Back from the Brink

　

影星与死神擦肩而过

We know Jason Priestley as the handsome young star of the long-running television show Beverly Hills 90210. Last summer, most of us learned he is also a professional race car driver when he was involved in a serious racing accident. In an exclusive interview with 20/20’s Barbara Walters, Priestley talked for the first time about the crash and his grueling recovery.     我们知道Jason Priestley是电视系列片“比夫利山90210”年轻潇洒的影星。他也是职业赛车手。我们大多数人知道，去年夏天他遭遇了一次惨重的赛车事故。在20/20节目主持人Barbara Walters对其进行的独家采访中，Priestley第一次讲述了那次撞车事故以及后来艰难的身体康复。 Priestley’s face was smashed almost beyond recognition. His feet and back were broken. He survived thanks to a highly skilled rescue operation and his own determination to live, but the experience left him a changed man. Priestley的脸被撞得近乎面目全非。他的双脚和脊背骨折。多亏了手术抢救医术精湛以及他顽强的生命意志，Priestley才与死神擦肩而过。然而，这次经历令他变了另一个人。 Throughout the 1990s, the charismatic 90210 star, who stood out for his boyish charm and sex appeal, led the life most teenage boys fantasize about. Priestley’s picture adorned the covers of countless magazines, and posters of him covered teenage girls’ bedroom walls. 二十世纪九十年代，这位以俊朗的外表和性感的魅力而出众并极具号召力的90210电视系列片明星过着令众多青少年为之梦想的生活。Priestley的照片装点着无数杂志的封面，他的大幅照片挂在少女卧室的墙上。 Last summer, he made the headlines again. This time the news was devastating. Priestley was close to death after the worst crash ever seen on the Kentucky Auto Racing Speedway. When he woke up a day later, he had no idea what had happened. “It was really quite shocking,”Priestley said, describing his reaction when he first saw his injuries. 去年夏天，他再次成为媒体首要新闻人物。而此次的消息却令人肝肠寸断，Priestley经历了肯得基赛车道有史以来最为严重的车祸之后几近死亡。事发后翌日，他对所发生的实况却一无所知。而当他亲眼目睹自己的伤势时，他描述了当时的反应，“这事真的蛮吓人的。” More frightening, Priestley said, was the thought that he might not walk again. He said he thought of Christopher Reeve, and of Sam Schmidt, a racing friend who was paralyzed after an accident. “I was really, really terrified that that was gonna be me.” Priestley说，一想到自己今后再也不能行走则更令人感到可怕。他说他想到了Christopher Reeve，还想到了赛车朋友Sam Schmidt，他在一次车祸后长年瘫痪。“我真的、真的害怕这一次轮上了我。” Priestley knew the dangers of racing; he’d been making at least part of his living racing cars for 10 years. Cars roar around a banked oval track within inches of each other at speeds approaching 200 miles per hour. Priestley并非不了解赛车有风险；十年来他至少一直把赛车视为生活的一个部分。赛车奔驰在倾斜的椭圆形跑道上，车距只有几英寸，车速达每小时200英里。 A Split Second Changes Star Forever 刹那间永远改变影星生活 Early on Aug. 11, 2002, Priestley was making a final practice run before the most important race of his life. During the warm-ups a car had blown its engine, and crews had to put down a “quick-dry” substance to cover up the oil on the track. As Priestley attempted to avoid another driver’s car, his wheel hit the substance and he lost control of the car. 早在2002年8月11日，Priestley在一生中最重要的一次赛车之前进行最后一次试车，在练习中，一辆赛车引擎爆炸，工作人员在赛车道上撒下速干材料盖住汽油，正当Priestley试图避让另一辆赛车时，他的车轮因撞上速干材料顿时失去控制。 “I just touched up on the quick-dry,” Priestley said. “From what I understand …… only a few inches of the wheel got on it and it was enough to upset the car.” Just eight-tenths of a second elapsed between the moment Priestley hit the brakes and his first head-on impact against the track’s retaining wall, according to Priestley’s friend and racing manager, Jim Freudenberg. “我仅仅是撞在了速干材料上，”Priestley说。“因此，我知道...只要车轮触碰几英寸材料就足以翻车。”根据Priestley的朋友兼赛车经纪人Jim Freudenberg说，Priestley刹车并迎头撞上赛车道防护墙仅仅是十分之八秒的事。 The accident was unusually severe because Priestley, who had been driving at a speed of 182 mph, endured not one —but two head-on collisions with the concrete walls. “When he caromed off the wall, he was going 86 miles an hour. When he hit the second impact, which was probably a sixth of a mile down the track, he was …… he hit it at 56 miles an hour,” Freudenberg said. 此次车祸异乎寻常的惨重是因为以往一直以每小时182英里的车速赛车的Priestley与水泥墙不是一次而是两次迎面相撞。“当他驶离水泥墙，车速依然达每小时86英里。在Priestley距赛车道六分之一英里处第二次撞到墙上时，他的车速达每小时56英里。”Freuden?鄄berg说道。 “No Signs of Life” “毫无生命指征” Flight paramedics Chris Smith and Elizabeth Clark heard the track’s emergency radio code. 赛车医务人员Chris Smith和Elizabeth Clark听见了车道上紧急无线电呼叫。 Flight paramedics Chris Smith and Elizabeth Clark heard the track’s emergency radio code. “We recognized it was the most serious code, which told us that basically there were no signs of life out on the track where they were extricating Jason,” Smith said. “My initial impression was that he was close to death when he came in,” said Clark.In fact, Priestley was technically dead for about 45 seconds. “我们当时意识到这个信号意味着最惨重的一次车祸，车道上正在被抢救的Jason基本上没有了任何生命指征。”Smith说。“他被抬进来时给我的最初印象是他几近死亡。”Clark说。理论上讲，Priestley已死亡了45秒。 “I actually checked out,” he said, “and for some reason I got sent back. I got returned. ” “我当时实际上已死了，”他说“因为某种原因我又被死神送了回来，我回到了人间。” “They tell me that when they were pulling me out of the car and they pulled my helmet off, my nose was pushed so far up into my forehead, they could actually see into my sinuses. And look into my head,” Priestley said. “他们告诉我，当他们把我从赛车中抬出来，取下头盔时，我的鼻梁已经被挤到前额，他们能看到我的鼻窦，甚至看进我的脑袋。” Priestley说。 Just 28 minutes after the accident, Priestley arrived at the University of Kentucky Hospital trauma center. Fearing the worst, family and friends gathered at the hospital. Luke Perry, his friend from 90210, was there within hours. 事故发生后仅仅过了28分钟，Priestley就被送进了Kentucky大学医院外伤中心，家人朋友担心他不行了，都守候在医院。从90210剧组来的友人Luke Perry几小时内赶到医院。 Perry said doctors thought it would be a good sign that Priestley’s cognitive skills were intact if he could recognize Perry. Perry climbed onto Priestley’s bed and looked directly into his friend’s face. Perry 说，医生认为Priestley如果能认出Perry就说明他的认知能力完好无损，这将是一个吉兆。Perry爬到Priestley床上望着他的脸。 “He looked right at me, and he said my name. And everybody in that room breathed a big sigh of relief,”Perry said. “他看着我，叫我的名字。房间里的每一个人大松了一口气。”Perry说。 Road to Recovery 康复之路 Priestley, 33, survived his brush with death on the race track, but the road to recovery was difficult. The accident forced him to face the very real possibility that both his racing and acting careers would be over. Determined to prove wrong the reports that he might never walk again, he is making amazing strides. 33岁的Priestley在赛车道上与死神擦肩而过。然而，康复之路并非一帆风顺。这次事故迫使他正视现实，即他的赛车和演艺生涯都将终止。Priestley决心证明媒体称他不能再行走的报导有失事实，他正迈出惊人之步。 He’s walking well without a limp or sign of pain, but he’s not yet able to run. “If I am off my feet for a while they start to hurt when I get back on them, but that goes away pretty quickly,” he said. 他行走正常没有一瘸一拐或露出丝毫痛苦的迹象，但是他还不能跑。“如果我脚受力一会儿，就会疼痛，但很快就不疼了。”他说。 Priestley recounted the extensive surgeries he’s undergone during his recovery. “I had the operation to repair the shelf that my eyeball sits on. I had the operation to repair my nose.” He also had extensive back surgery to fuse his broken vertebrae. Priestley列数他在康复期间所做过的各种手术。“我做过眼眶手术，还做过鼻梁修补手术。”此外，Priestley还做过大面积的脊椎整形手术。 He said it will be about a year before he is totally healed. And while, unbelievably, he still wants to drive race cars, he said he won’t go back on the track until he has completely healed from the accident. 他说要等将近一年才能完全痊愈。令人不可思议的是他仍然念念不忘赛车，他说自己直到完全康复才会重返赛车场。 Drawn to Risk 开始冒险 Priestley has always loved driving fast and living on the edge. Even as a young man, growing up in Vancouver, Canada, he was a risk taker. Priestley一向爱开快车，冒险寻刺激。他在加拿大温哥华成长时期，就已经是个冒险青年。 “When I was 16, everyone else got a car, I got a motorcycle,” he said. “I was a rugby player, I was a hockey player. You know I just love to challenge myself and I love to compete.” He also loved another risky business— acting. Since 90210, he has appeared in seven movies, playing a range of characters. In Die Mommie Die, a hit at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, he played an FBI agent masquerading as a gigolo. “当我16岁时，别人都有一辆车，我却有了一辆摩托。”他说。“我做过橄榄球手，还做过曲棍球手。你知道我喜欢挑战自我，喜欢竞技活动。”此外，他喜爱另一种冒险行当———表演。自从演90210电视系列片之后，他演过七部电影，扮演过各种各样的角色。在今年“阳光之舞电影节”上展出的轰动展会的影片“妈咪之死”中，他扮演一个假扮成男舞伴的联邦调查局的特工。 And car racing was taking an even larger role in his life. His private wish was to qualify to drive in the race. 可是，赛车在他的生活中占据了更大一个成份。他的个人愿望就是成为一名合格的赛车手。 Priestley has crashed or spun out numerous times on the race track, and once in a boat race. But in 1998, his restlessness turned to recklessness when he crashed his Porsche into a telephone pole in Hollywood Hills. Priestley已经有许多次撞车或者开出赛道的经历，另一次是在划船比赛中。但是，1998年，他的不安分变成了不小心，那一年，他驾驶着Porsche车撞上了好莱坞山间的一根电话线杆上。 Priestley was arrested for driving while under the in fluence. He spent five nights in jail. His driver’s license was suspended for a year and he had to complete an alcohol-management program. Priestley因酒后驾车被拘捕，在监狱蹲了五天。他的驾驶执照被吊销一年。他不得不开始戒酒。 Priestley said he learned a lot from that experience. “The fact of the matter is I’d had too much to drink to be operating a motor vehicle. And for me it was — it was a learning experience.” Priestley说他从这次经历中学到了许多。“事实是我喝得太多不能再开车。对于我———这是一次经验教训。” He said he doesn’t think he’s an alcoholic, but he’s not sure. He said he hasn’t had a drink in 10 months. 他说他不认为自己是一个酒鬼，但也不能肯定。他说自己已经十个月没沾一滴酒。 “The one thing that I’ve learned in the last couple of years,”Priestley said, “is that I really don’t know much at all.” 　“过去的两年我了解了一件事就是自己太不懂事。” Priestley说。 Does he still want to race in the Indianapolis 500? He's not sure. 他还想在Indianapolis 500赛事中一显身手吗？他不能确定。 “I don’t know if I would be able to take a car into the corners with the velocity that you need to, to compete in, in that race,”he said. “I don’t think you can go through something like this without being changed by it.” “我不知道是否自己能够在那场比赛中以你需要的车速把车驶向弯道去竞赛。”他说。“我不认为你能够完成某件这样的事情而不受其影响。”