The Makin Year (With Abject Apologies)

The Makin Year (With Abject Apologies) at our house. We and our friends Zhenya and Lena Not without reluctance I sit down, finally, in mid- Poplavsky hosted the New Year’s party which December, to compose this document (I don’t even Alina and Lena insisted had to be appropriately know what to call it), since I am all too well aware formal. Hence all the men were “encouraged” to that what I should really do – and what I always wear dinner jackets — a rarity in the US, and re- intend to do – is write “proper letters” to everyone. sisted by most of us, but, I have to admit, a good However, the truth is that I never manage to write way of making the girls feel that all their efforts to even half the letters I intend, and those comprising dress up were not entirely undermined by husbands the fifty-percent of the intended total are always and the like in their usual inappropriate garb. All written at the last moment, with much of the con- the same, when I sent copies of the photographs to tents of each new letter culled from the “.doc file” of the last. So, with apologies (but also fully aware that I shall receive a number of similar documents from friends this year), I sit down to write a little general epistle on our year… As I write, the second stage of the first major snow storm of our winter is blanketing not only our own Washtenaw County, but the entire Mid-West. Snow storms have their disadvantages, but at least if feels like the approach of Christmas. Of course, I could have done without clearing our entire drive way yesterday afternoon and again this morning, and Alina could have done without hav- everyone who came, I appended a friend’s com- ing to leave her car on our road, for fear of being mentary that the male side was, after all, repre- stuck in the garage tomorrow by a new snow fall, sented by гопники в смокингах… but it does look pretty outside, I must say. And, of course, the boys find snow and snow suits just per- I can’t think of anything much that hap- fect (especially when the day care centre they at- pened in the Winter Semester here – not too much tend joins every school for fifty miles around in snow, plenty of teaching, Alina returning to work closing because of the weather – and forcing one of after her maternity leave, and Neil starting day care us to stay home with them…). Most of our seem to be the main features of the first months of neighbours, of course, have snow ploughs on their the year. We had already learned that the differ- trucks or garden tractors, so all the other Mountain ence between one boy and two boys is an order of Ridge residents have already cleared their drive- magnitude, not a single digit, and there is no point ways mechanically, and the road itself has been in amplifying that point. We had also learned that ploughed twice by a neighbour. Rural life. the boys have lots in common (noisy, active, unbe- lievably sporty, notwithstanding our athletic in- We are spending Christmas and New Year competence), as well as having very distinct char- here this year, modestly and quietly (two friends acters – Gordon is both shy and gregarious, Neil will join us for Western Christmas, New Year will seems a bit more even-tempered, although every be met in our house or at friends’, and Orthodox bit as demanding. Sometimes I wish that they did- Christmas will be even quieter), since the last n’t play quite so much ice hockey on the echoing twelve months have been very busy and demand- floor of our dining room, and that “Goal!” and ing, and the next semester, which starts on 4 Janu- “Score!” had not been among Neil’s first words ary, will also be very demanding. (along with “bow-wow” and “cat-tie” – Tikhon, Stasik, and Friendsie have been remarkably toler- A year ago we were preparing for a very ant, by the way), but we have coped – just about… active Christmas and New Year, the latter met with large numbers of friends, mostly from out-of-town, 1 The boys celebrated birthdays in April Mrs M., especially if we lose and my mood is (Gordon – his fourth) and May (Neil – his first). ruined for the entire weekend. Even more excit- It hardly seems possible that so much time has ing was the granting of conjugal permission for gone by since Gordon appeared, and it seems like the installation of satellite TV. Permission came yesterday that Neil swam into this world. because of the then forthcoming European Cham- pionship, Ipswich’s recent promotion, and satis- Just after the end of classes, in early fied viewing of BBC America and the Food May, we rented a house in northern lower Michi- Channel on the satellite system in the cottage up gan, a few miles north of Harbor Springs, and north. Before the authorities had always said had a very pleasant week of pretty good weather. “no”, claiming that there would be nothing but The house overlooked Lake Michigan, and had football, rugby, and cricket on TV from morning its own beach, to which you could descend in til night. In fact, this fear has been proved quite some grandeur on a special chair lift. Friends groundless. There has been no cricket whatso- joined us for the weekend, and much fun was ever — it seems not to be available on our satellite system. I have enjoyed Sky Sports News most nights though, as well as several English football matches a week, and all the major rugby matches… The least said about the European Championships (and the World Cup qualifiers) the better, however… It should also be admitted that live European football always reaches us in the middle of the working day or on Saturday and Sunday mornings — thereby creating certain problems in terms of professional productivity and/or domestic family happiness, depending on results. had. Quite how we caused the chair lift to mal- The boys spent the summer with us – the function at the end of our little beach party was previous day-care centre had become unsatisfac- never explained, although it was eventually tory, and was always horrendously expensive. fixed… Alina took them for four days a week, and I for one (spending the other four days of the working This was also a period of anxious week in my office struggling with research and crouching over computers and short-wave radios writing — at least, that was my excuse). Our as the football season in England wound down. plans to produce a fully literate four-year-old by The agony of Ipswich just missing out on auto- the end of the summer did not quite work out, but matic promotion was lived through in full by at they seemed to enjoy being with us. My expedi- least one member of the family. And so was the tions to museums and the like were also, I must glory of triumph in the playoffs at Wembley, the add, less popular than the trying journeys to local broadcast duly followed on the World Wide Web lakes with fishing tackle, worms, and a dread that in my office, early that (work) day. I had to Gordon would fall in to the water or Neil climb smuggle the necessary bottles of English beer out of his push chair and eat a worm. into the Modern Languages Building, and then drink them at a rather un-beer-drinking hour, on a The major adventure of our year came in week day. It was a dirty job, but someone had to July and August, when we were in Europe, com- do it... Since then, of course, there has been bining professional and "leisure" activities, as much trepidation, and much excitement, not least they say here. It was Neil’s first major trip because all of the radio commentaries are now (unless we count the two weeks in Maine in sum- “web-cast”, so I can sit with the computer listen- mer 1999), and the first time any of us had been ing to Radio Suffolk’s commentators every Sat- to Europe for almost two years. We started off in urday morning, somewhat to the annoyance of Barcelona, staying with our very hospitable 2 friends the Espinals, and falling in love with flew to Helsinki, where we spent a day before Catalonia. taking the train to Tampere. There we spent a week attending an international conference (which was rather dull, perhaps a bit like my paper…). After the gastronomic glories of Spain and France, Finland seemed rather unin- teresting, but at least our accommodation was good – a lovely spa hotel, with pools which the boys loved, and a great location on a huge lake (<http://www. tampereenkylpyla.fi/>). We persuaded the conference organizers to give us a two-bedroom suite with a full kitchen, great balcony, and even a sauna, so we lived in some comfort, and, tiring of the restau- rants, but loving the local produce, entertained friends in our hotel room. Our best day in Finland, though, was when friends from Mos- cow arrived in Tampere and kidnapped us all, taking us to the cottage they were renting in “the real Finland”, as they put it – the cottage was on a quiet, mirror-surfaced lake, sur- rounded by forest, with wild mushrooms and We also spent a few days in southern berries growing right up to the door.

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