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“НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ”, ЛЮТИЙ 2013 WWW. UNWLA.ORG 23 three - dimensional tre e. Then they painted it green using paint salvaged from an old parcel. Painted dried peas, made to look like Chrsitmas balls, were suspended by bits of thread. Attached to the tips of the "boughs" were tiny little twigs that represented candles. The only t hings that the tree lacked were size and the characteristic scent of fir. More than anything else, we needed news from home — from our dea r family and friends. Every day I would hurry home from work, plo w- ing my way through the deep snow, with only one thoug ht on my mind: would there be any mail? If so, Mother would put the letter (or the package, if there was one) in a visible location so that it could delight me as soon as I entered the room. If there was a parcel, mother would first satisfy her own curiosi ty by untying the strings and removing the top wrapping material, but then she would put everything back exactly as the senders' hands had packed it. She wanted us to experience the same joy in unpacking it as she had. Of course, since the heavy winter sn o w- falls all such delights came to a halt. Instead, my own experience of daily hope and disappointment was not unlike that of the Ukrainian poet Shevchenko who, during his exile, wrote, "And again, I have no mail from Ukraine." On January 1, New Years D ay, it began to snow once more — a windless snowstorm. Huge quiet flakes thickly blanketed the layers of snow previously tamped down. It made walking to work even harder as I had to make a new path in the new snow that reached over my knees. The next day the snow finally stopped. The moon was a l- most full and I, having to work late, could make my way home by the light of the moon that night. Everything glistened in the silvery crystalline moonlit snow. On Christmas Eve I managed to leave work a little earlier , happy that I could make it home before it was too late. The moon had not risen yet. The sky had taken on a dark blue, a l- most purple hue, but where the sun had just set, a bright golden streak lit up the horizon. By the time I neared home, the first eveni ng star had a p- peared. In spite of myself, I stopped, and gazing at it, thought of all those people back home who also were looking for the first star — although, pe r- haps, in a different constellation. The star was wondrously bright and it twinkled in the fro sty sky. It seemed to me that with each step that I took, it moved with me; it was leading me home. A sense of the grandeur and infinity of the hea v- ens fused with a sudden awareness of the distance that separated us from our real home. Ove r- whelmed by yearn ing and sorrow, I knocked on the door, and shaking off the snow from my valyanky I entered with the traditional Christmas greeting: "Khrystos Rozhdayetsia!" — "Christ is Born!" Immediately I was struck by unusual warmth. Obviously, tonight we were heating o ur home with more than our usual ration of fuel. The room seemed festively ornate. The tiny cardboard Christmas tree cast a realistically long shadow on the rime - covered walls. And it wasn't just this shadow that touched me — there was a scent of fir in the air. It was then that I saw the letters and the package. They were laid out on the festively spread white tablecloth. Without even removing my coat, and under the smiling gaze of my mot h- er, I leapt for the package. There on the very top, wrapped in thin ti ssue paper was a piece of Prosphora 1 and, next to it, a sprig of fir. Oliusia, my dearest and truest friend in the whole world, had sent us this package. It was a heart - wrapped, not a hand - wrapped package, as my father once wrote from his prison camp. Suc h wonderful things it contained! Every single item was skillfully wrapped and carefully marked to let us know whose gift it was. Even in this, Oliusia's personality shone through. She was the one who mailed the parcel but if something in the package was a gift from someone else as well, she made a note of it so that all the gratitude would not be directed to her alone. We knew how difficult it was to send such a parcel. Often it was necessary to travel quite a distance to a town where packages being sent to Kazakhstan were accepted for delivery. Among the contents, to be shared commonly by all, there was also special medication for Mother. Seeing the handwriting on the little box, I recognized it as Oliusia's. She was a pharmacist and she had prepared the me dic a- tion herself. And so, the distance between us that had so overwhelmed me earlier with its immensity somehow suddenly shrank. And although I have no rational explanation for it, I know that it had to be Oliusia's goodness that cleared the way for those sturdy and patient oxen so that they could deliver this package on this very night. The sprig of fir that Oliusia's good hands had placed in the box, filled the room with an aroma of Christmas and of our native home. It brought to life the cardboard Chri stmas tree and it cast a shadow of God's own tree onto the cold 1 Prosphora – the previously blessed bread co n- sumed at the beginning of the Christmas Eve supper. (Translator's note)
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