I was ashamed of where I lived .
我为我住的地方感到羞愧.
we had a big family.
我们是个大家庭.
Several of the members of the family were sleeping in one room,
几个家庭成员睡在一个房间里.
but that's not so bad if you get along and we always did.
如果你们相处的还不错,也许还不算太糟糕,我们就相处的很好.
As you get older,though,things get worse
但是,当你年龄越来越大的时候,就会更糟
We lived in a lot of old houses.
我们住过很多老房子.
Some of them were in bad shape ten years before we moved in.
很多在我们搬进去的10年前就已经破损不堪
They were hot in summer and treezing in winter.
夏天太热,冬天又冻的要命.
I woke up every morning forla year and a half with dust on my face It had fallen out of the ceilling during the night.
有一年半的时间,我每天灰头土脸的起床,哪些灰尘是在我晚上睡觉的时候从天花板脱落的.
when we boys got old enough to learn trades in school ,
当我们长大一点,学会了在学校赚点小钱的时候,
we wanted to fix up the old house.
我们想整修这个老房子.
We did try once.
我们试过一次
But when we tried to whitewash the old walls,
但是当我们尝试给这些陈旧的墙刷油漆的时候,
the dust fell off the wall as the brush went across it.
刷子刷过,墙皮大片的掉下来.
We ended up with the old walls looking even worse than before.
墙看上去比刷之前还要惨,我们只好作罢.
