By Archie Adams

　　湖南师范大学 谭烁 选注

　　生活中什么才是真正重要的？也许不经意间，小小的弹珠会告诉你这个大道理。

　　The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday mornings. Perhaps it's the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe it's the unbounded<注1> joy of not having to be at work. Either way, the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable. A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the basement shack with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning paper in the other.<注2> What began as a typical Saturday morning, turned into one of those lessons that life seems to hand you from time to time.

　　Let me tell you about it. I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band on my ham radio insgroupsto listen to a Saturday morning swap net.<注3> Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, with a tremendous signal and a golden voice.<注4> You know the kind, he sounded like he should be in the broadcasting business.<注5>

　　He was telling whoever he was talking with something about "a thousand marbles."<注6> I was intrigued<注7> and stopped to listen to what he had to say. "Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you're busy with your job. I'm sure they pay you well but it's a shame you have to be away from home and your family so much. Hard to believe a young fellow should have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to make ends meet.<注8> Too bad you missed your daughter's dance recital."<注9>

　　He continued, "Let me tell you something Tom, something that has helped me keep a good perspective on my own priorities."<注10> And that's when he began to explain his theory of "a thousand marbles."

　　"You see, I sat down one day and did a little arithmetic.<注11> The average person lives about seventy-five years. I know, some live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about seventy-five years."

　　"Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52<注12> and I came up with 3,900, which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime. Now stick with me,<注13> Tom, I'm getting to the important part."

　　"It took me until I was fifty-five years old to think about all this in any detail," he went on, "and by that time I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays. I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy."

　　"So I went to a toy store and bought every single marble they had. I ended upshavingsto visit three toy stores to round up 1,000 marbles.<注14> I took them home and put them inside of a large, clear plastic container right here in the shack next to my gear.<注15> Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away."

　　"I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focused more on the really important things in my life. There is nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight."<注16>

　　Now let me tell you one last thing before I sign off<注17> with you and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container. I figure if I make it until next Saturday<注18> then I have been given a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little more time."

　　"It was nice to meet you Tom. I hope you spend more time with your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the band. 75 years Old Man, this is K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good morning!"

　　You could have heard a pin drop on the band when this fellow signed off.<注19> I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had planned to work on the antenna<注20> that morning, and then I was going to meet up with a few hams<注21> to work on the next club newsletter. Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. "C'mon honey, I'm taking you and the kids to breakfast."

　　"What brought this on?" she asked with a smile. "Oh, nothing special, it's just been a long time since we spent a Saturday together with the kids. Hey, can we stop at a toy store while we're out? I need to buy some marbles."

　　Work like you don't need the money...Love like you've never been hurt...Dance like nobody's watching...