Кругосветов Саша - Try living in Russia стр 8.

Lyusya's sensible mother advised her daughter how to build her life. She introduced her to a widower who had two children, a boy and a girl. Vladimir Petrovich, a bus driver and a stately, handsome man, became Lyusya's husband. He was simpler than her and more stupid. He loved her devotedly. And she allowed herself to be loved. However, apparently she was a good wife. And she managed to become a mother to another woman's children. But she never wanted children of her own. Nadezhda Danilovna decided to move in with her daughter and help her bring up the children. I had grown up a bit by then. I was going to school, year two or three. Before she left us, my nanny sent me to school on my own. For the first time. She asked me all the questions, how to cross the junction, at which light, where to look. When she wanted to attract my attention she would say «Sasha dear, look into my eyes». I looked into her eyes, answered all her questions and left for school by myself. And she tailed me, watching furtively – she wanted to make sure that I was really carrying out all her instructions.

This was not the end of my friendship with my nanny and her daughter. While I was at school I would spend the summer at our rented dacha together with Nadezhda Danilovna, Lyusya and her stepchildren, Vova and Galya, who were younger than me. Together we would explore all the forests, lakes and shooting ranges of the Vsevolozhsk region. We would go swimming and collect mushrooms and berries. Unfortunately, Lyusya went on to have problems with her stepson. When he was older, he started working at a factory and became a Komsomol leader. Vova was a good guy, very genuine and honest. His friends loved him. But then he was invited to work for the security services, something that often happened to Komsomol members at the time. And he found the offer tempting and flattering. Lyusya, on the other hand, couldn't forgive him for working for the security services, which she hated, and cut all ties with him. She didn't forgive him until the day she died. Much later, when Nadezhda Danilovna had passed away, her stepdaughter, Galya, had a daughter of her own. She was called Nadya (Nadezhda). In honour of her grandmother. Galya always considered Nadezhda Danilovna her real grandmother and Lyusya her real mother. Lyusya remained close to Galya and later to Galya's daughter. Such closeness isn't self-evident even between mothers and their natural daughters and grandchildren.

My memories of my nanny and her daughter have always been very important and dear to me. Whenever I told anybody of my beloved nanny I described her as a very simple person who was endowed by nature not only with goodness, but also with insight and a special kind of worldly wisdom. With Galya I was friends all my life. And ten years ago I bumped into Vova. He was an old-age pensioner already and had left the security services. We reminisced about Nadezhda Danilovna and Lyusya. I once again unquestioningly repeated my sacramental phrases about the wisdom of a simple Russian woman… «What simple woman?», he interrupted me, «she was a graduate of the Smolynyi Institute for Noble Girls. They only accepted girls from aristocratic families. Her family weren't simple at all. What do you mean, illiterate? She knew five languages. And her husband was a very senior member of the regional committee.» How do you like that? I was shocked. There goes your simple woman. Your illiterate woman. What a dimwit I was. And how the people of that time knew to keep their mouth shut. They were able to grow into a new skin. To live another's life instead of their own. And to never let the secret out. No to give themselves away with either a word or a hint. And my parents accepted the risk and kept silent. One thing offers comfort: we all genuinely loved each other, my parents, nanny, her daughter and I, the youngest. And was I really that wrong? No, I was right. She was full of goodness. And insight. And worldly wisdom. These things don't come from the Smolnyi Institute. But from a person's own heart. From the difficult life, the hard life that falls to the lot of every person, no matter where he or she lives in the vast expanse of our motherland. From the fields and forests of central Russia's nature. Some people find all this under every bush, as my dear nanny used to say – the goodness, the insight, and the worldly wisdom, too. Just as they find our father in heaven.

Post-war Romanticism

For Samuil the war meant work and more work. Every day, day in, day out. In the hospital there were the wounded, bandages, dressings, operations. The sick had to be fed. He organised a farming initiative farming on a personal plot of land. They had eggs, chickens, herbs and vegetables. There were melons and gourds. They listened to the summary reports from the front. The treated and discharged the wounded. The war subsided. The boys grew up unnoticeably. Antonina felt that her Syoma had developed a roving eye and decided to «strengthen» her family. During the last year of the war, when she was 42 and Syomochka approaching 50, she gave birth to her son Sasha, our baby. The parents were no longer young and Sasha turned out a weakly child. Like Nabokov's Cincinnatus, he was born into and lived his life in spheres not from this world. He pushed just a tiny part of himself out into our world. Which is why he was so fantastically thin that he appeared transparent. He wouldn't undress in the sun so that people wouldn't see that he was slightly translucent. In return his abilities were not from this world either. He knew by heart excerpts from hundreds of volumes, reference books and encyclopaedias that he had read. He would read anything he could get his hands on – prose, poetry, plays – in addition to studying painting with the help of art albums. He had encyclopaedic knowledge. He was a good pianist. All his mother's most romantic dreams for her children's future came together in Sasha. Antonina invested her entire soul into her youngest son. But Sasha was not from this world. Not of this world. Unsuitable for our rough and sinful life. Once he'd finished musical school he was sent to the regional central town to enter the conservatory. At that time Samuil had already been sent to the sanatorium in Zheleznovodsk as chief doctor. Sasha never made it to the conservatory. He spent the money. Got stuck somewhere in the back of beyond. Fell in love with an insolent, useless, simple girl. For life. Without reciprocity. All she needed was money and presents. That's why he sacrificed his marvellous library. Then he worked as a pianist in a restaurant. The other musicians brought him a tipple of vodka, then some more. Weak as he was, Sasha didn't need much. Random people would take him home. Once his parents had left this world he threw everything to the wind – the flat, the instrument, his mother's dreams, his undeveloped talent. His brothers were worried for Sasha and wanted to help and support him. They tried to remonstrate with him. What could they have done, far away as they were? They had no choice in the matter. They had to work. They only met up during the holidays. Sasha had no strength to fight. He let himself go. Ended up in prison for a silly matter. When he got out he vanished. Perished at the hand of a random passer-by. Our dreams are in vain. Our highflying impulses are in vain. Our world is no place for highflying impulses. This is a world for those who are strong and full of vitality, and even more for those who are cruel, greedy and merciless. This is no world for Antonina, «Our Lady from Zheleznovodsk», or Sasha, the Cincinnatus from the North Caucasus. But all this is for later. For the time being Sasha was a child. His parents, advanced in years, worshipped him.