The officer held up the flattened bouquet and asked, “You have pansies in Russia?”
“Yes, we grow many flowers, but those are not pansies. I believe they are violets.”
“Oh, a horticulturist, well isn’t that nice.”
“A chemist, actually. I just like flowers.”
Sergeant Zilliony prodded at the brassieres, upsetting many more of the precious particles from home. All the remnants of my Russia were being sucked through a black hole in this foreign atmosphere.
“Welcome to America. Good luck,” the customs officer said as he closed my bag.
“
Next in line were a group of Italians with many suitcases and cardboard boxes. The officer watched as they lifted everything onto his examination table. Another uniformed person pointed me in the direction of yet another uniform. There my passport was scrutinized by a woman behind a high counter. I had to stand on the tips of my toes to see her. It felt good to stretch my ankles. She looked at me sideways.
“You are here to stay?”
“Yes.”
She said nothing and just stamped my passport. That was it. It was official—I was in America.
I went through double metal swinging doors, and on the other side, several men dressed in black pants and white shirts were holding signs with handwritten names. They spoke Russian.
“My son is going to engineering school.”
“Did you file for Social Security?”
“I am not eligible.”
“Take a class at the college.”
“Pottery, perhaps?”
They laughed and displayed their signs overhead as the area started to fill with people. I panicked for a moment hearing them speak Russian. Had I gotten on the wrong plane? No, I was here. The sign said “Welcome to the United States of America” in several alphabets, including Cyrillic. The tall glass windows, the smell of coffee and fried dough, and the smiling, toothy grins of the people in posters screamed
Excited and nervous, I wanted to do a little dance, but I managed to control my enthusiasm. I was in America and had to get to Port Authority. Port—I had some port once, and I enjoyed it very much. Authority—in the Soviet Union, it always made me suspicious. All the English words swimming before my eyes gave me vertigo. I tilted my head down between my knees to stop the spinning, and when I stood up and opened my eyes, in front of me was a bus with the name of my destination written on a sign across the top of its window. It was my first “lucky break” in America. I found a seat, and when the motor started rumbling, the diesel fumes reminded me of home. I clutched my precious valise on my lap. There were roads being built and many hotels along the route to Port Authority. The traffic was moving toward a skyline I had only seen in pictures. The man sitting next to me had a leg that twitched, and his suit smelled of oranges. He held his leg to stop it from bouncing up and down. He smiled at me, but I could not find a smile on my face yet—I was too nervous. I kept thinking of my song:
“Breathe, Stalina, breathe,” my father’s voice whispered to me from sometime long ago. I missed him and started to relax.
Chapter Five: Liberty
Once at Port Authority, I had two hours before the next bus was leaving for Hartford, Connecticut. Out of the bus I touched the concrete and felt the ground shaking. I stood frozen, holding tightly to my bag. The bus driver was helping people get their luggage. He saw my hesitation to move.
“Don’t worry, ma’am, it’s the subway you’re feeling. The Eighth Avenue IND runs right under our feet.”
“In Russia our metro is deep, deep underground.”
“Go right through that door, ma’am. You have arrived in New York City.”
The bus terminal was very different from the airport. It was as if nothing was moving. Many people were wearing dark clothes and were slumped in corners and against the walls. I made my way quickly past staring eyes to get outdoors to breathe some air.
The Port Authority had a sadness to it that was strangely comforting. It was not just in Russia that people had hard times. I was being shown the real America. Clutching my valise, I went through the glass doors to a very noisy avenue. The street in front of the building was torn apart, and a deep hole made the traffic stop. It sounded as if every horn was sounding from every car. There were workers in the hole, and I could see the tops of their yellow hard hats bobbing as they threw dirt over their shoulders with shovels. I turned the corner and practically tripped over the spike-heeled shoes of a very tall woman with bony legs in fishnet tights and a skirt that came up to my nose. Her black hair stuck straight into the air like the sharp tips on barbed wire. It was obviously a wig.
I pulled back and said, “Pardon me.”
She did not say a word as she crossed her long leg behind her and leaned against the wall. Another woman wearing a tight-fitting dress made of bright green satin tapped her shoulder and asked for a cigarette. Prostitutes. Again I see America is much like Russia. Only our ladies of the street are not so old and hard. As I cleared away from their sidewalk space and stepped toward the curb, I saw the Christ Almighty Savior Church on Forty-second Street. The angels over the arched doorway were like those on top of St. Isaac’s. Next door to the church was a
