With three kids and a home business, and her disabled mother living with her, Kristen Becker often lets the dishes and laundry pile up. ’I am very comfortable with chaos,’ she says.
克里斯汀?貝克(Kristen Becker)有三個孩子，一份在家里做的生意，還有一位身患殘疾的母親和自己住在一起，在這樣的情況下，她常常會任由臟盤子和臟衣服堆積如山。她說，我一點兒也不在乎又臟又亂。
Her husband isn’t.
可她的丈夫在乎。
He organizes his clothing by type, color and pattern, alphabetizes his CD collection and keeps rubber gloves in his car for unexpected spills, she says.
貝克太太說，她的丈夫會按種類、顏色和款式擺放衣服，把CD按字母順序排好，在車里準備一雙橡膠手套，以防意外噴濺事件發生。
He sometimes goads his wife into being neater by making only his half of their king-size bed, heaping the magazines and bills splayed across the kitchen counter into teetering stacks, or moving his wife’s mound of laundry across the room.
他有時會迫使妻子變得更整潔一些，比如他會只整理雙人床上自己的那一邊，把廚房桌子上散落的雜志和帳單堆成搖搖欲墜的一摞，或是把妻子小山式的臟衣服在房間里搬來搬去。
Ms. Becker retaliates by letting her messes pile up even higher. But one day she couldn’t take it anymore. Sick of her husband’s incessant straightening and scrubbing, she decided to dismantle his neatly ordered life.
而貝克太太則以把東西堆得更加壯觀進行回擊。不過有一天，她再也忍不住了。厭倦了丈夫不斷的整理和擦拭，她決定顛覆丈夫井然有序的生活。
While he was at work, Ms. Becker rearranged his closet -- randomly moving shirts, pants and sports jackets together, and pairing slippers with boots and sandals with loafers. She moved his toiletries around in the bathroom and took papers out of his file folders and put them back in the wrong sleeves.
趁著丈夫上班的時候，貝克太太重新“整理”了丈夫的衣柜──把襯衫、褲子和運動外套亂七八糟地扔在一起，把拖鞋和靴子配成雙，把涼鞋和休閑皮鞋配成對。她把衛生間里丈夫的洗漱用品來了個大搬家，把件夾里的紙張拿出來，然后放到另外一個套子里。
’It was delicious,’ says Ms. Becker, 39 years old, who runs an online gift shop from her home in Crofton, Md. ’I was getting him back for all those times I felt pressured to keep things clean and organized.’ (Her husband immediately moved everything back. He declined to be interviewed for this column.)
貝克太太今年39歲，家住馬里蘭州克羅夫頓，在家經營著一個網上禮品店。她說，太棒了，我是在報復他一直以來強迫我保持東西干凈整齊。(她的丈夫馬上又把一切恢復了原位。他拒絕就本文接受采訪。)
In the battle between messy and tidy, which side should win? Should slobs learn to be neater? Or should neat freaks loosen up?
在臟亂與整潔之間的大戰中，哪一方該獲勝呢?拉遢鬼是否應該學習變得更整潔?還是潔癖鬼該放松一下?
Neatniks will tell you that order is the way of the world -- everything has a place and every place should be labeled. Often, they feel they bear a burden for having to clean up after their partner. Even worse: They think they hold the moral high ground.
有潔癖的人會告訴你秩序是世界運轉之道──每個東西都有一個位置，每個位置都要有標簽。他們常常感覺有責任為自己的伴侶收拾殘局。更糟糕的是，他們認為自己在道德上占有優勢。
But messy people suffer, too. They feel guilty for not being neat. They resent being controlled by someone more rigid and demanding. And they hate having to clean when they don’t want to -- or endure the hints or griping if they refuse. (Note to my husband: I don’t think I can live without you, but make just half the bed and I’ll try.)
不過拉遢的人也不好過。他們為沒有保持整潔而感到愧疚。對被更刻板、更苛刻的人所控制感到憤憤不平。討厭不想打掃的時候卻必須去打掃，忍受拒絕打掃后對方的暗示和嘮叨。(給我丈夫的提示：我認為沒有你，我就活不下去，不過你整理自己那一半床，我會試著離開你也能生活下去。)
’I have a chronic case of Reorganization Stress Syndrome. It’s when an item that used to be in Location A suddenly appears in Location B, with no warning,’ says Dave Brooke, 39, a supply-chain analyst in Santa Rosa, Calif. As a messy person living with a neat one, he has it worse than most: His girlfriend is a professional organizer. ’Having the place look beautiful and neat is a wonderful thing -- until I need to find something,’ he says.
加州圣羅薩的39歲供應鏈分析師戴夫?布魯克(Dave Brooke)說，我患有慢性再整理壓力綜合癥。當一件原本在A處的物品出現在B處的時候，就會毫無預警的發病。作為與一個愛干凈的人生活在一起的拉遢鬼，他的處境比大部分人都要糟糕：他的女友是個職業整理者。他說，讓地方看起來漂亮整潔是件美妙的事，不過我找不到東西了。
Having to search for your stuff is one thing. But having a fight with your partner over a sock on the floor is something else entirely. ’People build up resentment, and then they snap,’ says Carolyn Kelley North, a marriage counselor in Lighthouse Point, Fla. ’The sock becomes a symbol of the relationship as a whole.’
不得不到處找自己的東西是一個問題。不過因為一只扔在地板上的襪子而和伴侶大吵一番卻完全是另外一回事了。佛羅里達州燈塔市的婚姻顧問卡羅林?諾斯(Carolyn Kelley North)說，人們會慢慢積怨，然后會突然爆發。襪子成了整個關系的一個象征。
Yes, you heard her right: If you’re not careful, the essence of the most important relationship in your life will be distilled to one dirty sock.
不錯，你理解的沒錯：如果你不小心的話，你生活中最重要的關系的精髓就只剩下一只臟襪子。
