a little break from this cycle, to give myself some space to discover what I look like and talk like when I'm not trying to merge with someone. And also, let's be honest—it might be a generous public service for me to leave intimacy alone for a while. When I scan back on my romantic record, it doesn't look so good. It's been one catastrophe after another. How many more different types of men can I keep trying to love, and continue to fail? Think of it this way—if you'd had ten serious traffic accidents in a row, wouldn't they eventually take your driver's license away? Wouldn't you kind of want them to?

天啊，我真该暂时摆脱这种循环，稍事休息，给自己一些空间去发现，在我不试着与他人融为一体时，我自己看起来、说起话来的样子。还有，让我们都诚实点吧——暂时把亲密关系放在一旁，或许在我来说是一种慷慨的公共服务。当我回顾我的浪漫史，发现其看起来并不怎么好。可说是一个接着一个灾难。还能再有几种不同类型的男人让我继续尝试去爱，然后继续失败？这样想吧 ——你若连 续出十场重大车祸，难道最后不会被吊销驾照？难道你不会多少希望驾照被吊销？

There's a final reason I'm hesitant to get involved with someone else. I still happen to be in love with David, and I don't think that's fair to the next guy. I don't even know if David and I are totally broken up yet. We were still hanging around each other a lot before I left for Italy, though we hadn't slept together in a long time. But we were still admitting that we both harbored hopes that maybe someday . . .

我之所以对卷入另一段感情有所迟疑，还有最后一个原因。我碰巧还爱着大卫，我想这对下一个男人来说不公平。我甚至不晓得大卫与我是否完全分手。在我动身前往意大利之前，我们仍常彼此消磨时间，尽管我们已有很长一段时间未同床共枕。但我们依然承认，我们俩都仍抱着希望，或许有一天……

I don't know.

我不晓得。