05 Jan Fifty Years Ago on January 5…
Kiev. Statue of Lenin (removed in 2014) at the foot of the Shevchenko Blvd. Year 1997.
Fifty years ago on January 5…
…my husband submitted a request to the OVIR (Office of Visas and Registration) to allow our family to leave the country of victorious socialism. To his astonishment, the clerk greeted him politely. And she tearfully complained about her increasing workload and her superiors’ lack of understanding that she needed an assistant. He sincerely sympathized and apologized for adding to her workload on the very first working day of the year. She thanked him and noted that not everyone understood how difficult her job is. We later learned that at that particular period of time, due to complaints from human rights activists transmitted to the West, there was an instruction to treat “the traitors to the motherland” gently.
Only with the passage of years did I realize how little we knew back then and that we understood even less. Recently published books (I can provide the titles) and my own age-acquired wisdom have proven this fact. So, my website (https://appledoesnotfall.com/), which I proudly considered not only a family site but also a historical one, turns out to need important additions and revisions. I never imagined that 50 years later my days would be filled with serious reading and improvements to my website, the precious legacy my young’uns would hopefully treasure. But that’s how it should be, because “you can’t see a face when you’re face to face. What is truly significant is seen from a distance” (https://culture.ru/poems/43511/pismo-k-zhenshine).
I congratulate myself, my children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and all who know what I’m talking about. Here is to the next 50!
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