I do not know my ancestry very well. The fact that my mother – an orphan, was brought up in an orphanage, in a boarding school. And she never saw her parents and knows nothing about them. But my father, besides his mother and father, has two brothers, two sisters, three nephews and five nieces. Well, I – the only and favorite daughter. This is my “one-sided” genealogy… Grandfather says about our ancestors reluctantly. But my grandmother likes to talk about the past. From her I learned a lot about my family.
Grandmother’s grandmother was a beauty in her youth. In addition – the daughter of a rich widow landowner. The “train” of the cavaliers accompanied her everywhere. My father indulged her in everything, adored her. I did not understand just how resolutely and rudely she refused the bridegrooms. The girl was already the twentieth year, she was capricious and spoiled – well, just a princess from the tale of the Brothers
Grimm “King-Drozdoborod.” The old landowner was still thinking about his, probably, an early death and that there was no one to hand over the management of the estate – there was no son-in-law. And he had a poor but smart and hard-working guy who was left without his parents. The young man lived in his own hut built near the estate, he led the household and even sewed his own clothes. The old man thought about it and… gave his adored daughter for the “tramp”. Soon the landlord died, and his son-in-law with his wife inherited all of his fortune. They had a son, my great-grandfather. The estate flourished… And in 1917 Soviet power was established. The estate was destroyed, its owner was killed… And so my grandmother’s father, accustomed to luxury, became an ordinary peasant. Ten years later he married a girl from a neighboring village, my grandmother appeared. During the Great Patriotic War she met my grandfather. Since 1944, they have not parted. They made plans, dreamed after the victory to create a family. And there was a victory, and there was a family – just
this, about which they dreamed. Near Kharkov they built a huge house. Just for a big friendly family. Three sons and two daughters were born to them… Today grandparents have six granddaughters and three grandsons. And when we, all nine, come on summer vacations to the village, to that spacious light house, grandmother and grandfather are very pleased with us. Only sometimes it seems to me that they would like that at this time in the house it would be at least a little less quiet…
