2005年NPR美国国家公共电台十二月-Ingenuity, Not Money, Keeps Families War

The cold means that many of us will be turning on our heaters more and more and that means big bills for natural gas, home heating oil and electricity. In some places, the price of natural gas is up 70% over last year and heating oil is up 30%. In upstate New York, where commentator 1 Jill Vaughan lives, the cold can be especially intense. For her and her neighbors, who don't have much money -- keeping warm this winter will mean more than paying a higher bill once a month.

"I was a little intimidated 2 by my daughter's new house. The sunlight glowed and hardwood floors, that kind of beauty doesn't come cheap, when I toured the family room, I was struck, it had a fireplace. There was plenty of room here for a small table, a microwave and a bed. I thought this is their winter room, I shared my thoughts with my daughter, she rolled her eyes, I know what she was thinking. My calculations belong to a different world than the one she lives in now. I felt foolish, but I know she remembers her childhood when one room was all we could afford to heat."

"I spent most of my life keeping warm on a shoestring 3, it's second nature to scan any house for its winter possibilities. Somethings are obvious, stack hay bales around the foundations, staple 4 plastic over the windows, nail blankets up over the leakiest windows and doors, cold shrinks the boundaries of the house, only one or two rooms are used, in the main room the kerosene 5 heater glows and we circle bodies around that nucleus 6. Hot dogs heat in a pot on top of the heater, kids do homework in blanket cocoons 7. Years ago, we built a raised bunk 8 bed for the living room to take advantage of the warmer air, kids slept down at the sideways, stacked like cordwood. The heater shut off at night, but the orange flame flickers 9 early in the morning. Oatmeal cooks on it, to stoke the children's furnaces against the cold wait for the schoolbus. We bring car batteries in to warm. People with central heat don't know what cabin fever means, dim light from blanketed windows and a crowded room gets old after a few months."

"For some of us, the government has a heating assistance program. This year, prices are so high. The allowance doesn't cover enough fuel to make companies willing to deliver around here. Child-protective services takes warm seriously, babies whose calories go to keep in warm instead of gaining weight might be taken, which makes heat-seeking parents desperate. I see neighbors or people on my caseload loading fallen branches into their trunks the day after a windstorm for fuel. Their kids are folklore 10 trolls in layers and snowsuits. The calculus 11 of keeping warm is second nature to the poor. It's an outdated 12 skill if you can do the same thing by cranking a thermostat 13 up. We can't. We want our families warm physically 14 and emotionally, and will use our energy and ingenuity 15 to do it, anyway we can."

Jill Vaughan is a job counselor 16, she lives in M, New York.