From that point on, my mother practically lost her two brothers and two sisters: they became more and more involved in this group, colder and colder toward her. Or more precisely, they were formal with her, and treated her like a stranger. They were only close to their “communal sisters and brothers”—my mother was generous but also unapproachable, I think I got this, and this collective decision on the part of her four siblings was because they’d finally found some structure to their lives with this community (Grandpa, their father, grew up in boarding school, and Grandma, their mother, was the daughter of an army officer), and this somehow justified shutting out their unmanageable, magnanimous older sister. They’d answer: “Let the dead bury the dead,” because the scriptures are full of cruel one-liners.

The president of the Catholic union was my mother’s godfather. She worked for him; I know she translated documents from four different languages. She flew to Russia to attend a conference, for the university, I think. These are our family legends. She studied sociology and political science, then argued with the young professor she was working for as an assistant. Too pure, she couldn’t work for glory or for money: often, at the end of a job, she’d feel angry, wounded, and would arrogantly say: “Then I’ll do it for free—keep your money.”

She played guitar and sang, but then she lost her voice. After an operation on her vocal cords, she had to be silent for a month.

She stopped riding her scooter because it scared my father.

She worked to support him while he started his career as an entrepreneur, then she stopped working, to raise us. She fought with people at the university, stopped taking trips like the one to Russia.

I remember when her father died; the funeral was held the day she turned thirty-nine. I spent the night with my paternal grandparents, and when I arrived at the church, I saw her standing with strangers all dressed in black, and I rushed over and wished her a happy birthday. One of my uncles explained to me then that my mother was unhappy because her birthday was on the same day as her father’s funeral. But I really couldn’t connect the two, and all I said was: “But it’s still her birthday…”

When I was a teenager, my grandmother, whom I loved very much, would drop these comments like: “You know, the problems between your parents, your mom’s problems with your dad.” And I’d say: “Okay, Grandma, what does that even mean … Problems, sure—what does that even mean?” but I didn’t want her to explain. To us, it felt like our parents couldn’t be with anyone else.