Part 1

Time was in my life when the dawn happened to other people. I was definitely not a morning person. Then I had children, and the first light took on new meaning. Sometimes it was the sigh at the end of a fretful night up with a feverish baby; or the opposite, the joyous cry of an exuberant 3-year-old eager to get the day going. It was only later, when mornings were taken over by the getting-to-school frenzy, that I discovered the serenity of the surprisingly fast transition from night to day. For the small price of 15 minutes of sleep I could buy 15 minutes of solitary peace—with a cup of coffee and the newspaper. Given the tidbit of time at my disposal, I developed the habit of skimming the paper, which quickly came down to a surreptitious and almost superstitious ritual of checking out obituaries. 

At first I attributed this new habit to advancing age—I had recently turned 40—and glumly concluded that I was becoming morbid. But why, then, was I finding my secret rite so uplifting? Finally, after many years of starting the day this way, I have figured out that I am doing it not to obsess about death but to find out about life. Real life. Obituaries capture the benchmarks of life span without passing judgment or making order out of the events. The high points are easy –Pulizer Prize winners joke that as soon as they are named they know what the headline is going to be on their obituary—but I read most attentively for clues to the defeats and the flatline periods, the inexplicable changes of heart and the twists of fate, the gambles and the unexpected consequences, the loose ends…

Part 2

Sept. 11 delivered both a shock and a surprise—the attack, and our response to it—and we can argue forever over which mattered more. There has been so much talk of the goodness that erupted that day that we forget how unprepared we were for it. We did not expect much from a generation that had spent its middle age examining all the ways it failed to measure up to the one that had come before—all fat, no muscle, less a beacon to the world that a bully, drunk on blessings taken for granted.

It was tempting to say that Sept. 11 changed all that, just as it is tempting to say that every hero needs a villain, and goodness needs evil as its grinding stone. But try looking a widow in the eye and talking about all the good that has come of this. It may not be a coincidence, but neither is it a partnership: good does not need evil, we owe no debt to demons, and the attack did not make us better. It was an occasion to discover what we already were. “Maybe the purpose of all this,” New York city Mayor Rudy Giuliani said at a funeral for a friend, “is to find out if America today is as strong as when we fought for our independence or when we fought for ourselves as a Union to end slavery or as strong as our fathers and grandfathers who fought to rid the world of Nazism”. The terrorists he argues, were counting on our cowardice. They’ve learned a lot about us since then. And so have we.

For leading that lesson, for having more faith in us than we had in ourselves, for being brave when required and rude where appropriate and tender without being trite, for not sleeping and not quitting and not shrinking from the pain all around him . Rudy Giuliani, Mayor the World, is TIME’s 2001 Person of the Year. 
Part 1

我生命中有一段时间，黎明与我无缘。我那时根本不愿起早。后来，我有了孩子，第一道曙光便有了新的意义。有时孩子生病，整晚不得安宁，于是黎明是在我的一声叹息中迎来的。有时恰恰相反，精力充沛的三岁孩子迫不及待地要开始一天的生活，黎明于是在孩子欢快的叫喊声中到来。后来，孩子上学了，于是清晨就是在送孩子上学的忙乱中度过的。正是在这忙乱的时刻，我突然发现从夜晚过渡到白昼竞何其短促，那一瞬间却又无比宁静。那么，不妨少睡十五分钟，就可以喝咖啡，看报纸，享受十五分钟独处的宁静。由于可以支配的时间有限，我便养成了利用这片刻随便翻阅报纸的习惯，而且我喜欢偷偷地查看报上的讣告，这一习惯几乎到了雷打不动的地步，近乎是一种迷信般的仪式。

起初，我以为这是因为上了年纪的缘故(当时我刚四十岁)，于是我不无悲哀地认为这是一种病态心理。可令我不解的是，为什么我竟对这个秘密的仪式感到如此振奋?我就是以这种方式年复一年地度过清晨那片刻的时光，直到有一天我突然明白过来，我如此喜欢读讣告并非迷恋死亡，而意在探索生命，真正的生命。讣告捕捉一生中的重要时刻，却不对事件进行评断。辉煌的时刻当然容易在讣告中发现，普力策奖得主不无诙谐地说，一得奖他们就知道自己讣告的标题是什么。然而我读讣告专心捕捉的却是生命中的失败，人生中百无聊赖的时刻，莫可名状的心意改变和命运的峰回路转，人生中的赌博和事与愿违的结局，还有那未了的心愿……

Part 2

 “9·11”事件既令人感到震惊，也令人感到意外。震惊的是攻击事件本身，意外的是我们对事件的反应。至于说这两者哪个更为重要，人们也许永远会争论下去。对于当天一下子涌现出来的可歌可泣的事迹，我们已经谈得不少了。在一片谈论声中，我们居然忘了，面对这些令人敬佩的行为我们当时是多么感到意外。因为我们本来就没有对这代美国人抱有多大期望。他们的中年是在自叹不如的心境中度过的，他们和上一代美国人比来比去，总感到自己望尘莫及。他们虚浮有余，坚实不足，根本谈不上是世界的灯塔，倒却是横行的恶霸，沉醉于福荫之中，总觉得受之无愧。

我们也许会脱口而出地说，是“9·11”事件改变了这一切，正如我们会脱口而出地说，英雄需要有恶棍来陪衬，善良需要有邪恶来砥砺。但当你望着“9·11”死难者遗孀的双眼时，你难道还能侃侃而谈“9·11”事件所引发的好处吗?不错，善恶并存也许确非巧合，但它们也绝非相互依存的伙伴:善用不着恶陪伴左右，我们并不亏欠魔鬼，“9·11”事件也没有把我们变成更好的人。它只是一次机会，我们不过借此发现了自己的本色。纽约市市长朱利安尼在朋友的葬礼中说得好:“也许这一切的目的就是要考验一下，看看今日的美国是否仍像当年为争取独立而战时那样坚强，是否仍像当年为结束奴隶制而团结奋战时那样坚强，是否仍像当年我们的父辈为消灭纳粹而战时那样坚强。”他认为，恐怖主义者就指望我们会胆怯。但自“9·11”事件以来，他们想必对我们已有所了解。当然我们对自己也有了不少认识。由于朱利安尼在这次考验中堪称表率，由于他对我们的信心远胜于我们对自己的信心，由于他该勇敢时就勇敢，该鲁莽时就鲁莽，他温情流露，但那绝非应景之俗套，由于他不分昼夜，不停工作，虽被痛苦包围，却能勇敢面对，因此这位天下第一市长当选为2001年《时代周刊》的年度风云人物。