My mother's stories (chapter twelve)

My mother’s stories

chapter 12

My mother's triuphs and mishaps in Bashkiria

It was exactly how her uncle, who knew her mother’s character too well, had foretold her: the further her train went away from the village the better she felt. And the first thing that she did after she crossed half the country - she went to a dance with her cousins. She was asked to dance almost immediately but seeing that nobody had invited her cousins yet she tried to reject an offer saying she couldn’t dance. A young man was persistent, however, and said he was a dance teacher. After some argument my mother agreed at last and they were dancing, joking and laughing all the evening, while her cousins stood uninvited leaning against the wall.

“Small wonder it was,” my mother usually concluded this scene with satisfaction “as they were so stupid and ugly”. She, unlike her cousins, was never deprived of dancing partners and after the ending of that first party three or four young fellows insisted on accompanying her to her uncle’s house. It was a real triumph to return with an escort of admirers. But this was, I suppose, the beginning of strong mutual dislike between her and her cousins.
        She got on well with her uncle’s younger son and daughter but his elder daughters never missed an opportunity to harm her. One of those girls was known as a kleptomaniac. She reached the peak of her ill fame by stealing the money which her parents had been saving to buy a cow. They discovered the absence of the money after their neighbour came to their house and reported that their daughter had been seen in town sitting on the bench surrounded by a bunch of boys treating all of them to expensive sweets and biscuits. After being caught by her father, the girl denied everything until he seized her, pulled her skirt up and found the money, or rather what was left of it, shoved in one of her stockings.

Nevertheless, she was not properly punished even then because she had a faultless weapon against her father. Every time after being caught stealing, the girl began to shout, reminding her father that he stole a horse at the age of 17 and was caught trying to sell it. He was deported for this crime beyond the boundaries of Ukraine. Nowadays, people consider an opportunity to leave these boundaries as good luck, but at the time of Stalin’s government it was a wide-spread punishment. “I should be send beyond the boundaries of Ukraine for this,” my mother used to say this phrase very often, usually when she blamed herself for something. So that is why my mother’s uncle was sent to the distant northern republic, where the frost reached minus 45 degrees of Celsius in winter, snow-drifts could reach the roofs of the houses and people usually attended the first of May demonstrations in their hats and warm coats. Her uncle, however, got married there, settled down and became a respectable member of society, but every time his kleptomaniac daughter hurled accusations into his face he was lost for words.

To be continued… 

(c) Anna Shevchenko

1. Festive demonstrations
2. A merry-go-round
3. The settlement in the steppe
4. The settlement in the steppe (the ending)
5. Urban life and its advantages
6. Collectivization and electrification of all the country

7. Roaming through the village and a man with two horses

8. My mother's struggle for freedom

9. A boy from the orphanage across the road

10. Living at the edge of the city

11. My grandmother's imprisonment

12. My mother's departure from the village forever