Two Old People

Late last week I went to the post office to check the mail. I had a notice that there was a box for me, so I went up to the counter.

Lyuda was helping a guy wrap a box he was mailing. I watched in interest because I have wrapped thousands of boxes for shipping and mailing. Thousands. Many thousands over the 4+ years I was supervisor in the mailroom. I rather enjoy packing a box, wrapping it as needed with tape, weighing it, fixing the postage on it and then shipping it off to other parts of the world.

Can I really believe I am getting sentimental over seeing someone get a box wrapped up with packing tape? Strange. Oh well... I did enjoy that job tho, yes, I did. ha ha

There was an old babushka waiting behind the guy. I thought she was with him because she was right behind him and neither one of them were in The Line, waiting to talk to the gal behind the glass partition. As soon as Lyuda saw me, she motioned that she needed to finish wrapping the box up and then she would help me. The old babushka started talking to her then, asking about her pension. Lyuda answered her while finishing the wrapping. No, she had no pension for her, she had no pension for anyone right then, she didn't know when the pensions would come in.

The man paid his postage to the other gal behind the counter and left. Lyuda went to get my box - a little box from amazon.com. She handed it over the counter to me and both the babushka and I stepped forward and reached for it. I actually ran right into her. Surpised, I looked at her and said, "Excuse me!" and then took the box. I realized right away that this woman was quite confused. Babushka then left while I looked at the package and squirreled it away in my bag.

I went outside and there she stood, tall and thin and not dressed quite correctly. Now I had noted inside that she had no hat on and the wind was quite cold and blowing hard. She had on a thin wool coat that was buttoned most of the way up, but no scarf. She had on boots, but no gloves, and one of her hands was fake, a prosthesis of some sort.

I stopped at the bottom of the steps, looked at her and said, "Are you warm?" I should have asked her if she was cold, but the first thing that came to mind was warm - was she warm enough? She looked at me in puzzlement and said, "Warm????" And then took off in a lot of Russian which I partially understood. But I said to her, "I'm sorry, I'm a foreigner and I don't speak Russian well."

Well, that got her started going on about how much she liked foreigners and how kind they are and so forth and so on and we started walking together. I kept my eye on her because I really was worried about her. She was not dressed right for a babushka outside in the winter. She was missing several layers of clothing, or so it seemed to me, the missing hat and scarf being the most obvious.

We got to the first corner and she stopped in puzzlement and said, "Where are we? What street is this? Is this xxxx street?" I answered, "No, xxxx street is farther that way" and I pointed ahead of us. No way was I going to let her go off by herself at that moment. So, we started walking on together and she kept chatting.

We got to the next alley way and she stopped, looked around and asked me again where xxxx street was at. I pointed just a bit up the street, just a few more yards. I asked her if this was where she wanted to go and she said (really she said this, I understood it) "Maybe I want to go over there" and she pointed in a vague direction toward some of the buildings down the alley.

But then she started walking on to the corner, and then stopped again. "Where are we? What street is this?" I pointed to the street sign posted on the corner of the building. It said xxx street 70. Then I asked where which number she wanted. "76" and she turned and walked off down the street.

I wasn't sure what to do at that point. Follow her? I was headed the opposite direction. Go up to the next building and see what number it was? I knew that down the street the way she was going she was going to pass a long factory and I just couldn't imagine that 76 was that way. But I wanted to make sure. So, I quickly started walking toward the next building, just a few meters farther up the road. Part way there I turned around to make sure I could still see her and

she was gone. Disappeared. Nowhere to be seen.

I stopped and stared down the street. There was no place for her to go, unless she had immediately turned around after I started up the street and had gone back to the post office, or maybe down the alley she had vaguely pointed toward. Maybe she was afraid of me and so misled me in where she was going? I quickly walked up to the next building and sure enough it was 72. I turned again - still no old babushka in sight.

I started praying. The light was getting to the point where with the cataract I have in my right eye now I have a hard time judging depth. I don't like to walk alone that time of evening because I am afraid I'm going to trip and fall, break one of my new knee caps or do some other bodily damage simply because I can't see the potholes or dips in the sidewalk very well.

I didn't know what else to do. I couldn't go hunt this woman down. So I prayed. I prayed all the way over to the main street. I prayed while I shopped. I prayed while I quickly walked home on the well-lighted street.

I've never seen her before. I don't know if I'll ever see her again. I feel kind of guilty that I didn't offer her my hat. I just pray, even now, that she made it home safe and sound and is ok.

~*~*~*~
Yesterday Mel and I walked over to the post office and then on to the store. We did our shopping and then came out of the building. Walking in front of us was an older man with a white cane.

I have seen the man several times in the general area of the store, either coming or going. He does very well. He wears very thick glasses, but doesn't really look at where he is going. My guess is that he has macular degeneration so looks at things out of the 'corners' of his eyes, but he uses the cane because he, is for all intents and purposes, blind.

We caught up to him just as the sidewalk narrows down to a one person width. We could have hurried around him on the side, but I wasn't in the mood to hurry like that right then. We both slowed down and walked behind him until we got to the stop down, off the cement sidewalk and on to the asphalt walk-way.

At that point I was watching him very carefully. I was sure he knew the step was there somewhere, and he did note it with the long cane. But he tripped on the gutter dip that was put in just before the step.

At the exact time he tripped and started to fall forward and to the right, Mel tried to pass him on the right. He hit Mel with a thud, immediately caught his balance, Mel stepped back, they both stepped down and I followed after them both.

All I could think of was: God ordained that Mel would be at that exact spot so as to keep that old fellow from falling and possibly hurting himself badly. He would have gone down a full 6 inches off the step, onto the paved walk-way and maybe then into the dirt.

We followed him all the way to the street, where we all crossed safely and then he took off at a fairly brisk walk, tapping his cane here and there. Mel and I walked on home, Mel helping me in the almost dark when I had trouble seeing exactly where the dips and potholes in the sidewalk were at.

~*~*~*~

I've thought a lot about those two old people. I've wondered at the way God works. It is no accident that Mel and I were at those two places at exactly those times. Two old people who needed help and no one else was there.

I will be thinking about these two happenings a lot. There is much to mull over in my mind - about the old people here, about us here, about how there are no accidents with God, about God Himself and the way He works in our individual lives.

There is a lesson to be learned here, more that just the simple facts that immediately meet the eye.

I will enjoy seeking it out and learning it.

Babushka

Sasha, Cindie, Babushka, Niece, Dima


Olya


The thin old woman sits across the room from me. Her hands folded peacefully in her lap, fingers gnarled and swollen with age. She sits with no curve in her spine, barely leaning against the hard back of the chair, feet clad in heavy black wool socks, firmly planted side by side on the floor, head held high and faded blue eyes brightly watching all that is happening around us. I wonder, “Who is this woman? Why is she sitting alone in the midst of so many people? Why does no one talk to her? Why do they ignore her as if she does not exist?”

Babushka had entered the room with Victor’s mother, Sasha. Sasha was dressed in a bright red floor length dress, with her blonde hair beautifully cut and styled. Babushka was dressed in an equally stylish mid-calf length dress, dark blue with tiny white polka dots, topped with a matching solid dark full length vest, her thin gray hair tightly pulled back from her face and held with combs. Nothing seemed to escape her sight and it was plain to me as I watched her off and on that she held strong opinions about each thing that happened. Her face changed from pleasure to annoyance, from apprehension to disappointment, to pleasure once again as events unfolded around us. Still, my heart went out to her and I wondered if this woman was partially deaf and that was why no one spoke to her, or maybe she was senile. Yet when I took out photos of my grandchild and passed them around she watched eagerly for them to come to her. I was shocked when the woman sitting next to her passed them on to someone else. Babushka could plainly see, she was not blind, and she had very much wanted to see them.

I was also alone in the group. As the only American woman there, as someone who only understood parts of the conversations around me, and understood only parts of the social interaction between people, I too, was mostly an onlooker at the party. As the women came into the room and then left again to unknown parts of the house for unknown purposes, Babushka and I sat quietly across the room from one another and observed. Often when I took my eyes away from the little ones playing on the floor or lying on the bed I would catch her looking at me. Never a smile was sent my way, but a certain twinkle in the eyes let me know that she was aware of me and of our situation, that she was interested in me as a person, as an American, as someone new, that she wanted to talk with me as much as I wanted to talk with her.

I actually enjoy being an onlooker at events like this. I am not really required to do anything other than to be present. I once offered to help in the kitchen, but was told by my translator in no uncertain terms that as a guest I must stay out of the kitchen. So, from that time on, unless specifically asked by the hostess or another woman, I do not offer. I just sit and wait and eventually someone will come over, someone who is brave enough to try to talk to me. One day I will be invited.

All of the women disappeared with their children. Most of the men wandered out of the room. But Babushka and I sat quietly, glancing often at each other. Olya returned and I motioned her to come over. I quietly asked her if it would be ok to show Babushka my photos of Stirling, my grandson. Eyes widened in surprise, she answered, “Of course!” I opened my purse, withdrew the photo envelope, stood up carefully on creaky sore knees and hips and walked over toward Babushka. Immediately her eyes lit up and she smiled a big toothless grin at me. Well, almost toothless – I know she had two or three and at least one looked to be covered in gold. She pointed to the chair at her right side and commanded me to sit down. Olya pulled another chair up in front of Babushka and we began to talk.

I showed her my photos and with shaking hands she took hold of them. Her fingers were bent and swollen and separating the photos one from another was difficult. Olya also has arthritis and her fingers are mostly frozen, but she gently reached out and helped Babushka view them one by one. As she held them, Babushkas hands began to shake even harder and very quickly she motioned for me to take them once again. I slid them back into the envelope, laid them on my lap and reached for her hand with both of mine. Gently I applied a bit of pressure, just enough to let her know I was loving her, that I was glad to be able to meet her and communicate with her, and she smiled a smile a mile wide.

She started talking about their garden and how many trees were in it, how many fruit bushes, and how many different kinds of vegetable they plant each year. Because her words were simple, spoken in Russian with little Ukrainian mixed in (I think!) I understood a lot of what she was saying. But Olya’s translation was an incredible help. (I still have so many problems with Russian verbs!) She explained that she used her money she received from the German governments’ restitution to help her family buy the house and land they now owned. There was still so much to do in the house. It needed a lot of repair, new pipes, running water, and heat. They had worked on the heat before winter set in, but as I understood, there was only heat in one room during the whole winter. And this winter has been one of the coldest in written history. Life is very difficult, she told me. Not just the work or the repairs needed – but life itself. She was too old to work out in the garden now, but she could add her pension money to help with all the costs involved.

I watched Babushka’s face as she spoke to me, and once again her eyes revealed so much of what she was thinking. Excitement, joy, amazement, sorrow – just to name of few of the emotions that slipped across her face. Soon another woman joined us and I realized that she, too, was Babushka’s relative – a niece I think. This woman asked me how old I am and I responded that in a few days I will be 52. She smiled and told me that she is 45. Sasha popped into the room for a moment, spoke a few words to me in broken English, and then told her mother, “Tell her about Germany!”

Babushka was 19 years old when Germans invaded the Soviet Union in 1940. Once they had some kind of control over this part of Ukraine, the soldiers began rounding up women and sending them back to Germany to work as slave labor. I had seen the movie, Schindler’s List, and most people think that the people who used as slave labor were only Jews. But hundreds, if not thousands, of Soviet citizens were hauled off by force as well and worked until they died of exhaustion or starvation, or were finally confined to a concentration camp and executed. Babushka was starving when she arrived at the farm to which she had been assigned. She told me that the people there had been very kind to her, giving her only tiny bites of food to eat each time, until she could hold a full meal down once again. She was put to work as a milk maid. In the family was a 15 year old son, and she beamed with pride when she told me that he had told his family several times that “Babushka has the most beautiful hair, it shines so!” She said that in German first and then in Russian. And then she explained that she never learned to speak German, living there four whole years, she did not learn. After saying that, she promptly repeated something in German – a poem maybe, or a long saying. I wasn’t sure it was German at first, due to the heavy Russian accent, but some of the words just had to be German from their sound!

The niece broke in and said that both of her parents had also been in Germany. I am not sure I followed her story completely, but the gist of it was that her mother’s family hid her from the Germans for as long as they were able. Somehow the soldiers knew she existed, so they threatened the family and told them that unless they gave their daughter to them, they would take their son instead. Because the son had already started a family, they gave up their daughter. After the soldiers took her away – they took the son as well. The daughter worked in a factory which produced war machines of some sort. I’m not sure what happened to the son, but someone in the family ended up in a concentration camp in Germany. Both this niece and Babushka beamed with joy when they told me, “And then the Americans came and liberated us!” The niece told me the American soldiers gave everyone chocolate, cigarettes and chewing gum and I laughed out loud. I’ve heard that story before – American soldiers are known all over the world for handing out those particular items to children and to people they liberate. The niece’s mother and father, both Ukrainians, met each other while working as slave labor in Germany, came back to Ukraine, married and had a family.

I remembered a story that Vitya told us last year, a story about his Babushka. And I realized that this was her! He had explained that everyone in Ukraine had thought she was dead. Because Stalin was killing those who returned from Germany, she had to return very carefully, sneaking back into the country and being careful that the authorities did not notice her. Vitya told us that day, when Babushka returned to her village, she was afraid to go home, so she sat down on some steps to rest. One of her relatives found her there, barely recognizing her, but joyful that she was still alive. Stalin was insane with paranoia and had thousands of returning slave workers, released concentration camp prisoners and soldiers returning from the German front killed because he was afraid that they were really spies. After all, they could not have survived unless they had collaborated with the Germans in some way!

And then I realized that the “German restitution money” she had referred to earlier was the money the German government paid to Ukraine not long ago. I was so glad to hear that she had received her money! It could not ever repay the years she had lost, the starvation and only she knows what other things happened to her. But that money had helped her help her family now, and she was proud of that.

We did not stay much longer as it was getting dark. As we prepared to leave, Babushka invited me to come to her village and visit this spring or summer. I am sure that Vitya, or possibly his wife Lyuda, will pass along an invitation to me later this year. And I hope that I am able to go. I would love to see her home, to see her in context, to see the things she loves, the people in her life.

I am blessed to have met this woman!