The truth is, it had always
been a hard country, and a sad one. It was a land where the invaders had come from all sorts of directions, across all sorts of centuries. If you had to choose, though, you’d say it was harder than it was sad, and the communist era was no different. It was a time, in the end, where you moved from one long queue to another, for everything from medical supplies to toilet paper, and vanishing stocks of food.
And what could people do?
They stood in line.
They waited.
The temperature fell below freezing. It changed nothing.
People stood in line.
They waited.
Because they had to.
* * *
—
Which brings us back to Penelope, and her father.
For the girl, none of that mattered so much, or at least it didn’t yet.
To her this was just a childhood.
It was a piano and frozen playgrounds, and Walt Disney on Saturday nights—one of the many small concessions from the world that lay wayward and west.
As for her father, he was careful.
Vigilant.
He kept his head down, and held all political ideas in the shadows of his mouth, but even that wasn’t much comfort. Keeping your nose clean while an entire system broke down around you guaranteed only that you would survive longer, not that you would survive. An endless winter would finally break, only to return in record time, and there you were again, at work:
Small, allotted hours.
Friendly without friends.
There you were at home:
Quiet but wondering.
Is there any way out at all?
The answer was formed, and worked on.
Definitely not for him.
Maybe, however, for the girl.
* * *
—
In the years between, what else can be said?
Penelope grew up.