A Beginning - or an end&;#063;

Utopia. At least, that's what this is supposed to be. I don't even
know what Utopia is anymore. We were all full of such dreams and hopes.
I remember when we rejoiced over the fall of the Tsar, and how I wished
I had delivered the final shot. How I wept over Lenin's body at night,
wondering in what direction we would go next. I never dreamt of this. I
remember when Mikhail and I first met at a labour camp in '47. The
world was much simpler then - all you had to do was dig. There was just
earth and sun and wind and rain, and nothing else mattered because
Russia would be great again. Papa Stalin would father us towards
victory, and finally the European dogs would see what they were
missing. I remember when Mama heard we were going to get a flat, all of
our own, with our own kitchen and bathroom and bedrooms. How when we
got there the wallpaper had peeled off the walls, revealing damp
patches where the cheap concrete had been unable to withstand the heavy
Moscow snowfall. How she was in raptures over the cooker and a separate
bedroom for Mikhail and I, with the children next door. How she wept
when she remembered that Papa was not here with her, admiring her
daughter's new home.

They had married early, as usual, and had a large family. My four
brothers, sister and I were brought up on a small farm in Mishai, just
outside of Moscow. All of the other villagers were jealous of our
family; we had so many sons, so high an income. But I remember my
father and brothers returning from the fields with their calloused
hands and mud-soaked trousers. Frostbite was common in the winter, when
our cotton gloves were ripped and the wood was cut down for farming so
we had no fire. Our own small plot, left over from collectivisation,
was not enough to support us. I used to travel to the village store and
queue for bread when I was little. My sister would hold my hand tightly
and whisper to me - gossip from school, whose mother had suddenly found
enough meat to roast a pig, whose sister was marrying which brother,
whose father had gone to Moscow. I wondered why we had to wait so long
for bread and why my sister would tell me things I could never
understand. We were always taught that Papa Lenin was our saviour.
Finally, we were all equal. I new I didn't have to stay at home and
wash my husband's clothes. I could have a job and earn money and wear a
red band round my arm, just like Stefan's mother. I never knew why my
father was so tired and complained that his back was breaking, after
all, he had been working for Russia! Surely that was the most glorious
thing you could do?

When I was 7 I asked my teacher why some people didn't like working for
Russia. She told me that everyone should like working for themselves,
after all, we were no longer slaves to the aristocracy. Then she asked
who didn't like working for Russia. I told her that my father was ill;
all he wanted to do was work on his small plot and be with his wife,
but he had to work every day.

He was gone the next morning. Mama said that the police had come round
in the morning, because they wanted Papa for some special work. I never
saw my father again.

Mikhail loved our flat. He was so proud of his family, his beautiful
daughters and his strong, brave sons. He used to sit them on his lap
and tell them wonderful stories of the glory we were building, day by
day, in the factory. When we sat down to eat our frugal dinner at night
he would always say how Mama and him had helped make this, had made the
machinery the produced what they were eating. My two sons wondered at
how organised it was; that their parents helped feed Russia. My
daughters helped decorate the house, to make it "ours". I tacked up a
small print of Stalin over our dining table, and they saved any paper
from bills or payslips to draw on. Soon we had a mural over the table,
filled with the bright pink of pay receipts and the dull grey of cheap
envelopes.

My eyes are filling with tears as I write this. I remember the last
time I saw my daughters. We were on the way to work - the night shift -
when Hanushka leaned out over our balcony to wave us goodbye. Josef
came out to bring her inside and was followed by Lorenza, the youngest.
She waved her red headscarf through the bars of the shared balcony,
leaving the door to our small, dingy kitchen wide open. I could see the
faded print of Papa Lenin on the wall behind her, surrounded by a
shrine of childish drawings and poems about our Saviour and his Chosen
People. We were the perfect family.