Lonely Place America. Novel-in-Stories

Irina Borisova

Many women, driven by a need for change in their lives, contact a marriage agency. These are their stories – ironic, woeful, romantic, and often very funny – as varied and as wonderful as the women themselves. Working as a matchmaker in the 1990’s Irina had seen a lot related to the international dating phenomenon, particularly as it was viewed through the eyes of Russian Women. The author is a Russian, but she has written these stories in a charming idiosyncratic English.

Lonely Place America

Novel-in-Stories

Irina Borisova

© Irina Borisova, 2016

© Irina Borisova, translation, 2016

© Mikhail Borisov, photos, 2016

Editor Curt Lang

Editor Tod Greenaway

Created with intellectual publishing system Ridero

Part I. Problems with Electricity

How It All Started

The idea of a marriage agency originally came to mind after my lady friend’s request to use my post office box for her sister Galya’s personal letters. Galya, a divorced lady of thirty seven with a sixteen year old son, lived together with her parents. Many people in Russia live with their parents because low wages do not allow them to rent apartments, let alone to buy them.

Living with her parents did not bother Galya much. On the contrary, she found it quite convenient. Her mother was more her son’s mother than she was herself. Her mother also cleaned the apartment, cooked and washed, so Galya was occupied only with her job but her evenings were free – and boring.

Galya liked toВ visit theatres and other cultural events. She liked company for these outings, so she placed an advertisement inВ the local personals paper. She wrote that she wished toВ find aВ man for В«disinterested friendship, visiting museums, theatres and beautiful St. Petersburg suburbs inВ summerВ». It was really all she wished. She was incautious enough toВ write her telephone number inВ her ad. The telephone started toВ ring days and nights. The greatest quantity ofВ callings occurred just at night and night fantasies ofВ men calling were rather far from attending theatres and museums.

Galya’s parents were indignant. They demanded to switch off the telephone overnights. The uninterrupted ringing continued for two weeks. However, none of the people calling corresponded to her image of an inquisitive gentleman wishing to raise his cultural level by visiting places of interest.

Galya herself was rather cold and selfish. She had an unfortunate first marriage, and she did not want toВ repeat her mistake. She did not want toВ get anybody else toВ take care of; her life generally quite satisfied her and the last things she needed were marriage andВ sex.

She removed her telephone number from her second advertisement and asked men toВ write toВ my post office box as she did not have her own. IВ got letters out ofВ the box, and Galya occasionally visited me and took them. As aВ reward IВ was also allowed toВ read all the letters.

Now I can share some peculiarities of Russian mens’ letters. First, many of them were very short, sometimes only a telephone number, a man’s name and the request to call. They were often very poorly decorated, very often written on random scraps of paper torn I had no idea out of what. Letters were sometimes written even on telegram forms picked up I suppose at the Post Office where the idea to write maybe came suddenly to someone’s mind and was immediately embodied.

Some ofВ letters were also long, trying toВ describe the personality and all the life ofВ the man writing. But true feelings and loneliness were usually hidden under such aВ deep coating ofВ irony that it sounded more like an attempt toВ laugh at life inВ general and especially at the man writing the letter himself.

Again, none of the men who sent letters matched the part of a gentleman escorting Galya to theatres. What all men wished was rotating around all the same, which was absolutely declined by Galya. One person even offered to repair Galya’s country house sto