Letters from Lida - 36

March <?> 28, 1927

<part a>

Fanechka, my dear!

This week we received from you only a postcard where you wrote that we skipped one week <and did not write you>. I was very surprised because we are sending you letters regularly every week.. Why are you worrying so much about Olia? She came back from the dacha and now is in Lida. I asked her why she does not write  <to you> and she said that she did not write for a long time and now it is hard to start, but still she promised me to write you. Why do you write so little about your personal life? How are you, how do you feel? For how long do you have a job? Olia told me something about foreign countries. Where on earth do you want to go?  Now I see, or rather I am more and more sure how irresponsible are you towards me.

<part c>

I did not expect this from you. I should pay according the rules of the Jewish people, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, but so far I am trying to be patient and not to pay you back. There is not much news at home. The dining room is not fixed yet. Mendel is not coming, only is promising. Last week I sent you a photo of Borenka,(1) he already started to walk. Lisa (2) made two very pretty little pillows, a boy and a girl, Olia liked it so much that she came to visit us on Thursday to make <pillows>, and stayed late. Then the rain and thunderstorm started, and she stayed with us overnight and next day stayed after the dinner, <Russian dinner is served in the lunch time> until she finished her “children.” The pillows came out very pretty and she wants to frame them.

<part b>

This is a first time since she came from Palestine she visited us for such a long time but I said that this does not count because she came not to see us but to make pillows, and if she wants me to visit her (because she asked me to come very much) she has to come to us (so I will pay her back same way). So imagine, she did not make me to wait for her and next day, e.g. on Saturday, she decided to pay us a visit again, and I was very glad and visited them the same evening. All this time I did not visit her, only sometimes when I needed something. What do you say, I wrote so many silly things to you. Fanechka, have you received everything from Arkiny <?> and Basia Karpejsky? Have you got everything? Do you have money in the bank or are “gol as sokol?” <Lit. “Naked as a hawk” – Russian proverb meaning “have nothing at all”> Today Dodelnys <?> are leaving although we are not sending anything for you with them  because you did not write what you need. Reveka with Mayechka are already in America. They are waiting for a telegram about their arrival any day now. I even think that Shapiro will publish that in his newspaper. “Fau!” <?> Yidel became  a real owner and enjoys himself <unclear.. On Friday there was a fire on Zavalnaya street, a wooden house was on fire. Some firefighters got hurt because it was in a very tight location. Yidel got a nail in his foot, they got it out of course and he got a shot against the blood poisoning. He is already well and is walking, even went to Vilno on business. Write me about yourself. Kiss you with love, yours Frida.

Regards from everybody.

(1) Possibly a little brother of Frida and Fanya – there was a son Boris, of whose fate nothing is known.
(2) Sister of Fanya and Dora, as yet  unmarried