Let’s begin
Our story, and it is our story, I assure you, begins with me, sitting in my car, calling my grandma Nona. She still uses the same landline she used when I was ten years old and eating Russian-style french fries in her apartment.
[a quick note about our story - this one includes some real classic Dobrenko Drama so I had to hide it super sneaky behind a high security paywall. if you wanna read the whole essay and share your own family drams in the comments, please consider throwing ₽450 rubles / $5 to your favorite soviet comedy writer.]
The “ring ring” of her landline sounds different from the one you hear when you call a cell phone, I think, waiting for her to answer, distracting myself from the horror I am about to inflict on us both.
It’s an earthy tone, traveling through the dirt of America to get to her, a fring friiing earthtone landtone alloh?
Expecting a telemarketer, Nona answers irritated and weary, ready to be let down and hang up.
“Privet Nona.” / “Hi Nona.” I respond.
“Ah Sashinka privet!” / “Ah Sasha hi!” she answers, her voice all of a sudden lit up like the fourth of July.
I clear my throat, readying myself.
Lying to my own grandmother. And for what? For who? Or is it whom? For whom?
If there’s one thing my Soviet Jewish upbringing has taught me, it’s this: “if it's easy, it isn’t real.”
beep beep beep
If Nona had still lived in Ukraine and I was making an international call, the ring tone would be way different – like the ‘beep beep beep’ a truck makes when it backs up.
Hey – speaking of, let’s back up about thirty minutes to a simpler time, back when I still understood what was good and right in the world.
I receive an SMS text message from my dad, the green, non iMessage text message bubbles from our past convos doing a perfect job representing all that stands between us: culture, language, and also phone provider.
Oh.
Hm.
What’s strange about this text message is how normal it is. He and my mom semi-regularly send me links to products at Costco, usually smoked salmon, the subtext being “there is a sale so good, so unbelievable, that if you didn’t — what do you mean you don’t need it?? You do need it. You need it because of how good this deal is.”
Another text comes through:
We'll install it for Nona to use today.
In screenwriting they always say ‘start late, leave early,’ meaning: an audience is smart, so you want to throw them into the middle of things and let them figure it out. Based on these texts, I’m pretty sure my dad invented this rule.
I am now confused and I am interested. How could I not be! The text was not about a great Costco sized deal, but rather a simple, beautifully understated FYI that my parents are going to install a tea kettle for my grandma.
Color me intrigued, dear papa.
Then, another text:
Please give her a call this morning and let her know that this is a gift from you guys
WHAT? Before I have the time to even type the words, “wait what?”, a text meant to clarify comes through:
Valentines day gift
Wow. Cannes you believe it? I could not. All I could say in my mind was Ёб твою мать! – a Russian phrase that means “holy shit!” but translates literally to “fuck your mother.”
The whole thing feels like a poorly run, shoddy escape room (so, any escape room). A few random, barely connected clues – tea kettle, Nona’s place, Valentine’s day - that make no sense on their own and even less together.
Now, a mystery must be solved, and there’s a clear first action to take: ‘call Nona.’
But it can’t be that easy. If there’s one thing my Soviet Jewish upbringing has taught me, it’s “If it's easy, it isn’t real. Trust nothing besides that which is impossible. Good luck!!”
In reviewing the texts for this piece, I noticed for the first time my response, which really sums up the lifelong indoctrination I’ve suffered at the hands of these two, roommates of mine for 18 years.
All I wrote back:
Will do.
Except I did not.
Instead, I called them.
My parents answer the phone as a unit - first my dad, then my mom right behind, creating an echo chamber of s’mothering. There’s a breathiness to the hellos, so I know they’re on a walk, yet I also know they’re on speaker, strolling down by the Atlantic ocean, speaker phone held between them, volume up all the fuckin way.
I picture them like Tony and Carmela Soprano, speed walking, talking loud into the speaker phone, not giving a fuck as people pass them by, what the heck else do you want them to do – their idiot son - yea the one in Los Angeles trying to be a movie star - he can’t get it through his thick skull – call Nona, Sasha. We are installing it TODAY.
I am confused, I tell them. What are these texts, I ask.
They explain it to me slowly, like I’m the idiot, like this is as obvious as freedom itself — they’re buying Nona a new tea kettle - chaynik, in Russian – and they’re asking me to call and let Nona know that this chaynik will be a Valentine's day gift from me and Lauren to her.
Wow. I mean. Let’s deep breathe together. In……..out.
This is my parents’ signature move, the ‘ask-by-tell’ bait and switch. Like putting the phone up to my ear and saying “talk to your grandpa for a sec?” as the phone is already ringing. It's a wolf’s order dressed in the soft and fuzzy clothing of a sheep’s question. Like when your boss 'asks' you to do something - “Hey if you have a sec could you perhaps call Nona? Plz confirm! THANK YOU.”
Useful and necessary when a kid is, oh I don’t know, three years old? Five, even? But when that child is of the age when you say both of those numbers together and make 35, maybe not?
But even this feels a little extra for my parents. It’s not like we usually send Valentine’s Day gifts to the grandparents and, on account of my boofing it and forgetting to send mine, my parents swoop in and save me with a tea kettle.
No, this is a first. A revolutionary move within the Dobrenko family line.
I want to fight it and yet, I do not fight it. I used to — I’d scream and cry and rage against the famchine, but to what avail? No avail, that’s what. No avail.
So eventually I gave up, and I gave in. Like a good little captive. And soon, much to my chagrin, I began to love my captors. Stockholm Syndrome some call it, though I know it by a different name…
Family.
Privet / Hi
Welcome back. Nona and I, remember, are on the phone, her voice a fireworks display of love, my mind unable to see anything but the post-blast flotsam and jetsam — all that debris, plastic tubes floating in the lake, sad, broken, the aftermath of an explosion. Here we go.
“Kak ve / How are you?” (formal) I ask.
“Harasho, staroshinki. kak ovas fso, kak Valdik? / Good, living the old life. How’s everything with you guys? How’s Valdik?” Nona responds and asks about our son Wilder (who she calls Valdik).
“Horosho, begayut mnoga mnoga / Good, running around a lot,” I respond.
“Da da on kak evo papa. / Just like his daddy.”
“Ya hatyl skazat – ya vam koopil padarak na valentine day, y radetele vam dast evo zaftra. / I wanted to say, I got you a gift for Valentine’s Day. My parents are gonna give it to you tomorrow.”
“Aah ne nada bela. / You didn’t need to do that.”
I did not, in fact, do that, so we’re on the same page there.
“Ya hatyel. / I wanted to.”
“Spaciba. / Thank you.”
“Nezashta. / It’s nothing.”
It was nothing, Nona. It was. Now, sweet Nona, it’s a whole lotta something.
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