My husband works in M&A as an associate. Lots of his colleagues have been fired, so he works every day till midnight and at weekends. In his little time off, he sleeps, watches TV and sees friends for a drink. He took the job to get rich, but he won’t get a bonus this year. He is stressed and nervous, sleeps with his BlackBerry and keeps complaining. He wants a new job – but doesn’t know what he wants to do. It’s too risky for him to quit in current times, but his job is damaging both of us.
我丈夫就職於一家併購公司，擔任助理職務。他的許多同事都被解僱了，因此現在他每天都工作到深夜，週末也經常加班。在為數不多的空閒時間，他不是睡覺、看電視，就是和朋友喝酒。他開始做這個工作，是為了變成有錢人。但從現在情況看，他今年顯然不會拿到太多獎金（如果有的話）。他變得壓力很大，且十分焦慮。他睡覺時枕邊放着黑莓，並且不停地抱怨。他想找一份新工作——但不知道自己想做什麼。我認為目前辭職風險太大，但他的工作對我們兩人都造成了傷害。
Client adviser, female, 28
客户顧問，女，28歲
LUCY’S ANSWER
露西的回答
I wonder which part of your predicament bothers you most.
我想知道哪種情況最讓你感到煩惱。
Is it that the expected riches have not materialised? Is it the way your husband works the whole time? Is it his incessant complaining? Is it the BlackBerry by the bed? Is it the way he watches telly, sleeps and sees his friends? Or is it that even though he claims to hate his job, he can’t think of anything he’d like better?
是你丈夫沒有成為有錢人？是他大部分時間都在工作？還是他不停地抱怨？或者是牀頭的黑莓？還是他看電視、睡覺、和朋友喝酒的行為？或者是儘管他宣稱討厭自己的工作，卻不會想想自己更喜歡哪種工作？
I can see that all of these could be annoying – with the possible exception of sleeping, which deserves a little tolerance. If he were my husband, what I would dislike most would be his wanting to leave but being clueless about what to do instead. If he can’t think of alternatives, the endless complaint does not deserve endless sympathy. For now, he is stuck where he is. Unless he has a private fortune – which you imply he hasn’t – it would be madness to quit until he has another job or scheme up his sleeve.
我能理解所有這些問題都可能令人煩惱——或許除了睡覺之外，這應該值得寬容。如果他是我丈夫，我最不喜歡的就是他想離職，卻對離職後做什麼工作毫無頭緒。如果他不考慮換個工作，只是無休止的抱怨，那麼就不值得你一直同情他。目前他陷入了困境。除非他有一筆私人財產——你的信裏似乎暗示他沒有——否則，在找到另一份工作或有什麼錦囊妙計之前，辭職將是非常愚蠢的.。
For you, this means finding a way of being less bothered by it all. As far as the money goes, I assume that will get better if he sticks it out. The hours, however, are not likely to improve much. This sort of work demands a lot of time. The BlackBerry beside the bed strikes me as something you should learn to live with: I’ve never known why people make quite such a fuss about this. We all have other distracting things by our beds – books and telephones and newspapers – and so long as we sometimes close them and put them away, it isn’t the end of the world. Having drinks with friends isn’t that bad either: at least he has friends, which is more than many unhappy men do.
對你而言，這意味着你要設法減少所有這些問題帶來的煩惱。至於錢的問題，我覺得如果他堅持做下去就會有改觀。不過，在工作時間上不太可能有太大改善。這種工作就需要投入大量的時間。我覺得你應該學會對放在牀頭的黑莓習以為常：我從不知道人們為什麼要對這種東西大驚小怪。我們都會在牀頭放其它會讓人分心的東西——書、電話和報紙。只要我們有時把它關掉或者拿開，那就不是世界末日。與朋友一起喝酒也並非那麼糟糕：至少他還有朋友，這一點比許多不開心的男人好多了。
The only really troubling thing in this picture is that he never seems to make any time for you. If he isn’t prepared to be nice to you in his spare time, I fear that a change of job may not make things much better.
這種情況下唯一真正令人不安的是，他似乎從沒有為你留出任何時間。如果他沒打算在閒暇之時對你好點，我擔心即使換個工作也無濟於事。
