A Dad Who Truly Cares
裏克·賴利/Rick Reilly
I try to be a good father.Give my kids gifts.Take them to swim.Work nights to pay for their text messaging...
But compared with Dick Hoyt, I’am lousy.Eighty-five times he’s pushed his disabled son,Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons.Eight times he’s not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on bicycle handlebars—all in the same day.Dick’s also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S.on a bike.Makes taking your son bowling look a little lame, right?
And what has Rick done for his father? Not much—except save his life.
This love story began in Winchester, Mass.43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs.“He’ll be a vegetable the rest of his life,”Dick says doctors told him and his wife when Rick was nine months old.“Put him in an institution.”
But the Hoyts weren’t buying it.They noticed the way Rick’s eyes followed them around the room.When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate.“No way,”Dick says he was told.“There’s nothing going on in his brain.”
“Tell him a joke,”Dick countered.They did.Rick laughed.Turns out a lot was going on in his brain.Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate.First words?“Go Bruins!”And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out,“Dad, I want to do that.”
Yeah, right.How was Dick, a self-described“porker”who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried.“Then it was me who was handicapped,”Dick says.“I was sore for two weeks.”That day changed Rick’s life.“Dad,”he typed,“when we were running, it felt like I wasn’t disabled anymore!”
And that sentence changed Dick’s life.He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could.He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon.“No way.”Dick was told by a race official.The Hoyts weren’t quite a single runner, and they weren’t quite a wheelchair competitor.
For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year.
Then somebody said,“Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?”How’s a guy who never learned to swim and hadn’t ridden a bike since he was sixgoing to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried.Now they’ve done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii.It must be a buzzkill to be a25-year-old stud getting passed by an old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don’t you think?
Hey, Dick, why not see how you’d do on your own?“No way.”he says.Dick does it purely for“the awesome feeling”he gets seeing Rick with a cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together.This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters.Their best time? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992—only 35 minutes off the world record, which, in case you don’t keep track of these things, happens to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time.“No question about it,”Rick types.“My dad is the Father of the Century.”
And Dick got something else out of all this too.Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race.Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95clogged.“If you hadn’t been in such great shape,”one doctor told him,“you probably would’ve died 15 years ago.”So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other’s life.
Rick, who has his own apartmenthe gets home careand works in Boston, and Dick, retired from the military and living in Holland, Mass.always find ways to be together.They give speeches around the country and compete in some backbreaking race every weekend,including this Father’s Day.
That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he can never buy.“The thing I’d most like,”Rick types,“is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.”
我努力去做一個好爸爸。我送孩子們禮物，帶他們去遊泳，上夜班為他們掙信息費……
但是，與迪克·霍伊特相比，我是一個糟糕的父親。有85次，他在馬拉鬆賽跑中，推著自己身患殘疾的兒子跑完26.2英裏。其中有8次，他不僅推著坐在輪椅中的兒子跑26.2英裏，還接著在遊泳比賽中，拖著坐在橡皮艇上的兒子遊了2.4英裏，用自行車載著兒子走了112英裏——這一切都是在同一天裏做的。迪克也帶著兒子去越野滑雪，背著兒子爬山，他還騎自行車拖著兒子穿越了美國。比起迪克的所作所為，你帶著兒子去打保齡球，就顯得太差勁了，對嗎？
那麽，兒子裏克又為父親做了什麽呢？除了救了父親一命，就沒有別的了。
這一動人的故事開始於馬薩諸塞州的溫切斯特鎮。43年前，裏克出生時因臍帶繞頸而差點被勒死，這使他的大腦受到損傷，喪失了肢體的支配能力。迪克說，在裏克九個月的時候，醫生告訴他和妻子“他的餘生都將是一個植物人了，把他送去一家福利院吧”。
但是，霍伊特夫婦並不接受這樣的結局。霍伊特發現，當他和妻子在房間裏走動時，裏克的眼睛可以跟隨著他們轉動而轉動。裏克11歲的時候，霍伊特夫婦帶兒子去了塔夫斯大學工程係，詢問是否有什麽方法可以幫助孩子進行交流。“沒有辦法，他的大腦是空白的。”他們告訴迪克。
迪克反駁說：“你給他講個笑話試試。”工作人員這樣做了，結果裏克笑了。這說明，他的大腦中是有思維意識的。裏克終於可以通過安裝在他身上的電腦進行交流了。這台電腦會在裏克的一側頭部觸碰開關時，由他自己控製光標。他“說”的第一句話就是：“我要看熊隊！”一位高中生在一次事故中癱瘓後，學校為他組織了一次義跑。裏克敲出一句話：“爸爸，我想跑步。”
是的，不錯。迪克這樣一個自喻為“肥豬”的人，怎樣推著自己的兒子跑5英裏？要知道，他從來沒有一次跑過1英裏以上。然而，迪克盡力做了。“跑完之後，我就累癱了。”迪克說，“我全身疼痛了兩個星期。”那一天改變了裏克的生活。他寫道：“爸爸，當我們跑起來的時候，我覺得自己不再是個殘疾人了!”
這句話也改變了迪克的生活。他變得熱衷於盡可能多地給兒子這種感覺。迪克擁有了結實健壯的身體，於是他和裏克決定嚐試參加1979年的波士頓馬拉鬆比賽。賽事官回答迪克：“不行。”霍伊特父子不算是一個獨立的賽手，但也不算是殘疾人選手。
接下來的數年裏，裏克和父親隻能進入大眾領域，跟著賽手們一起跑。後來，他們得以正式地參加賽跑。1983年，他們跑得非常快，以至於贏得了次年馬拉鬆比賽的參賽資格。
後來有人說：“喂，迪克，為什麽不報名參加三項全能比賽？”迪克從6歲以後就再沒有騎過自行車，而且從來沒有學過遊泳的他，又怎樣拖著110斤重的兒子完成三項全能的比賽呢？然而，迪克盡力去做了。今天，他們已參加了212場三項全能比賽，其中包括四次在夏威夷舉辦的15小時鐵人三項比賽。作為一個25歲的小夥子，坐在橡皮艇上被一位老人拖著，一定會很尷尬，你覺得呢？
迪克，為什麽不嚐試一下自己一個人參加比賽？迪克回答說：“我不會這樣做的。”每當他們跑起來、一起遊泳、一起騎車時，裏克的臉上就會洋溢著幸福的笑容，而迪克這樣做僅僅是為了那種看到兒子笑時的“美好的感覺”。今年，65歲的迪克和43歲的裏克完成了他們的第24次波士頓馬拉鬆比賽。在20000多名選手中，他們位居第5083位。他們最好的成績是什麽？是在1992年取得的2小時40分的比賽成績，與世界紀錄僅相差35分鍾。也許你不知道，這個世界紀錄當時是由一名殘疾青年創造的，他完全依靠自己的力量推動輪椅前進。裏克寫道：“毫無疑問，我的父親是百年不遇的好爸爸。”
除了這些，迪克還得到了一些其他收獲。兩年前，在一次比賽中，他患上了輕微的心髒病。醫生們發現，他的一條動脈已堵塞了95%。一位醫生告訴迪克：“如果不是你的身體好，在15年前你可能就死去了。”因此，從某種程度上說，迪克與裏克拯救了彼此的生命。
裏克現在自己生活（他雇用了家庭看護），在波士頓工作。迪克居住在馬薩諸塞州的荷蘭鎮，也退出了高強度的運動生活。父子二人時常會聚在一起。他們在全國進行巡回演講，每個周末都要參加某項高強度的比賽。今年的父親節，他們也聚在一起了。
那天晚上，裏克請父親吃了一頓飯，可是裏克真正想送給父親的禮物是永遠也買不到的。他寫道：“我最想做的，就是爸爸坐在輪椅上，我為他推一次。”
1.這句話也改變了迪克的生活。他變得熱衷於盡可能多地給兒子這種感覺。
2.從某種程度上說，迪克與裏克拯救了彼此的生命。
3.裏克真正想送給父親的禮物是永遠也買不到的。
1.compete in: If you want to win them, you must compete in the race.
2.buy one’s dinner: If you buy their dinner, you’ll cost an arm and a leg.