Gardner began knocking on doors, applying for training programs at brokerages, even though it meant he would have to live on next to nothing while he learned. When he finally was accepted into a program, he left his job in medical sales. But his plans collapsed as suddenly as they had materialized. The man who offered him the training slot was fired, and Gardner had no job to go back to.
    Gardner开始上门申请学习经纪人课程，即使这意味着在他学习期间会衣食无着。当他终于被录取上培训班时，他辞掉销售员的工作。然而，他的计划突然之间转为泡影正如他们突然呈现一样。那个曾经答应给他上培训课的人被辞退了，而Gardner又丢掉了自己的工作。
Things got worse. He was hauled off to jail for $1,200 in parking violations that he couldn't pay. His wife left him. Then she asked him to care for their young son without her. Despite his lack of resources, Gardner said, "I made up my mind as a young kid that when I had children, my children were gonna know who their father was." Although a broker finally helped him enter a training program, Gardner wound up with no place to live. He was collecting a meager stipend as a brokerage trainee, and, like many working poor in America, he had a job but couldn't make ends meet.
    事情弄得一团糟，更糟糕的是，他因交不起$1,200停车违章罚款费而被监禁。他的妻子离他而去。之后，她要求他来抚养孩子。尽管缺少经济来源，Gardner说，'我从小就打定主意：我有了孩子，他们一定会知道他们的爸爸是谁。"尽管一个经纪人终于帮他上了培训班，最后，Gardner弄得身无栖身之地。当时，他只筹集到少量的培训班学费。正像许多美国穷人一样，他找了一份工作，但还是入不敷出。

The Kindness of Strangers

陌生人施善帮助

When he could afford it, he stayed with his son, Chris Jr., in cheap motels. When they returned home at night, Gardner says, he received help from some unexpected sources. “The ladies of the evening were beginning their shift. And they would always see myself, this baby and the stroller.     当他交起学费时，他和儿子Chris Jr.住在廉价汽车旅馆里。 Gardner说，他们深更半夜回家时意外地受到一些人的帮助。“晚上，女士来汽车旅馆上夜班，总是看见我、小婴儿和那辆推车。” ”So they started giving him $5 bills. Without their help, Gardner said, there would have been nights when he couldn’t have fed his son. The Rev. Cecil Williams, founder of Glide Memorial Church in San Francisco, remembers the first time he saw Gardner, who had gone to the church with his son to stand in a meal line. He said, “I wondered, ‘What in the world is a man doing with a baby?’”
    于是，她们就掏出五块钱给他。Gardner说，没有她们的帮助，儿子可能就会挨饿。旧金山Glide 教堂的创建人Rev. Cecil Williams回忆第一次见到Gardner的情形，当时他带着儿子排在就餐队伍中间。他说，“我当时纳闷：一个大男人怎么会身边拖着一个婴儿？”
Even to Williams, it was an unusual sight. The Urban Institute estimates that children make up 25 percent of the nation’s homeless population, but most are living with a single mother,not the father.     就连Williams也弄不明白这是怎么回事。根据城市协会估算，全国无家可归的人口中儿童占到百分之二十五。但是，绝大多数儿童和单亲母亲而不是单亲父亲一起生活。 liuxuepaper.com