話說，聊天時，你會說些什么？

When my relationship unraveled nearly two years ago, I decided to suspend my career as an actuary in Boston and take a long vacation in Costa Rica, where I planned to learn how to surf and do yoga. Yes, it was the most clichéd response possible for a heartbroken 32-year-old Westerner like me.

兩年前，一段感情結束后，我決定暫停自己在波士頓的精算師職業(yè)生涯，到哥斯達黎加休個長假，在那里學沖浪、練瑜伽。沒錯，對于像我這樣的一個處在心碎之中的32歲西方人來說，這是最為俗套的一種應對方法。

After four weeks there, I was traveling by car with several friends I had met at surf school when we came upon a red-faced, middle-aged woman hitchhiking on the outskirts of a small village. Our radio was broken and we were bored, so one woman in our group, Abby, said: “We’ll offer you a ride on two conditions. First, you must sing us a song, and then you have to tell us a story. Do you accept?”

到那四周以后，在和幾個沖浪學校認識的朋友乘車旅行的途中，我們偶然認識了一個臉頰緋紅的中年女子，她剛徒步走到一個小村莊外。我們的收音機壞了，有點無聊，所以我們中一個叫阿比的女人說：“如果你答應兩個條件，我們就載你一程。一個是給我們唱首歌，然后給我們講個故事。你同意嗎?

The hitchhiker, an American, responded with a crooked smile and a nod, freeing her hair from behind a Disney visor. “What would you like me to sing?” she asked.

這個徒步者是個美國人，她狡黠一笑，點點頭，摘掉頭上的迪士尼遮陽帽。“你們想讓我唱什么歌?”她問。

“Anything you like,” I told her, “as long as it’s by Rod Stewart.”

“隨你喜歡，”我告訴她，“只要是羅德·斯圖爾特(Rod Stewart)的就行。”

One rendition of “Maggie May” later, her story began.

演繹了一首《瑪吉·梅》(Maggie May)之后，她開始講故事。

“It’s interesting you ask me to tell you a story,” she said, “because I’m living in the middle of a love story right now. I came to Costa Rica one year ago and met the man of my dreams. He was selling jewelry at a stand in the market. He’s Italian, and as soon as I spoke to him I felt something I hadn’t felt in my whole life. It overtook me. Love like in the movies, but this was real.”

“挺有意思的，你說讓我講個故事，”她說，“我現(xiàn)在碰巧在談一場戀愛。一年前，我來到哥斯達黎加，遇到了我理想中的愛人。當時他正在市場里的一個攤位上賣珠寶。他是意大利人，和他說話的一剎那，我有種這輩子都沒有過的感覺。這種感覺傳遍全身。聽起來好像是電影里的愛情，但這是真的。”

This was promising.

這讓人覺得人生充滿希望。

“So you’re here to see him?” one of my companions asked.

“所以你是來這里見他?”其中一位同伴問道。

“Yes, absolutely, dear. I’m heading into town now to see him for the first time in 12 months.”

“是啊，當然啦，親愛的。我現(xiàn)在正要進城去看他，我已經(jīng)12個月沒見到他了。”

We broke into huge grins; we too were now characters in her story, deliverers of love from a dusty roadside to the man of her dreams.

我們都綻放出笑容;我們現(xiàn)在也是她故事中的角色了，要從一條塵土飛揚的路上把愛送到她的夢中愛人那里。

“Does he feel the same way?” Abby asked.

“他也是同樣的感覺嗎?”阿比問。

“Yes, he emails me every day to tell me so.”

“對，他每天都跟我發(fā)郵件這么講。”

I turned to her. “Are you excited to see him?”

我轉過身問她。“去見他你激動嗎?”

“I haven’t thought about anything else for an entire year.”

“我一整年都在想這一件事。”

“So you came all this way alone to see him?” I asked.

“所以你大老遠自己來看他?”我問。

“Well, I had to, didn’t I? It was breaking my heart to be away from him.” She paused for a breath. “Although my husband came too; he’s back at the house.”

“呃，我沒得選，不是嗎?見不到他，我的心都要碎了。”她喘了口氣。“不過我丈夫也來了;他現(xiàn)在待在我們的住處。”

Our hands shot up with questions.

我們開始搶著問她怎么回事。

After my trip, I was eating steak at a Boston bar, still mourning that the woman I thought I would marry, Alejandra, had broken up with me. I’d met her five years earlier, and she was, in every way imaginable, an inspiration to me. She was the woman who taught me about love.

旅行結束后，有一天我在波士頓的一家酒吧吃牛排，還在懷念我原以為會跟我結婚結果卻分了手的女人亞歷杭德拉(Alejandra)。那時候我們已經(jīng)認識五年了，在你能想象到的各個方面，她都能給我?guī)韱l(fā)。是她教會了我如何去愛。

Next to me at the bar was a couple on their first date. I could tell because their conversation reminded me of those awkward exchanges you have with co-workers’ spouses at Christmas parties. They opened with a discussion about their commutes to the bar. They both lived within a 10-minute bus ride, and they managed to stretch out this topic for 30 minutes.

鄰桌是一對初次約會的情侶。我能看出來，是因為他們的談話讓我想起了在圣誕節(jié)派對與同事的配偶之間的那種尷尬對話。他們先說起自己如何乘車來的酒吧。盡管二人的住處離酒吧都只有10分鐘的車程，但他們活活把這個話題講了30分鐘。

Next up, the weather: In Boston it rains sometimes, and they had both noticed this. An hour in, they turned to the really deep stuff. One was a teacher, and the other knew a teacher. How could they be destined for anything other than true love?

接下來就是談天氣：波士頓有時會下雨，他們之前都注意到了這點。一小時過去，他們才開始講到真正深入的內容。他們一個是教師，另一個認識一位教師。他們這不是天生一對是什么?

O.K., so I may have been directing some of my brokenhearted anger at them, but all I could think was that I wanted no part of this game. If being single meant having to partake in this kind of conversation, I’d rather pass. How could I go from the deep connection I had with Alejandra to discussing bus schedules and weather patterns?

好吧，我可能一直在把自己的一些悲痛欲絕的憤怒轉移到他們身上，但我只有一個念頭，我一點也不想?yún)⑴c這種游戲。如果單身就意味著必須參與這種談話，我可不要。有過和亞歷杭德拉那種深入的談話，我怎么還能在約會的時候這么談論乘車計劃和天氣模式?

I thought back to a dusty roadside in Costa Rica and the woman who shared her heart with four strangers. Why couldn’t we all embrace her openness? Why did being with a stranger so often mean we couldn’t immediately talk about meaningful things?

我又想起在哥斯達黎加灰撲撲的路邊認識的那位和四個陌生人分享內心感受的女人。為什么我們不能都像她那樣坦誠?為什么面對陌生人我們就不能馬上談論有意義的話題?

With this in mind, I decided to approach my re-entry to dating with a no-small-talk policy. Not that I would insist we talk only about heartfelt subjects; ideally, there would also be plenty of flirtatious joking and witty banter. I simply wanted to eliminate the dull droning on about facts and figures — whether it’s snowing or raining, how cold it is, what we do for work, how long it takes to get to work, where we went to school — all those things that we think we have to talk about with someone new but that tell us little about who the person really is.

想到這里，我決定依照不寒暄的原則重新開始約會。并不是說我要堅持只談掏心窩的話題;理想情況下，可能也會有不少調情的玩笑話和打趣的機靈話。我只是想去掉有關事實和數(shù)字的無聊的長篇大論——是下雪還是下雨，天有多冷，做什么工作，去上班要花多長時間，在哪上的學——這些都是我們覺得跟新認識的人必須談的東西，但你從這些談話中幾乎沒法知道這到底是個什么樣的人。

Why can’t we replace small talk with big talk and ask each other profound questions right from the start? Replace mindless chatter about commuting times with a conversation about our weightiest beliefs and most potent fears? Questions that reveal who we are and where we want to go?

我們?yōu)槭裁床荒苌岬暨@些閑扯，講些重要的事，從一開始就問彼此一些深刻的話題?不單調無聊地談論通勤時間，而是談彼此最重要的信仰和最深的憂慮?談論那些能體現(xiàn)出我們到底是什么樣的人，以及想要往哪里去的話題?

Admittedly, there were some issues with this policy, as my friends were more than happy to point out. They argued that some are not comfortable jumping directly into big talk, reasoning that certain people find small talk relaxing.

無可否認，這項原則存在一些問題，就像我的朋友們很樂于指出的那樣。他們認為，一上來就談論大話題，有些人會不舒服，也有些人會覺得談論那類小話題讓他們比較放松。

This is undoubtedly true. But another friend countered: “If she isn’t comfortable with it, then she probably isn’t right for you anyway. Your plan is a great way to filter.”

這當然也是實情。但還有一位朋友反駁：“如果她對談論大話題感到不舒服，那她可能就不是你要找的人。這是你過濾不合適人選的好辦法。”

This friend operates his own bizarre filtering system by bringing women coconuts on first dates, claiming that any woman who doesn’t accept the coconut isn’t marriage material. Why? I have no idea. Even so, I accepted his opinion for what it was.

這位朋友有他自己比較古怪的過濾方式，就是在第一次約會的時候給女伴帶椰子，如果哪個女人不接受他的椰子，就不是合適的結婚對象。為什么?我不知道。即便如此，我還是接受了他這種觀點。

Another common complaint: You can’t ask big questions until you know the answers to the small ones; you need facts to know where to dig deeper. I’d argue, however, that you can elevate any question from small talk to big talk with a little tweaking.

另一種常見的抱怨是：在知道那些小問題的答案之前，你沒法問大問題;你需要知道基本情況才能談更深入的問題。但是我會說，稍微用一點技巧，任何從小話題開始的問題都能轉換成大問題。