Why could we stay in for days at a time in the first months of our marriage and be happy? What had happened to us? The gray monster of our grim life devoured our love.
Sometimes I’d raise a silly rebellion. I’d go off to visit friends by myself, more in order to show him and get revenge than to have fun. The revenge part didn’t work. It didn’t upset him. Once I came home late, tipsy, with a cake from a Georgian admirer. I immediately told him who had given me the cake. He calmly washed the dishes, seeing that I wasn’t up to domestic duties. My mother later said that in his place she would have dumped the cake on my head.
SEPTEMBER 17. It’s vile remembering all this, but on the other hand, it’s useful, so that I don’t repeat the mistakes.
Gradually I stopped being a gregarious and curious person and turned into a gloomy Soviet bitch. Instead of books, I was interested in the empty bottles piled in the kitchen, the
refurbishing the apartment needed, the grocery bags. I made scenes over five rubles. In conversation I developed disgusting phrases: “cover expenses,” “plaster the holes,” and so on. I was cranky around the apartment, unkempt and in a robe, throwing objects around angrily. What was happening to me? At night we managed not to touch in our small bed. Often he sat up until two or three in the morning listening to the radio in the kitchen or reading American mysteries. In the mornings I hid under a pillow so as not to see and hear him go off to work. I felt he did everything wrong—eat, sleep, dress. I wonder what he thought of me.
I was intolerable at times. I had to get it off my chest. I’d start picking on him, and he kept quiet, making me crazier. I didn’t stop until he started shouting. We didn’t have stormy and passionate reconciliations after our fights. We were losing our love and respect for each other. Instead of moving forward, I was hurtling downward. I knew that it couldn’t go on for long.
SEPTEMBER 19. People say that we keep the good from the past and forget the bad. But all I have is the bad.
He was big, a bit fat, soft, and kind. It was pleasant kissing him. He smelled like a clean, sweet child. In bed he was silent and unrushed. He considered himself a specialist in female psychology. Maybe that’s why he continued paying attention to other women: Those poor lonely females needed him. This is the good part, and I can only be sarcastic about it.
He wasn’t greedy at all. When he had money, he spent it on me. The problem was that he rarely had money.
I’m back being petty and nasty about him. He was smart and educated. He was interesting to talk to, even though he often preferred silence. Soon after the wedding we stopped talking about books, art, or politics.
I’m sure that we would have made marvelous lovers or friends if we hadn’t married. That’s why I feared marriage for so long afterward. Marriage shows all the flaws of our system. The irritations and humiliations accumulate over the day, and pour out at home in the evening. I didn’t have the nerve to talk back to my boss, to defend my position. At home we pay for our chiefs’ nastiness, the low salaries, the crowded metro, the lines in the stores. Isn’t it better to be alone?
SEPTEMBER 20. The wisdom of a thirty-five-year-old woman: Your worst enemy is yourself, or rather, your weakness, your egoism, and your impatience.
When we fall in love, we want it all right away. We can’t stand anticipation, vagueness, tension. As a result, we ruin everything. At the start of the best romance I worried so much about a bad ending that I made it happen.
How old was I, around nineteen? Mother and I went to visit friends at the cinematographers’ resort. I was walking down a path in a new dress with large blue daisies on white with red dots in the center and a white lace collar. A romantic girl with long hair. Since this is the cinematographers’ place, it has to be like a movie. . . . The bushes parted, and a handsome, bearded youth, with enormous blue eyes and a charming light Georgian accent, came out. He said there was a party and invited me to
join them for cake and cognac. I ran to Mother for permission. Our strict friend disappeared for ten minutes to find out who the young man was and what the party was for. He led me to the house of Georgian artists and, giving my young friend a severe look, left me there in his care. But the party was over, the cognac was gone, and we went for a walk by the lake.
He was from Tbilisi and was in Moscow with his teacher to work on his dissertation. His name was Grigol. He was elegant, shy, and mysterious. Grigol took me by taxi (a real gentleman, it’s forty kilometers to town) to my friend’s house. We had a date to go to the movies. I rushed into my friend’s apartment and announced that I was in love.
But instead of happiness there was only torment. He wrote poetry at night and slept late. I sat by the phone waiting for his call, not eating breakfast, I couldn’t swallow a thing. As soon as he called, Mother ran to warm up the food. It was an American brunch, but without the champagne, which wouldn’t have hurt.
Then we spent the day in Zagorsk, wandering amid the wonderful churches and attending the service. He talked to me about architecture and icons. When I got home that evening, I sat on the couch with Mother and wept wildly. “What if he stops loving me?” Mama was surprised, but she understood. “He hasn’t even fallen in love with you fully, and you’re worried about his stopping.”
Of course, he didn’t stop right away, but fear and impatience poisoned our innocent love. He was always late, and every minute seemed an eternity. If he was pensive, I thought he was bored. If he hadn’t kissed me yet, that meant I wasn’t attractive. If he wanted to make love, that meant that this wasn’t serious and he was just out for pleasure. And so on.
Now we are good friends, and our tormented affair is just a pleasant memory.
I met my future husband ten years later. I was different then. I had enough control not to rush him, not to impose my fears and worries on him. I think that I did my marriage campaign on a high level. But the question is, Was it worth it?
To be fully honest, I changed after the wedding. What happened to my patience and control? I thought that it was all his fault, that he was making me lose my temper. But what did he think? “Why has she changed? She used to be so gentle and understanding. And now it’s hell.” I can only guess what he thought. He usually said nothing.
SEPTEMBER 30. Yes, the reality of my family life clearly didn’t correspond with my beautiful dreams. When we were in college, my girl friend and I would make a New Year’s wish, write it on a piece of paper, burn it, and drink the ashes with a glass of champagne. The wish was always the same: “Meet him” An older friend used to joke coarsely, “What, are you waiting for a prince with blue balls?” And we were. We didn’t want to get married because that meant the end of anticipation. We quoted the poet Marina Tsvetaeva: “Between the fullness of desire and the emptiness of execution my choice was made from the start.” Love was something separate from real, everyday life. We read poetry: “I sent you a black rose in a goblet of wine gold as the sky.” I was called “black rose” back in school. During class the boys would send me notes with a drawing of a black rose (was it interest, mockery, delight?).
My first kiss came at eighteen (retarded development?). An old Petersburg apartment (a love affair’s not interesting in your own city; you need a journey with a meeting and separation), two in the morning, his parents asleep. Before the kiss we had tormented each other for several weeks, talking about life and death and reading poetry. And then, at last, I got up to go to the other room. He was in the doorway, our hands touched, and then I was in his arms. And there’s the emptiness of execution: From a deity he turned into flesh and blood. The charms vanished, and all that was left were hands and lips. I didn’t know how to kiss. He said that I had to open my mouth a bit and move my lips. We practiced for almost an hour, first between the door and the cupboard and then in the armchair. Afterward I couldn’t fall asleep. The sweet mystery was turning into a still - not-understood reality. I decided that the first thing I had to do was learn how to kiss. I tried it on the pillow, but that didn’t work. Instead of kissing, I was biting, and the pillow was all wet. I’d wait until morning. You obviously needed other lips.