“But mom, I have a boyfriend,” I pleaded with my mother.
“Yes, but this one is Russian.” She snapped back.
My parents had just gotten back from their trip to Dominican Republic, where on their flight back they ran into another Russian couple. A Russian couple with a 20-something year old son. Obviously this meant that they exchange photos and phone numbers and I was now staring at a piece of paper and a photograph of a Russian guy. A guy I was supposed to call, regardless of the fact that (a) I knew nothing about him, (b) I already had a boyfriend…one I was living with, in fact, and (c) this Russian guy did not live in my state, nor did I have any idea exactly which state he did live in.
If you’re like me, you’ve probably faced this many times. Your mom is on vacation/at a store/out for a walk when she runs into another Russian person and this Russian person happens to have a son. A son you are now sworn to, since he’s running his own business/is in IT/is in Finance and if you have grand kids they’ll speak Russian. Cuz, you know, it’s important that we all keep to our roots and culture (aka, she wants to speak to her grand kids in Russian, damn it).
I’ve battled this one with my mother for years (in fact, I’m pretty sure she started in on me around the age of 12, when, in my humble opinion, I was far to young to be dating). It doesn’t matter where they live, what they are like, or what other things are happening in my life – a Russian guy is my mother’s dream.
There are many times that I’ve imagined what the conversation would be like,
“Hi, I’m Katia. My mom ran into your mom on the plane. No I don’t know where your mom was going. No, I’m not sure if she was coming home to cook you kotletki. Anyways, based on the 2 sentence description I got, along with your picture, I’d like to go ahead and propose we get married and have Russian babies immediately.”
Click.
Sorry, mom. At least I tried.
