當外語重燃我的人生
閱讀
When I was about six years old， I started collecting model trains with my father. We would assemble the track in the attic， put a foam mountain with a tunnel over the top， and， through the magic of a transformer1， watch the trains make their rounds. My dad took me to train shows， and for my birthdays back then， I always got train sets or trestles2. I had books on model trains， and books on actual trains. Both kinds showed pictures of big mountains parted by trains， small towns bisected by trains， and trains adorning white Christmas-scapes. It is from those books that I built an imagination and acquired my earliest notions of heaven—a highland where it snows often and when it doesn’t snow， it rains， where summer seems always in retreat. There is a big lake. Behind that lake is a mountain. Between the lake and the mountain， there is a village.
The village exists. Its name is Corseaux. It sits in the Riviera3 region of Switzerland， sandwiched between Lake Geneva and the Bernese Alps4. I was there in April， reeling at how the postcards of my childhood fantasies had materialized into fact. On a clear day， across the still， black water， I could see France demarcated5 by white， snowy mountains. There was only one clear day. Clouds constantly threatened snow or rain.
Each day， I woke， washed， dressed， had a breakfast of bread and chocolate， and walked to the train station. The train’s punctuality6 strained the perceived limits of human engineering7. So I was always on time， for I felt that to be here， among the real things， and stray from my appointed place was to abet some great evil. From the Corseaux-Cornalles station， I would train into Vevey and then transfer to another train to Montreux. I would then walk five minutes to the language school—the purpose of my visit—and the work would begin.
I started studying French in the summer of 2011， in the throes of a mid-30s crisis. I wanted to be young again. Once， imagination was crucial to me. The books filled with trains， the toy tracks and trestles—they were among my few escapes from a world bounded by my parents’ will. In those days， I could look at a map of some foreign place and tell you a story about how the people there looked， how they lived， what they ate for dinner， and the exotic8 beauty of the neighborhood girls.