Part One – Here
(Western Hemisphere)
CHAPTER SIX – MISCELLANEOUS
One of my favorite styles in writing is potpourri, that is, a kaleidoscope of colorful events that gradually form into a pattern, canvas, fabric, in a word, material for an unexpected outfit – a novella. My readers are apparently familiar with “The Story of Chivali”, “Operation Singapore”, “We will build our new world” and even with the novel in memoirs – “Flashes of Two Hemispheres”. All of them are written in this style of kaleidoscopic pictures.
And now I also am writing this chapter, mixing fragments of memories of early life in America.
What struck us in the new apartment was an unexpected knock on the floor. Yes, to our floor. It was knocking from the apartment below us. As it turned out, a woman, Yvette, a single mother with a teenage daughter lived there. Both were uneducated, ill-mannered and impolite. But just at the moment when they began knocking on their ceiling, apparently trying to get in touch with us about the silence, my Aunt Leah was visiting us. She, an experienced emigrant who went through the school of fighting with neighbors in our houses, and in general, a very determined and brave woman, said,
“What parasites they are! I’ll teach them a lesson now!”
And, without waiting for our approval, she grabbed a mop from the kitchen and began to hit the floor with its handle. This caused a surge of “fucks”, screams and a new cannonade on our floor. But Leah didn’t give up.
“Take sticks and hammers, we’ll whack them now!”
But, of course, we didn’t start banging on the neighbors, but somehow calmed Leah down.
“You don’t understand, you’re making a big mistake! You must finish the enemy once and for all! Otherwise you will have no peace!” Leah tried to explain to us.
To be honest, we did not share these views of war communism, but with regard to peace, she turned out to be right. Ivette knocked on us every time she didn’t like our activity. We walked – knock, vacuumed – knock, turned on an electric meat grinder or mixer in the kitchen – knock, TV in the living room – knock. You can continue up to infinity.
After some time, we found out that this is a very common problem in our yard. In all the houses of our complex there was no sound insulation between floors, and the empty space, or, if you like, the box between the ceiling and the next floor became a resonator. It was hard, but everyone knew it and most put up with it in terms of daytime activities. However, our neighbor had “acoustic problems”. When our relatives, new emigrants, stayed with us for a while waiting for their apartment, the neighbor began to have a crisis. She raged, banged, but could not do anything. Sometimes Ivette’s complaints took on a comical character,
“What is going on in your apartment? There are three of you, and eight people sit at the table three times a day! I’ll die!” she yelled.
“Relatives who are emigrants, you know how it happens. They will find an apartment and move out. Go to the house management, complain, maybe they will have it faster.”
“But who is clattering their hooves?” Yvette did not calm down.
I just laughed in response. It was a small dog of relatives, whose claws were no longer cut due to its old age, and they clattered on the parquet floor.
“Listen, Yvette,” I said, “When we have gests, come to us, eat, drink – it will become easier to you.”
But she took this invitation as a mockery and never came.
When we got a little more comfortable, we covered our parquet floors with carpets, and in the living room we even put an insulating pad under them – nothing helped. The knocking continued. A couple of times during these attacks I called the police and put the phone receiver on the floor. The police patrol arrived instantly and Yvette was reprimanded. But, as you understand, this did not have any result. One day she tried to call us to a “mediation”, and I decided to get ready and go to the debriefing. It occurred to me to ask around in the office for emigres, where the legal adviser worked, what happens in such cases.
“What is your address?” he asked me.
I was surprised what role the address played, but I named it. The legal adviser burst out laughing,
“You are probably the thousandth of these houses with a similar problem. It is unsolvable. Anyone who cannot accept it must move out.”
I calmed down and did not waste time on discussions in the “mediation”. I could live without their maxims that we must respect our neighbors, but I could not help but walk around the apartment. There was only one answer to this question – pass exams faster, become a doctor and move to a separate house. This was our plan, but Yvette gave up earlier. One day she and her daughter disappeared from our house. None of new neighbors downstairs complained about us.
The reader may think, “What a horror it is to live in such conditions,” but I disagree – over all nothing like that, many things in life here were incomparably better than there.
We, began to fly more as locals did. For some reason, this was not previously accepted there to the same extent as it was here. The plane here was treated like a flying intercity bus. Accommodation was also not a problem: there were plenty of hotels and motels at a variety of affordable prices for a traveler.
But this feeling did not come immediately. At first, all the new arrivals, and us too, traveled the old fashioned way – staying with friends in the guest rooms of their homes.
Probably our first trip was to Sasha’s fortieth birthday. He celebrated it in a recently purchased house – large and comfortable, where the guest room was not a room, but a studio – a bedroom, kitchen and bathroom. It was very convenient to stay in such conditions
Sasha sent us two plane tickets – one for a man, that is, for Mr. Neiman, and the second one for a woman, that is, for Mrs…. oops! The last name was different. The ticket was originally intended for Sonya’s (Sasha wife’s) friend, who was unable to go to the birthday party. Then my wife got her free ticket. In those distant years, no passport was required for a flight; any identification document, for example, a driver’s license, was suitable. But we didn’t need a car in a big city for life and movement; it created only a financial burden. That’s why we didn’t have a car or a license. I had a Kaplan course certificate, but my wife… had nothing. I had to make her a document, as happens in movies about intelligence officers. I borrowed from a friend her Kaplan pass – a small paper card with a photograph, re-photographed it, pasted onto the copy Lilya’s photo, wrote down the required last name, first name, and – voila – the document was ready. To make it look more solid, I took it to an office supply store and covered it with plastic (laminated it). Worked great. We were once again surprised at how simple everything is here, without bureaucracy.
The anniversary was celebrated in a large and beautiful courtyard garden, decorated with a wooden terrace for sixty guests, laid out around a giant elm tree.
The neighbor on the left remarked,
“Imagine how Sonya suffered while preparing this feast. Do you think it’s easy to cook, decorate, clean and organize?”
The neighbor on the right retorted,
“In a family like this, where everything can be ordered from chefs, cover the tables and clean, I could easily handle it if I were the hostess. Couldn’t you?”
Several years will pass, and this neighbor on the right will replace Sonya in the place of the mistress of the house. She actually coped very well with many tasks and problems at work and in life. But about this – in due time, but for now I’ll tell you about the surprise that Sonya gave Sasha – also under the influence of the new life.
Sonya wanted to congratulate her husband in some original way, and couldn’t come up with anything better than ordering a congratulation from a “stripper.” Apparently, one of her friends or employees told her that this is how they did it. Of course, they did it, especially in a youth or hip environment. The spectacle looked very pitiful. A tired and middle-aged woman in a bra, jeans and cowboy boots cracked her whip, offering to saddle, bridle and ride over the hero of the day. The invasion did not last long, because the stripper was given money and sent home. But this event also contributed to the family discord.
In the meantime, I enjoyed communication with an old friends, hospitable trips and entertainment in beautiful and interesting places in the state. It was so nice to be reunited with an old friend of mind and his family. Once in my youth, I imagined that we would be friends as families, and our wives would be interested in communicating, just like us. And although this dream came true in one form or another, it was not at all the way I had long imagined it in my youth.
Tell me, in fairness, is something in your life the way you imagined it to be many years ago?
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