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Tanya Maliarchuk
Because I’ve never loved
anyone deeply. Perhaps I still
might. I don’t know. But my
ownstoriesaren’tparticularly
striking. I don’t know why.
It certainly depends on the
way they’re told. Because
you can tell them in one way
that makes everyone begin
to cry, and in another way
that makes everyone laugh.
The very same story.
My grandmother always told
me stories in a way that made
me cry. She cried too. Both
of us cried. That’s when I
understood for the first time
how nice it is to cry from
hearing stories.
My grandmother had a real
talent for story telling. She
certainlymust haveespecially
suffered something so awful
in her own skin that later she
had something to tell. She
remembered details very
well. In fact I would cry from
the details. Grandmother
once asked me:
“Do you know what birch
kasha is?”
“No I don’t. What is it?”
“It’s when you’re beaten
with thin birch switches.
They whipped me one time,
but I remembered the taste
of birch kasha my entire life.”
“And what does it taste like?”
“Salty. And slightly bitter.
Because the birch itself has a
bitter taste when you lick it.”
Grandmother had to take care
of her step-mother’s small
child, and that child fell from
the shelf atop the stove to the
floor. Grandmother ran away
into the woods because she
feared that her step-mother
would beat her. Her step-
mother would always give an
extremely painful whupping.
Grandmother left the child
lying on the floor and ran