Baba Summer Two

These people make me love Russia, says Judy Hogan, while taking her readers on a journey to 1992 Russia. The second book of Baba Summer quadrilogy is a wonderful combination of a travel memoir, a discovery of extraordinary Russian culture and a love story. Given Judy's fluency in Russian, she can perceive more than an ordinary tourist, and her very personal experience serves as a unique outlook on the state of post-soviet Russia and the tribulations of its people. Travelling off the beaten path, the author finds herself living in a tiny rural house with a family of ten, where the humanity of its people triumphs the materialist lifestyles of the western world. Through all seven chapters the author provides thoughtful exploration of the human soul, and the reader is left with a clear picture of Russian dushevnost. Above all else, the memoir is an intriguing story of love with its euphoric highs and emotional lows. Well, what is Love?

–Elena Semchenko,

a transplanted Russian living now in Canada

The most important life experience I’ve had, and I’m 83 now, was visiting Russia through a Sister Cities exchanges with Kostroma. I was, in 1990, still the editor and publisher of a small press, Carolina Wren Press, respected nationally in the U.S. I met the Mayor of Kostroma in Durham, and he said, If you come to Kostroma, look me up in November 1989. By August of 1990 I was sitting in his office. We began exchanges with the Kostroma Writers Organization, and I wrote 4 books about those years, through 2001, when we did an anthology of North Carolina poetry in English and Russian. Nevertheless, it proved difficult to publish Baba Summer, Part I. I had browsed the small press listings on the Poets and Writers site, and tried Adelaide Books, and suddenly, I had an offer to publish Baba Summer Part One. They do a lot of books, but when my turn came, I was very impressed, with the design, the cover, and the work they did to publicize the book. When the books arrived, I felt so happy. I had written of many meetings and used people’s letters (with their permission), and it was greeted with joy in Russia. In case you want to use it, I’ll attach a photo of one recipient holding Baba Summer. When I was working with and loving my Russian friends, our countries were good friends. In the passing years, on the political landscape, our countries are not so friendly. but I made my Russian friends happy, and I still correspond with many of them. I’m very grateful to Adelaide Books for taking on this fall Baba Summer Part II.

–Judy Hogan.

BABA SUMMER.

BOOK TWO

BABA SUMMER.

BOOK TWO

A memoir

by

JUDY HOGAN

Adelaide Books

New York/Lisbon

2020

BABA SUMMER. BOOK TWO

A memoir

By Judy Hogan

Copyright © by Judy Hogan

Cover design © 2020 Adelaide Books

Cover image by Nikolai Smirnov of Kostroma, titled First Snow

Published by Adelaide Books, New York / Lisbon

adelaidebooks.org

Editor-in-Chief

Stevan V. Nikolic

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any

manner whatsoever without written permission from the author except

in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

For any information, please address Adelaide Books

at info@adelaidebooks.org

or write to:

Adelaide Books

244 Fifth Ave. Suite D27

New York, NY, 10001

ISBN-13: 978-1-954351-08-0

This book is

for

Mikhail Bazankov, 1938-2015,

beloved friend and partner

in our cross-cultural exchanges.

CONTENTS

Chapter I.

Where is Yelena?

Chapter II.

An Old Russian Soul.

Chapter III.

Komarovo Again

Chapter IV.

At Larissa’s.

Chapter V.

Celebrated in Sharya, Kostroma Region.

Chapter VI.

The Cattails Know How I feel.

Chapter VII.

At Home in Kostroma.

Chapter VIII.

Afterthoughts. And What Is Love?

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Credits

BABA SUMMER: BOOK TWO.

CHAPTER I.

WHERE IS YELENA?

Peredelkino and Komarovo.

Early July 1992.

Adventures with Yelena.

That is what I promised Yelena I was going to call my chapter about my time spent in Peredelkino and Komarovo, and I said the first words would be: Where is Yelena? She would always make a face when I teased her about it, but it was true: we were often waiting for her or wondering where she’d taken herself off to.

A lively, beautiful eighteen-year-old, self-possessed, brave, determined, and ingenious, as we were to learn. And she had in her charge two women old enough to be her grandmothers. I knew a little Russian, primitive Russian, I called it, but Joan knew only a few phrases. We had both come with some trepidation, both because the news from Russia wasn’t good, and because one of the writers who had been part of the exchange in June, Rose Moss, had called me up shortly before we left, to tell me about their experience. She and Maxine Rodberg had returned a week early; had been very dismayed by what they could learn of the political situation (they were expecting civil war momentarily); by the food, which they said was terrible, though they had had meat three times a day, she acknowledged; by having had inadequate interpreter help, and by Maxine’s having been robbed on the streets of Moscow. They wanted to warn us not to go.

I listened to everything she had to say; and I also told Joan the gist of it, and she called Maxine to talk to her. Joan is nothing if not intrepid. She has an inexpensive and fairly flexible plane reservation possibility (space available) because her daughter is a pilot. I knew already most of what Rose had told me, i.e., that conditions in Russia were hard and the political situation unpredictable, but I could do okay without an interpreter, and I could help Joan. Plus, I had a Moscow friend, Larissa Bavrina, to whose apartment I could go if worse came to worst. I asked my deep mind about it, and the clear answer was to go. So I went, and so did Joan.

Both Valery Dolgov, our Lit-Fund director host, and the director of Komarovo, Alexander Perepalitsa, were very aware that the two women who had been there in June were very unhappy. Clearly, too, since economic conditions had changed so drastically even since the exchange had taken place in 1991, it was getting harder for them to hold up their end in Russia, to pay interpreters, and perhaps even to pay for our food at the two houses of creativity where we stayed. Rose had said that one experienced interpreter had quit in June and had given as her reason that Dolgov wasn’t paying her enough. He was fortunate to find Yelena for us. She had never had any job before, her father later told us, but she’d had a year in the very good Linguistics Institute in Moscow, and she accepted the job at 200 rubles a day. Late in that month-long visit, she told me it was very little money. In 1992 an experienced interpreter could get 200 rubles an hour or more. But she wasn’t taxed too hard most days, she enjoyed our adventures, and it was good experience for her. By August 20, the last time I saw her as I was about to board a train for Kostroma, she had become a dear friend. I know that she, like many other people I met and came to love in July, are part of my life now.

How to describe Yelena? She was slender, tall–not quite as tall as I, at five feet, nine inches; blonde, with her hair down to her shoulders, often pulled back and tied. An aquiline or eagle’s nose, as they say in Russia; fair skin, a serious air, but she could laugh–and more than once collapsed in giggles when asked to translate something that struck her as funny. She later told me that she was afraid to grow up. Adulthood, she thought, might change her. I encouraged her to find her way to staying as she was: honest, open, spontaneous, affectionate. She didn’t want to be a writer. She liked life too well. She wanted to give of herself directly to people, and so she did. And, behind the scenes, as well as in our presence, she helped us get to know better the writers we met.

In Moscow, at Peredelkino, she was with us mainly for sightseeing. At Komarovo, she stayed in the same building with us, right down the hall. She had her own adventures there: talking to writers we never did talk with, meeting two young boys from a neighboring youth camp, The Seagull, and going off with them. She loved our long, intense, evening conversations, and I also persuaded her, since we weren’t needing her that many hours per day for interpreting, to help me translate some poems, which she gladly did. I think, in fact that it is to her that I owe my second week at Komarovo.

If I hadn’t gone back there, I wouldn’t have met Nonna, who came to be a good friend. Our month would have been entirely different without Yelena. I only hope that from two intrepid American women she took reinforcement for her own courage as she enters the adult world at a difficult time in Russia. She would later admit that she, too, was worried. She said that she could more easily forget her worries at Komarovo, and she came to know an entirely different group of people there who were outside her usual friendship circles and whom she valued highly.

Even having said so much, it is hard to feel that I have conveyed her freshness, her zest for life, her wonderful mixture of human qualities. She was a perfect Russian devushka [maiden]. Our word maiden isn’t much used now, and virgin has so many unfortunate connotations in the West. We have fewer and fewer of our young women reaching the age of eighteen and still being virgins, either literally or psychically. There was a new, fresh quality to Yelena, an unselfconsciousness, though she was not above using the fact that she was attractive both to young and to old men. She was so free in her open, human enjoyment. She found a bicycle somewhere (or borrowed one?). I never quite understood the arrangement, and she was off, alone or with the boys, who turned up regularly to wait for her. Not a few times they sat in the reception area of our building while she interpreted a lengthy evening discussion in some writer’s room. I remember their long faces when we drove away to return to Moscow the first time. She called them my boys, and everyone in the building knew about them. The desk matron was often off in a huddle with Yelena to tell her some message from my boys. She’d go berry-picking with them or alone. When there was nothing else to do, she would gather wildflowers and make bouquets for people she liked. I was honored with such a one.

For such a young woman, too, she had wonderful composure. As she and I got to know each other better, she would confess her difficulties, whether it was not being able to get a van for us, or speak to Dolgov. But in a crisis or some situation that demanded common sense and tact--a worldly kind of being able to manage things, savoir faire, she was up for it. It was hard to believe she was only eighteen. Getting the van for the day was often her biggest job and one she especially reveled in when she succeeded. A few times, when we were waiting at Peredelkino, having been told such and such would happen, but it hadn’t, and we’d given up and started walking toward the village, here would come Yelena, sitting in the back of the van as though she were a queen in a carriage with fine horses. We’d be gathered up and taken to do our shopping. She’d have this air of having conquered every obstacle and set everything right.

We teased her that she was our mother, and, in many situations, she was. Hurrying us along, helping us shop, buying tickets so we could see a museum or a palace; once taking us into a church where a wedding was in progress–not the usual sight open to tourists. She clearly was well-equipped for the adulthood she was entering. It was easy to tell her so.

I’ll let the diary tell the story now, only interrupting to add what might not be clear or fully fleshed out in the entries.

*

July 1, Wednesday, 1:30 p.m. I’m at Peredelkino. I have a very nice room with its own bath and balcony, a very cheerful, young interpreter: Yelena. She says to call her Helen. They were at the gate when I came out of Customs.

6:20 p.m. Joan knocked on my door a few minutes ago. So she made it safely. I had just awakened from a deep sleep. I’m still groggy. Helen and the chauffeur, Sasha, were amused. Joan said, I told them not to wake you up. She wanted to know how long my flight was. I said, Twelve or thirteen hours. She said she slept twelve hours in Dusseldorf but didn’t feel like she’d had any sleep. I was glad she was on today’s plane. The other two were incredulous when I told them she might not be on the plane today, and if not, would be on it tomorrow.

I like it here. I can be happy here. They seem very determined to make us happy. Helen asks for whatever I say I need or would like to know. I wanted drinking water for my room, and we worked that out. The fact that I speak a little Russian helps me make a good impression. This place is not in its heyday, but in decline, at least in relationship to what it was. And it does, as Rose, who was here in June as an American writer visitor, said, look like an old people’s home. Most people who are here are old, and some are walking with canes. When I say hello, they reply, but no one speaks first. Sasha thought my speaking Russian would enhance my being able to speak to them.

9 p.m. At supper we were seated with a young woman named Natasha, the daughter of a writer, who is here with her daughter Dasha for some days, until next Tuesday. She helped us at supper–to choose our food for Friday and Saturday. She has been in the U.S. for a year. Is studying advertising. It’s still very light, of course. The TV lounge downstairs is full of elderly writers watching some program, and from the room next to me comes what is probably the TV news.

There are many birch trees and beautiful woods. The grounds haven’t been that well kept up, and some of the buildings look in need of repair.

Joan wouldn’t tell me her age. She’s very high-spirited but seems less whimsical and more willing to adapt now that we’re here. She said Bill (Director at Virginia Center for Creative Arts, our sponsor) offered her her money back, but she wanted to come. She had talked to Maxine, who was here earlier, who told her she was glad she’d done it. Later she told me she graduated from college (Duke) in 1948, so she’s eleven years older than me, about sixty-six. I keep thinking, I’m in Russia, but it hasn’t sunk in.

I’ll try to sleep. See how I do. A bed, a whole night to sleep, and nothing to worry about.

July 2, Thursday, 7:45 a.m. Last night I wrote that I have nothing to worry about. Not strictly true. I have to remember not to drink the tap water; I have to take care of myself physically. This is not a country to get sick in. I have to work out the dynamics of this place. I have some responsibility for Joan, who knows no Russian and said she won’t try to learn more. Then I have this complex and mysterious relationship with a complex man.

8:40 a.m. I’ve come out on my little balcony. There’s a magpie in the birch stand nearby. I’m ready for breakfast except for my shoes. I’m glad I’ll see Natasha at breakfast. The first person we’ve met here who is friendly. Though the older couple at our table, Sam and Yevgenia, were, too. Very pleased to meet you, they said, when I introduced myself and Joan in Russian. For the Russian people, and the writers here, this place is still a privilege. We’re getting meat, milk, cheese, things most people would be having trouble getting.

2 p.m. We ate lunch early with Valery Dolgov, head of the Literary Fund, which administers these writing retreats, Peredelkino and Komarovo, and Helen, our interpreter for this month. Now they’ve left again. Helen is more nervous around Valery and isn’t translating everything. They tell us we’re going to Moscow tomorrow and to Komarovo Saturday, so I don’t have long to work out getting the money and mail to Katya’s mother. I’m carrying messages and gifts for three different Russian families, none of whom I’ve met, from their American relatives and friends.

2:40 p.m. I got sleepy again and snoozed. I do seem to be getting acclimated gradually. At 3 I’ll try my phone calls again. I feel very far away from Mikhail. I’m close in actuality–250 miles–but far in spirit. Will I be able to explain to him I’ll be gone from here from July 4 until July 13. Ten days.

In these travel situations life gets reduced at times to logistics. My bowels, my back, and my sleep seem to be doing okay. That helps. My back is a little stiff and sore, but not bad. I decided to come down to the lobby and wait to make my phone calls. Valery, when I said, that I was trying to speak Russian, said that it was rare, Americans who speak Russian. I said, I know.

The woman, Yevgenia, who sits at our table, came in. She said it was very hot out, and I said, Yes, like in the U.S. It’s why I leave North Carolina in the summer. It gets to be 35 and 40 Celsius. She hugged and kissed me; pleased with me because I spoke Russian, I guess. She wanted to know where we were at lunch, and I said Valery Dolgov had come and he had said we’d eat at one o’clock, so we ate at one, not at two.

I heard the manager saying to the operator, Try to do it quickly. It’s an American guest.

4:35 p.m. Mikhail called. So I was able to tell him that I’m here and that only Susan is coming with me to Kostroma, and when she’s coming. He said he had benzine [gasoline], and I think he said he would come in the car to see me and take me to the country. But he may have been referring to my time in Kostroma. He sounded happy and excited. So I guess whatever it was earlier (our fight just before he left in North Carolina),on reflection, he feels good about his time there. Relief and delight in his voice.

It’s hard to get a fix on this time, what it means, what I’m trying to do in it. It’s hard to believe that I finally got loose of all that I had to do there. I’ve had these flashes: I’m here. I’ve begun my six months off.

I was disoriented yesterday. Less today. Mikhail’s voice helped, amazingly. Knowing that Larissa had called, and that I’ll be able to deliver the stuff (money and invitation) to Katya’s mother. Right now I can sit here and settle myself into this environment.

7:50 p.m. About these writers and translators who are here, there is something very solemn and reserved. It gives me a feeling for Mikhail’s backdrop. Hard to imagine them as playful as he was. His feelings had bounced back. He was in great form.

10:40 p.m. Because I was waiting for Katya’s mother to come, I was sitting outside and writing, and Yuri Khazanov came up. I had said, Good evening, and earlier today, when I spoke Russian to him, he said something to me in English. So he started a conversation in English, very abruptly. Why had I come here? Did I want to see them in their misery? I said no. I felt bad about the difficulties here, and I wanted to help keep communication open. I had become very interested in Russian people and culture two years ago; in the literary tradition that was still alive. He said it was gone, broken, ruined. Everything was broken. But he talked with me for maybe fifteen minutes, and he said he would give me his book of poems, if I’d promise to read it.

Then Ludmilla (Katya’s mother) did arrive, about 9:20, and gave me both flowers and strawberries, says she’ll come again. She’s so grateful for the presents. I brought her letters and $600, which is now off my mind.

11:35 p.m. Considering that it’s only my second day, I’m doing very well getting settled and acclimated.

Yuri’s opening up his frustration helped me understand why they’re so reserved, gloomy. They’re depressed about what is happening in their country and embarrassed for Americans to see it up close. Yuri listened attentively to what I said, but he wasn’t optimistic. I wonder what he thought about what I said. I suggested that there seemed to be literary vitality in the regions. I was thinking of Mikhail, who worries about the changes, but does not feel that the literary tradition is gone, ruined.

July 3, Friday. 9:40 a.m. Another man, Dorian, is talking to us. Joan was interested to learn that Andrei Voznezhinsky is here, which Ludmilla told me last night. She recognized him. Joan has read (and likes) his poetry. Things are loosening up a bit. All my saying hello is having an effect. Possibly, too, they are talking to each other. The Dostoevsky scholar walked with us to breakfast. I tried to speak to him in Russian; he spoke to me in English. He said my Russian would be quite good by the time I left.

3:15 p.m. We came back here for lunch after all. Valery Dolgov had told us we’d go to the Writers’ Union restaurant, but the plan changed again. which the plans seem to.

5:50 p.m. I dreamt that someone was calling me to the phone, and I was very sleepy, and it was hard to move fast. Could be symbolic of this adjustment I’m making. I’m being pulled a little faster than I’m comfortable with. I’d really like to settle for awhile; do less; write. I am taking writing time whenever it occurs, but I have no routine, and may not. I don’t know that I could say what I think this time is for. Partly, to learn; to gather impressions; to understand better what is happening. In a way I’m considering whether I could live here. There was a moment, an epiphany, as we were waiting for a light to change in Moscow. I saw two pigeons strutting around on the nearby grass and sidewalk. Time seemed to stand still. I had a sense that I am here now, in Russia, and it’s good to be here; even with all the problems. With people saying everything is broken. Katya’s mother said the same thing. The old way is certainly broken. Red Square isn’t available to go into. It looks heavily armed, though disguised that it is armed. Big trucks, but I bet they have guns or even tanks in them. People look okay. They are going to and fro, shopping. I can’t see a difference from 1990. There are hordes of tourists, and many Americans. Not difficult to pick up their accents.

9:45 p.m. I talked awhile with Natasha and Dasha and gave them my flowers and the rest of the strawberries. Joan didn’t want any, said she was allergic to them. Natasha said she had already figured out that I wasn’t a typical American. We exchanged addresses, too. I said I’d be glad to help her there if I could. She is a little worried about it, as her American family is maybe going to move, and she has only $350 a month stipend.

Yuri gave me his address and said he’d be happy to have me at his place--he and his wife–in Moscow, though he’s leaving town the end of July. We shall see. Apparently that fifteen-minute conversation meant something to him. I do begin to feel grounded here. I wonder why. Partly people. Sam and Yevgenia both said they’d miss us, and the two men who speak English, Yuri and Dorian, have also been very friendly, which, after being ignored the first day or so, is gratifying. Dorian says he doesn’t think the others are worried. He is worried, though, about his future. Joan kissed him goodbye. On the mouth. What a case she is. He was telling us the limerick he’d made up about the sound of the toilet, as his room is next to the bathroom in the older building. He said he has his savings, but they are dwindling, and he’s worried about what happens then they run out.

11 p.m. Settling into a new place is a funny thing, especially when you’re in a whole new culture. Partly you need to learn where everything is; how to solve food, water and sleep problems. Then you do wish for communication. So when people smile or talk to you, you begin to feel more accepted, more part of things; and more yourself again. To get to joke with someone (Dorian) or to talk seriously and say what you feel (with Yuri) helps you feel here and not a spirit circling, trying to land.

So why am I here? Something big is at stake. I don’t understand why I’m here, but I’ll know one day–maybe looking backwards. Every trip to Europe has had a feeling of necessity about it, of I must go. This one is no exception. Usually I haven’t understood before going or even at the beginning of my time, but gradually, or suddenly, I have understood. This time I think it’s focused on Mikhail and me, as two, but also on me as a writer. This new phase of my life. There is also the book I’m writing: Baba Summer. This is part of that. A second main part.

Natasha told me that the elderly couple at our table had both been in prison camps under Stalin. Joan is complaining about the children who play noisy games under her window until late (daylight lasts until 11) and sound like they’re killing each other, and the electric train, which wakes her up. And Valery worries her. People smile at me more, or look like they’re glad to see me. Many of them watch television in the evening. This morning Joan was sure they were watching a soap opera.

July 4, Saturday, 5 a.m. I’ve been afraid of oversleeping, so I am awake. Decided to stay up. I realize that I’ve gotten farther inside this culture than I had thought. Joan and I are having very different experiences, especially when we’re apart. Sometimes, even when we’re together. She liked the sightseeing and took a lot of photographs. I was happy to see the wonderful domes of St. Basil’s. They have almost a furred texture, which I hadn’t remembered. And to see the other shining domes, mostly gold, inside the Kremlin.

Helen had a little book with her and was trying to tell us about the various buildings. She was worried we weren’t getting a very good tour from her. She would tell me things sometimes quietly when Joan was somewhere else. I kept thinking about the danger of being mugged and tried to stay near Helen and keep an eye on Joan, who tended to wander off to photograph things. The three of us alone in St. Petersburg, though there will be a driver and a car there, too, I gather, seems a little risky. Helen gets bewildered by all the mixed signals from Dolgov. Joan, too, gets bewildered easily. She acts out her anxieties, whereas Helen covers them up. So I think it will fall to me to keep a level head. Helen has the language, but I have the presence of mind we’ll need.

It flustered Helen not to get the stamp order right in the post office yesterday. We eventually got it. Joan wanted stamps for postcards, but not the cards. I told Helen, no problem. Don’t worry. You’re doing very well.

Everyone around us is pretty distracted by their own worries–maybe not Sasha or Helen, but everyone else. I feel sure these writers whom Dorian sees as unworried, are worried, too.

Natasha says she thinks Russia is still more of a we culture than an individual culture. People still feel together. They’re sharing hardships now in a way that Joan has trouble fathoming. She’s worried about her vodka, the noise of the train, the children playing under the window, not going too early to breakfast. They’re worried about starving to death or civil war or another coup [putsch]. Or their culture being in every aspect broken. It may be the privileged class that is the most worried. I told Yuri that change wasn’t necessarily all bad. America is a country of change. The Russian culture has much to give the world. I said in the regions perhaps the culture was more intact. I was thinking of Mikhail, how intact he is.

I begin to think of him more, the intimacy we have. He is a man to whom intimacy comes easily. I must hug a tree this morning. I haven’t since he left North Carolina mid-June.

6:30 p.m. We’re at Komarovo. I’m tired and cranky. Then Joan started fussing because her room had no balcony and mine did. I blew up. I