It happened without a ceremony. Vika wrote at midnight, her time: "Appa, it opens. I can see the first photo. The shoe box. The lid. Grandma's handwriting." Then nothing for ten minutes. Then: "I am reading everything from the beginning. Do not call, I'm crying."
She read all of it in one night, 11 years of posts, with a dictionary of her own memories next to it. In the morning she sent a long message. The best line: "Appa, you wrote about the vinegar. Do you remember? When I was fifteen I wrote to a stranger on a food blog that my grandmother puts a little vinegar into the laghman, and I never knew if she read it. I found the blog. My comment is still there, under the recipe, with the spelling mistakes."
I do not remember that. But I know my mother's laghman, and the vinegar, and the day I tasted it first. I think my daughter has just closed a circle that I did not know was open.
My grandchildren can read me too now. Artyom wrote me from Almaty, by e-mail, because he has no Attelkom login: "Dedushka, you write too long." I deserve it.
1 Comment
Artyom is right. But please continue.
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