View From the Hammock brought to you by Purple Frog

My first few months of driving in America went almost uneventfully not counting a few red lights passed and driving on the wrong side of the road. September of 1996 threw a snowstorm at Kansas City and its vicinities: the sky turned grey and the snow flakes were like small puffy snow balls. I hurried up to pick up my son from school early and hit a traffic jam. Slowly moving forward on Shawnee Mission Parkway, I started having a problem with visibility; the snow was sticking to the windshield like plaster. I started looking for wipers and turned the button that I thought would be wipers, but the wipers didn’t move. What if they are frozen or the snow is too heavy?

“Tell me one good thing about socialism!” My friend George Hanson challenged me, and I was perplexed.  What could that one good thing be? That’s one question that is hard to answer for a fresh immigrant. I tried to fit in, temporarily developing amnesia in regard to my childhood memories - for a while, all you can see is the best of America and you start forgetting the good of your homeland. “Tell me one good thing about socialism!” This question isn’t asked often and when it is asked, it comes from men proficient in politics, or world travelers. George was both. He lived in Iran, Australia, England, and Wales. Shrugging my shoulders was my usual and only answer until now, but this time I proudly remembered, “Eureka! Here is one!” “Is it vodka?”

One of the amusing things I saw in America was a robe with the label, “One size fits all.” People are not of the same size.  That is why we have sizes S, M, L, XL, and so forth. That robe I tried in a store reminded me a story of a crocodile.

In America, everybody is in a hurry, and you can leave your house in the morning, go to Arby's, McDonald’s, or Wendy’s, and get a meal without getting out of the car. My first driving experience was connected with an observation of people chewing behind their wheels. The same people would do their banking without even having to take out a Big Mac or a Burrito out of their mouths. As for me, I needed to see the face of the cashier who takes my money. I didn’t trust an ATM machine yet and was hesitant to use a drive-through to get my food. One day, I decided to surprise my son–for God’s sake, his mother is a modern woma n. I saw many times how people placed orders at McDonald’s, so I followed the “Enter” sign and approached the first dark container. I rolled down the window and said, “One cheeseburger, one hamburger, two drinks, and an apple pie.” Silence. I saw a line behind me in the rearview mirror. I said louder, “One cheeseburger, one hamburger, two drink

            A few years after I started my new life in America, my father finally got his visa to come to see us. Knowing how much my Dad likes to see new things, I got on the road. Driving once on I-70 with a decent speed through the downtown area, I didn’t pay too much attention to my father’s gestures. He was thrilled as a kid, looking to the left and to the right. “What is this, what is that?” I’ve heard him asking. I was unable to answer, because my eyes caught a sight of something wild: the man in the next car pointed his middle finger at me. I pushed on the gas, leaving his ugly finger far behind. “What have I done?” No one has ever pointed a middle finger at me before.  I was just so proud of my driving to impress my father! “What is that?” My Dad was already looking at something else.  Luckily, he was too busy to notice what was going on outside the car.  I wouldn’t be able to stand his criticism. Again, I hadn’t ev

Christmas time was around the corner, and I got busy shopping. My father came to Kansas City from Russia for his first visit; he was ecstatic, finally seeing me on both feet.  “Christmas is coming. What do we cook?” My father was talking unusually fast and loud; it was his first Christmas in America.