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By the late forties and fifties no one rolled his own any more (and few women smoked) in my hometown, Eatontown, Georgia. The tobacco industry, coupled with Hollywood movies in which both hero and heroine smoked like chimneys, won over completely people like my father, who were hopelessly addicted to cigarettes. He never looked as dapper as Prince Albert, though; he continued to look like a poor, overweight, overworked colored man with too large a family; black, with a very white cigarette stuck in his mouth.
到40年代末、50年代初，在我的家鄉佐治亞州的伊頓鎮，已經沒有人自己手工卷煙了（而且幾乎沒有女人抽煙)。煙草業，再加上影片中男女主角都是煙鬼的好萊塢電影，把像我父親那樣的人徹底征服了，他們無可救藥地染上了煙癮。然而，父親并沒有像阿爾伯特親王那樣衣冠楚楚；他看上去仍然是個貧窮、肥胖、為養活一大家子人而拼命干活的有色人種的男子，一個嘴里叼著雪白香煙的黑人。
I do not remember when he started to cough. Perhaps it was unnoticeable at first. A little hacking in the morning as he lit his first cigarette upon getting out of bed. By the time I was my daughter's age, his breath was a wheeze, embarrassing to hear; he could not climb stairs without resting every third or fourth step. It was not unusual for him to cough for an hour.
我不記得父親是什么時候開始咳嗽的。也許開始時并不明顯，只是在清晨一下床便點燃 第一支香煙時才有點干咳。在我到了我女兒這個年齡時，他喘氣時總是呼哧呼哧的，聽了讓人感到不安；他上樓時每走三四級臺階就得停下來休息一會兒。連續咳嗽一個小時對他來說是常事。
