love-story

Their courtship unfolded in two settings, a Russian reality overlaid with New York memories

Florence, listen to me carefully. He squeezed her hand. Take whatever that agent offers you. Give him what he wants, and don__ ask too many questions. Get yourself an exit visa as soon as you can. Then leave! Disappear. Forget this wretched place

Was it an instinct towards their future life together that she was already sensing, which made her pull back? For what she was seeing suddenly, in her mind__ eye, was an image of the two of them dancing on the edge of the world, not realising that they were about to fall off

From the moment Julian entered the world, Florence had begun to conceive of life as separate from the aspects of its outward circumstances. Over and over, life renewed itself. Over and over, it made itself blind to the death and destruction of the past

The Bolshevik leaders perched atop the Mausoleum were no easier to tell apart than chess pawns. But Florence too was certain that she could recognise the twinkling eyes of Joseph Stalin, which looked down at her each workday from the oil painting above Timofeyev__ desk

She was arriving at a revelation that the secret to living was simply forgetting

A Red Riding Hood out of her depths in the woods of socialism

Sunset was just then settling over Red Square. There seemed some hidden vision to be gleaned. A message about man__ chaotic spirit and his sombre dignity. His dignity and his power. His power and his purpose. She was sure that there was some thread there, but the burden of decoding it made her feel too tired

Our communists aren__ like your communists. In New York they__e always on the street demonstrating, but their demands are absurd. Slash rents! Free groceries and electricity for the poor! They demand that landlords open up their vacant apartments to house the unemployed. They even demand that the Communist Party distribute unemployment relief instead of the Labor Department. They might as well demand cake and champagne!

Moscow appeared to her as an Asiatic sprawl of twisting streets, wooden shanties, and horse cabs. But already another Moscow was rising up through the chaos of the first. Streets built to accommodate donkey tracks have been torn open and replaced with boulevards broader than two or three Park Avenues. On the sidewalks, pedestrians were being detoured onto planks around enormous construction pits. A smell of sawdust and metal filings hung in the air

She would only let you know her, little by little ~ never giving too much away but willing to share the small parts that make up her life, she falls slowly like that ~ love isn't a maybe thing in her eyes & her heart is the prize, she knows her worth and she will withstand the wait.

Her love is rare but she'll keep you wild.

The Talmud states, "Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief. Do justly now, love mercy now, walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.

I don__ know why we fight.It takes much too effort to stay mad at you.To dodge your skin in the hallwayand leave the kitchen without bringing you a treat.It takes much too effort to stare at the sinkso my eyes don__ smile at you in the mirror.It takes much too effort to look away as we undressand lie apart in the now bigger bed.It takes much too effort to stiffen my bodybecause sleepy limbs forget fightsand pride is always lost in dreams.It takes much too effort to awaken every hour to make sure we are islands with a gulf of white sheets separating us.I dread the light peeking through the parted curtainsand empathise with your groans __ didn__ get any sleep either.I really don__ know why we fight.It takes much too effort to stay mad at one anotherwhen it__ so easy for us to love.

For a long time, my subconscious rested in a dark place, ticking through memories like a jukebox selecting a record...

Come to me in my dreams, and thenBy day I shall be well again!For so the night will more than payThe hopeless longings of the day.

All family stories are important, just as all people are important, and they deserve to be passed along.

If you really want to do something,you will.If not now, Eventually.