5/20/2008 - Trinity

Trinity Doesn’t Work on Highways

Four hours of driving experience is not sufficient for Kansas City, especially if you got them in Shreveport. My friend Joyce completed my driving school; placing me behind the wheel of her old car during the worse traffic jams. Joyce had a heavy foot and because I didn’t know any other driving styles, I took it after her.

“Lydia! You too have a heavy foot, girl! Go girl, go! Didn’t you see the green truck? Ah! It was in your blind spot…” " nothing could scare Joyce about my driving: that was all she said when we almost collided with that truck and then another one. I didn’t even notice how I began driving without any fear on highways, trying to support conversation with Joy. I passed driving test because of Joyce’ help " I thought I became a really good driver.

My son Paul noticed a year later, sitting next to me in the car, “Mom! Did you hear about the road rage?!” I never heard of a thing like that before " the driving expected to be long: we were going from my work back home, “Nah! I haven’t” I prepared myself for a cultural lesson, I was glad I listened. “Have you seen that guy, pointing a middle finger at you? That is a bad, bad sign.” My idea of crass was very limited so it took me a while to grasp a concept of what my 10 years old son tried to tell me. “Where did you learn this?” I was absolutely amused by what I heard.

“Oh mom, on TV, where else? And at school! You can learn all kind of stuff there.” Little Paul began teaching me with adult patience, “You don’t change lanes right.” Here I could argue, I knew how to change lanes, “First, you show the signal, you turn your head to check the lane, and you turn the wheel!”

Paul calmly commented, “Yes, exactly! But not all three at once! You should turn the head to the right to check the blind spot, then show the signal, and only then you turn the wheel to the right.”

“Really?!!!  Is it not what I am doing?!!!” My ten years old son patiently instructed, “Mom! You do all three at once!” I still didn’t get it: of course, how else you do it? “Mom!” Paul started it all over. “First, you show the signal, then you turn your head to check the lane, and then, only then (!!!) you turn the wheel!” This time I almost cried " I did exactly the same what my son was telling me. But then I started mentally rewinding my way of doing it and I got horrified: Paul was right! I did show the signal, turning my head and the wheel at the same time. I was horrified " I did it for a year and was not killed. I am sure some people thought I was suicidal! That really frustrated me: I didn’t realize that every time I changed lanes I put my son and myself at risk! “Why didn’t you tell me this before? We could be both dead by now!”  I was embarrassed and upset at the same time.

“Mama, I am not backseat driver! Nothing could be worse than to have a person in your care, who tells you how to drive!”  That was true: when Irina came to see us in Kansas City for the first time and I proudly picked her up from the airport all I head was, “Stop the car! Don’t you see the truck next to you? Oh, it is so big… And the driver is crazy " let him pass, he is speeding!... Slow down! Why didn’t you check the right lane?... Do you know about the blind spot?”

5/20/2008 - Questionable Corner

Street Corner with the Catch

One summer we invited Russian youth. To be honest,  the Summer Camp sucked: the food was awful, the program was not thought through, but black kids from poor neighborhoods had a ball, while Russian children suffered. They got unresponsive to all our efforts to involve them into boredom. All they wanted was to get out of building because inside was even worse than outside. I didn’t blame them: to be first time in America and sit inside of the stuffy and dusty building would be silly. Russian kids were from wealthy families and the money burned their fingers. Shopping was the most desirable activity on their to-do list.

The local bank employees called me one morning from the bank, “Lydia, are those girls yours?”

“What girls?”

“I am afraid that those girls on the corner are from Russia. They are so different and for our taste, they dressed provocatively, so we first thought they were local prostitutes that we see on our corner every day, but those seem way too young. We do not want to upset you, but this corner doesn’t have a good reputation. We do not want your girls to get hurt.”

I ran outside and I saw my Russian teenage girls standing on the corner of 10^th and Central in their tiny shorts revealing as much of their legs and hips as you would see people doing only in California and Russia. Nobody would even think they those girls could be under age.  “Girls, did I not tell you stay inside? Did I not tell you how dangerous this area is?!!! You can not go out without adults.”

“We just went across the street to buy some groceries! Big deal! This is 10 AM - this is not night! Why do you always try to scare us?! We are from a big city and we can go anywhere safe. Here it is like a village and people are so nice to us.” The girls started waving someone. I looked around and saw a truck driver pooling over where the girls were and a few guys across the street waiting. They waved back and grimmed.

“Oh, yeah! I am sure those guys are very friendly. Go back to the church! Right now! Go, I said! I will explain to you later how friendly they are!”

5/20/2008 - I Am an American Now!

My friends often ask me the same question: when did I really feel like a true American for the first time?

I moved to Kansas City without any driving experience. I had my driver’s license from Shreveport, LA, but on Highway I-35 it was as useful as an American passport in a jungle.

One lady with a heavy foot decided to teach me how to drive and placed me behind the wheel of her car the first day I arrived. She was talking to me all the way. Being polite, I tried to meet her eyes, and didn’t notice how I got rid of fear of driving that came with the price. The most difficult thing for me was to keep track of traffic signs, traffic lights, other cars and their signals, so I passed not only a few red lights unnoticed but even police cars. Who knew they were hiding? Police officers, though, never gave me a ticket. My accent worked like magic.

My very first ticket made me proud: finally, I was treated like a normal American.

10/28/2007 - First Christmas in America

10/28/2007 - Corned Beef

10/28/2007 - Chain Saw

10/28/2007 - Howling Thermostat

1/31/2007 - If You Never Had a Daughter

11/20/2006 - Thanksgiving Dinner

Before coming to America, I thought I knew everything about this country from a few American movies I saw: mostly Westerns. We Soviet children admired Aztecs, Comanche, Apaches and Cherokees and played "Indians" in our neighborhoods, wearing ponchos, moccasins and braiding our hair. Well, it was the style of the 70s anyway - the hippie era.

In America I became more aware of the feelings of the minority. Here I became the minority myself. Every time we went to Applebee’s, I trustfully took the strong dark skinned handsome guy always standing at the door for a real man. That man at the door wore his heavy, beautiful head piece made out of blue, red and white feathers, mustard color fringed suede pants and nothing to cover his tattooed muscular chest. That man-statue was able to catch me off-guard every time I entered the restaurant making me believe he was real until one day I finally asked a waitress, "Why do you have that Indian man standing at the door while everybody else sits at the table, enjoying food? Every time I feel uncomfortable like there was an American Indian at the door, who is not allowed in. It doesn’t create a good impression.

The waitress didn’t know what to say - she was obviously working part time, "Let me talk to my manager." The manager came and apologized, "We’re not trying to make any statements. This is just a statue. It doesn’t mean anything." The more I talked to the manager the more I felt like he didn’t understand. It was not just the statue - it was a statement: "We keep those "Natives" at the door. I wouldn’t want a Russian girl in her folk outfit to stay at the door where it is cold or hot and crowded all the time even if she was just a statue. In a few weeks my son and I came back to the Applebee’s and I didn’t even notice until we were leaving that the American Indian was gone. "Mom, good job!"  My son was sincerely proud of me, and it made me think about how many things we pass every day, not noticing.

 

 

10/29/2006 - Looking for a Bride?

Women in my grandparent’s neighborhood had to go to the well to bring water in heavy buckets. Water was needed for everything: laundry, cooking and bathing, regardless of the weather. That was why my parents finally decided one day to move into the city - they didn’t want us, girls, to grow without the comfort of the urban life.

My grandmother placed the old fashioned yoke between two empty buckets on the floor in the kitchen, bending her bony body over the wooden yoke to grab each bucket handle with the yoke’s hook. It was so neat to watch my grandmother’s movements especially when the handles acted stubborn, slipping from the hooks.

"Oi, ti mneshen’ka!" - My grandmother complained on her old fashioned village dialect, which meant something like "Oh, my God!"

She would repeat her attempts over and over until she was ready to place the yoke around her neck. Grandma looked always like Christ on the cross when she stretched her arms toward the ends of the yoke to secure the buckets. Then grandma would turn her right side forward to get through the door on her way out.

When I turned ten, I came to stay with my grandparents in our old neighborhood for a few weeks - I loved to visit my grandparents and stay in their old house.

I liked to wake up early in the morning and get out of the house to breathe in the smell of the farm. The smell of the freshly plowed soil mixed with dung was my favorite. Walking around my grandparents’ property, I always checked the barn where a cute cow blinked at me with her long eyelashes. "Moo-o-o-o-o-o".

I found vegetables in the garden and pulled out a bunch of fresh slender carrots. The easiest way to wash freshly picked vegetables was to dip them in the rusty canister filled with rain water that my grandfather set on the back yard to collect water. I never tasted carrots that were juicier than those crunchy orange sticks with green leaves, sticking out of my mouth, when I took the first bite.

Grandmother had already baked fresh pies in the Russian oven and waited for me in the kitchen with her face flushing - she had been too close to the greedy flame the whole morning.

Finally, my grandmother allowed me to go to the well. I proudly processed through the neighborhood with empty bucket hanging down below my knees, hitting my legs every step I took. Noticing how people tried to avoid me on my way to the well, I remembered that with the empty buckets I was bad luck to anybody who came my way: to see empty buckets was bad luck. I filled my buckets full - four gallons in each - and repeated my grandmother’s ritual, placing the bucket on the left hook first and then another bucket on the right hook of the yoke. 

Now, I am no longer bad luck for others, but I was bad luck for myself if I splashed any water on the ground: the belief was that the best bride is the one who walks so gracefully that she doesn’t splash a single drop.

I walked very carefully, but the full buckets were too heavy for me.

As soon as I took the first step with my left foot, at least two cups of water splashed out of the buckets. Right foot - same result. I tried to make my steps shorter just to see that it didn’t help - another puddle.

"Come on, girl! Let us see how good you are!" The neighbors cheered me up just to make me splash even more water and hardly made it home. To my embarrassment, I came home with buckets half empty. Nyah! I was not ready yet to be the best bride in the neighborhood. 

10/22/2006 - Suffering like Job

My daughter just had a miscarriage and after all our joy to see her becoming a mom one day soon, we went with her through all kinds of thoughts and questions about the meaning of life and death. With my daughter I was reminded how sudden sometimes our life can change. It felt like she walked one way with the smile on her face and someone grabbed her against her will and made her walk back from where she just came. But the way back had to be done with pain, bleeding and weeping.

Her doctor said that seven women out of ten lose their first pregnancy and it shocked us. That many? We never knew that! Why women end in situations when they are not in charge of their own bodies and someone decides for them what is going to happen?! To those women I dedicate this song.

Job’s Song

I prostrate myself, and pray and pray

On the floor and on my knees.

And while I pray, I hear you say,

"Do you know who I AM?"

Chorus in a rock style:

I don’t care who you say you are

How dare did you take away what was mine?!

I find no more ashes to hide my pain

I lost all my friends, who saw my shame...

I hide my eyes, and look and cry

For the One, who promised me

Is all you said was just a lie

Or that’s all you had for me?

Chorus:

I prostrate myself, and I hear you speak

"Do you know who I am?

I created you to be tough not weak

It’s enough for you to grieve."

Chorus:

I stood up and saw that life is good

Though bad things happen too

Here I am strong and whole again

This dark place is not to stay.

New Chorus for the ending:

And now I care who you say you are

I dare to find what you have for me

I need no more ashes to hide my pain

I won’t use your name in vain again... only when I pray.

10/21/2006 - Not Seeing the Woods for the Trees

          One day my friend invited me to go to the woods to pick wild berries on a very hot day. To tell the truth, I did not want to go not because I didn’t like to eat berries but because I never developed a passion for picking them up. But I said, "OK, Tatiana, let’s go.  That is may be exactly what I need. Some fresh air will be good."

"What is this?" I suspiciously pointed at something looking like an old spotted rug that my friend put on as soon as we left the car. "This is my raincoat. You should put one on too. I brought it for you. Mosquitoes could be really bad in the woods at this time of the year." I forgot all about nasty creatures!  As much as I hated the idea of wearing somebody else’s old coat, to have to scratch mosquito bites didn’t appear like a bright future to me either. I put the raincoat on. 

"What is it now?!" My friend handed me a can. "Lydia, now you have to spray your face and hands with repellent."

"Oh, no! I rather die. It is enough that I wear your ugly raincoat. I scared all the mosquitoes off. I can hardly breathe already. Why should I put repellent on?" - I hated to even touch the bottle! But you can’t argue with Tatiana - she was a chemist and a wild berry guru.  We always had the most fragrant jam at her popular parties.

Tatiana was large and confident, and when I saw her pouring horribly smelling lotion into her hands, I simply requested,

"Tatiana, could you do me a favor? Your hands are dirty anyway, put the lotion on me, if you could." Tatiana was very generous and she liked to take care of me like I was a little girl. So she spread stinky and sticky stuff on my hands and my neck and all over my face. I knew at that very moment that every berry I touch would be inevitably poisoned.

"Oh, gush! I am poisoned! I can taste the repellent on my lips and my tongue... well, thank you very much - it goes down into my throat now!" The spray smelled like a gas that we studied in our civic defense class under the topic of chemical weapon - so I knew that the spray was not just poisonous it was deadly poisonous! 

I used to be a chemist too for God’s sake! I was worried about it all the way to the woods and didn’t put a single berry into my mouth because of that".

It was hot and humid even without the raincoat! But under it I was sweating like in a sauna, inhaling more and more of the spray but still trying to focus my attention on the berries, the only thing that still looked positive. It didn’t work really well: all I was able to think of was the poison that ran down my chicks with the sweat straight into my thirsty mouth. 

The mosquitoes - they cared less for the repellent and bit every inch of my open body. The face started feeling much bigger because of the bites. The skin itched and scratching it, I rubbed more and more of the poisonous chemical into my pores.

You know what? I didn’t realize that to find berries you have to almost crawl on the ground to recognize the berries among the grass! In the woods I am always afraid of a potential criminal behind the trees.  So, I tried to pick up the berries, almost crawling in the long raincoat, sweating and trying to check what is going on behind me - all at once.  I did not want to be killed by some crazy guy with an ax. You know all those childhood horrible stories!

Three hours later I was exhausted! I did not see the berries through the sweaty tears!  I was too preoccupied with the mosquitoes, the sweat and the potential danger looming in the woods. The bottom of the one-galloon jar was hardly covered with berries, but at least my adventure was over.  I found Tatiana looking so happy!  She bragged, waving her jar full of deliciously looking and wonderfully smelling berries in front of my silly face.  What a reward for unique ability to ignore the secondary.

10/21/2006 - Colorblind

            Cats do not like me. I am sure this is because they somehow know that I like dogs more. Dogs appear as intellectuals to me. I tried several times to bring cats home when I was a girl to prove it wrong, but every time it was a fiasco: the cats either ran away, or even tried to commit suicide. You never heard of that? Let me tell you!
    One kitten bit the electrical cord and his body was making a rhythmical sound every time it hit the wall under the sofa. I found the cat in agony with the cord in its mouth covered with foam. That was not a pretty picture. I felt like a hero after saving my pet, but the cat never appreciated the sacrifice, leaving poop in my shoes in the closet until my friend decided that she was a better match for this type of thing " she didn’t mind the smell.
            My second cat fell from the top of the door onto a sharp metal surface and broke its back. That accident amused everybody - Japanese martial artists study how to fall on all fours without injury…and where do they go to learn this?  From...cats. Our cat probably was not Japanese and didn't know how to fall graciously.
    The third cat jumped out of the balcony on the fifth floor where we had our apartment and died after hitting the ground. Then I stopped trying.
    Five years ago I stopped at one of the pet stores to buy food for my fish and looked at the little puppies that cuddled or played in their cages.
    "How cute!" - I couldn't take my eyes off those clumsy little dogs.
    I looked inside another cage with the sign "SOLD" and saw a tiny kitten. My son was begging me to get a cat for a long time, but I had to be firm - no more victims in my house. This time a strange feeling arose in my heart while I was looking at that kitten and especially after I held that tiny creature in my hands: I knew it was OUR cat. A person who wanted to buy the kitten didn't come. The only problem with the pet was the color - it was a black cat! If a black cat crosses a street, people change their direction in an instant. I knew it was bad luck to even to see one but I had already begun falling in love with that cute blue-eyed trustful kitten.
    "This is the time to finally get rid of my prejudice and fear." I decided bravely. I got even happier noticing the funny little white tufts of hair sticking out behind the cat’s ears. "It's not black, it's not black." I recited these words in my car driving home. But deep in my mind I still doubted trying to find a reason to take the cat back. "What if my son has an allergy to cats? What if the cat brings us misfortune?"
    My son and I were growing in love for this new member of our family. Our love was tested for the first time when the cute white hair from behind the ears fell out, and our unusual cat turned into a very ordinary black cat - no white color at all. I tried really hard to find at least one microscopic white spot, but failed. I even thought about bleaching a few spots to cheat nature, but I had already begun to learn that the color didn’t matter. Love did.
    Another test was around the corner. Our black kitten had a unique way to make faces: she would stick her red little tongue out between the teeth to amuse everybody. No one had ever seen cat acting like a stubborn child! Little did we know the reason…our precious kitten developed oral cancer. The cat’s mouth was getting more and more deformed and looked ugly. The tumor bled. The vet suggested putting the cat to sleep. I didn’t know I could suffer this inevitable loss so badly. I couldn’t neither get it nor explain it: it was just an ordinary black cat, but I wouldn’t give up our family member.  The vet gave our kitten one month to live, but love did the miracle " the cat lived through that month and then another month and another. The ordinary mud black cat became a true miracle! A funny black miracle with only one tooth in her mouth sticking out, but we loved her even more. She was there with us alive; she would live.
    Cancer stepped into our family as uninvited guest, and I couldn’t help it, thinking again about the color of our cat. My Dad was diagnosed with cancer and I couldn’t help thinking, “What if I brought misfortune into the family?” Who would imagine that cats could have cancer?!
Little did I know that our black cat could become a symbol of hope and survival for my father. Every time my Dad called, he asked about the cat, “How is she? Is she doing well? Are you telling me the truth?”
My Dad died first and then, two years later, the cat lost the fight too.
    “No more cats!” " that was my firm decision. The shadow of suffering was hanging heavily over our heads.
    My husband called me from work and said, “My friend needs to find a home to his kitten, do we want one?”
    “Honey, we decided to never have pets again, remember? Remember that whole ordeal?”
    “Well, his daughter gave him a kitten for Father’s Day and he never had a cat before. He doesn’t want one.”
    “Remember the kitty litter, love?!”
    “His daughter is leaving for college and my friend is stuck with the cat he doesn’t want!”
    “Well, what is the color?”
    “Black…” Something warm moved in the core of my stomach. I paused, listening to my pounding heart.
    “I guess, it’s meant to be. Bring her in.”
    When the kitten arrived, it was so tiny that she disappeared in the black blanket. I almost crushed her neck, trying to get off my armchair, holding carefully my laptop in one hand and using my other hand to get off the ottoman. I had put all my weight on the fingers to keep the balance, pressing against the spongy surface. The kitten’s neck ended right between my fingers. Thankfully, that tragedy was averted.
This little five weeks black creature happened to be right where you want her less. I tried to move the floor lamp to a new place and had to really watch that I didn’t make my kitten carry the lamp on her back. After checking a carefully selected spot twice, I confidently placed the lamp down on the floor just to see four tiny legs and one black tail sticking out underneath it.
    The kitten grew and needed to be “fixed”. The day she came home she pulled out all stitches and had to be taken back to the vet with her tummy split right in the middle. The surgeon met me at the door after the surgery with puzzled look, “She is ornery! I just finished stitching her and she pulled all stitches out again. I stapled her this time and put stitches that do not dissolve, but I am still not sure it will work. She is quite a character!”
    May be it is not black cats that bring bad luck to us people, but we people bring bad luck to black cats?

9/19/2006 - Beer, Warrior, and Sexy Body

Men’s bodies are usually not insulted by greedy consumers