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December 22 marks the thirtieth anniversary of the overthrow of the Romanian socialist state ofNicolae Ceauescu. In a work of memoir, Nachescu recalls growing up under communism and wonders about the world Romanians hoped would follow its fall.

Arad, Romania, June 1982

At the edge of the river the sand turns into mud, seeping between my toes, cooler than the lukewarm water. Its not an unpleasant feeling, its just that who knows what creatures might be living under the greenish fluid. And its slippery. I can fall if Im not careful.

Dont go too far.

My grandmother has taken refuge under a tree.

I want to recreate that world just as I remember it. Werent we already living on the highest peaks of progress? In the Golden Age?

By now the opaque water is up to my knees. I comb it with my fingers, which look like white fish swimming close to the surface. I dont like that thought. But the water is warm, and my feet are sinking deeper into the mud now. Two older kids are playing with a ball. One of them pretends to hit the other, who catches the ball at the last moment. They might lose it in the river if theyre not careful. Last year an older boy who was in seventh grade drowned. I can see people crossing the drawbridge and the rusty pontoons that were once painted red and blue.

I want to swim a little, but my grandmother wont let me.

Dont go any farther!

Theres panic in her voice. Im now up to my hips, and instead of swimming, I just crouch in the water, letting it cool my hot shoulders and neck. I move my arms, faking swimming moves, then splash water toward nobody. I wish someone else was here, but I dont know who. Lately Ive been feeling like this, an unfocused yearning, an emptiness in my arms and chest, as if Im trying to embrace wisps of smoke.

Thats it, please come out now.

One last dip, then I stand up and walk toward the shore. Buni is pleased, I can tell.

Here, let me help you.

The bra that I have to wear this yeartwo triangles of polyester hanging from strings tied around my neck and flat chesthas shifted, and my grandmother puts it back into place. She touches my shoulders with her rough fingers, and I wince. On the back of my neck and arms, my skin feels tight. Her fingertips are rough, blackened by small cuts and nicks from a lifetime of peeling and cutting vegetables, as well as small pin pricks from all the needlework shes done.

Lets go get langoi, she says.

The line in front of the kiosk is short. Two women work inside, stretching the dough and then dropping it into the boiling oil. It must be very hot in there.

Nothing but the thinnest piece of paper separates the piping hot fried dough from my fingertips.

Let me hold it for you.

Maybe it doesnt burn her old skin as much. She blows air over the lango before giving it to me, still hot, but now I can start eating it if Im careful. In the middle, it has air bubbles caught in the golden crisp dough.

My grandmother wants to buy some for my parents so we get back in line. It is longer now, and I can feel the sun burning on my shoulders as the string tying my swimsuit bra rubs against the back of my neck.

But the line isnt moving. One of the women sticks her head out of the kiosk.

Weve run out of fuel, she says. We might get more later.

Some people seem to grumble, but most just walk away.

I should have gotten more the first time around, my grandmother says. Oh well, maybe theyll bring more fuel later.

We walk down crowded alleys paved with yellow granite toward the swimming pools, where my parents are. The rectangular bricks, arranged in a basket weave pattern, are hot, but theres thin grass growing between them thats cool enough to walk on.

My father is lying on his back reading a novel, while my mother is chatting with someone two blankets down. I dont want to talk to anybody. My mother says goodbye, then turns toward me and pulls the strings of my bra.

Ouch!

Her fingernails are short, with a pointy tip that she has recently filed. They scratch my shoulders right where it aches the most.

You just got sunburn.

Shes not impressed that it hurts.

We had some langoi and we wanted to bring some back, but they ran out of fuel.

My father puts the book down on his belly, then looks at us, shielding his eyes.

The restaurant should be open by now. Maybe we should go get lunch?

My father lifts himself heavily off the blanket, his belly hanging over his swimsuit, which has a fake belt and golden buckle.

My brother, Teo, comes back from the small kids swimming pool. My mom is trying to offer him a sandwich and grapes from her beach bag, but hes not interested.

Lets go to the big kids pool, he says. Hes really excited.

Hes not allowed in that pool unless Im with him. I can swim in the adult pool if my father is there to watch me. But Ill go with Teo. Id like to run into classmates or friends, somebody my age, like Emilia or Laura, even though I know they go to the thermal baths in Vlaicu, where they live. Not Emilia though, she told us she cant go anywhere this weekend because she has her period. I wonder what thats like, though it cant be fun if you cant go to the swimming pool. It would be very nice to run into Radu, who was in my class until fourth grade, but whom I rarely see, despite living in the same neighborhood.

I spend the next two hours diving and jumping into the crowded pool, challenging Teo and one of his friends to all sorts of competitions that involve swimming around other kids and even one parent whos frowning at us. This pool is for kids, I want to tell him, but I dont. In the end he leaves.

We had some langoi and we wanted to bring some back, but they ran out of fuel.

In the evening, the straps of my summer dress feel scratchy but I can finally take off the swimsuit bra.

Youre all red, youll get a good tan, my mother says.

Ill put some yogurt on your skin when we get home, it should make you feel better, says my grandmother.

Like always after swimming, the memory of water lingers in my body, which feels heavier and lighter at the same time, my muscles sore, my joints loose. Toes and knees and elbows feel like one fluid whole. I can fall asleep any minute, melt into a puddle by the side of the road.

The pontoon bridge sways as throngs of people cross it at the same time. I hang on to the ropes on the side, watching the bend in the river in the distance.

On the other side, people are watching sculptors working in the park on blocks of white stone. Despite being tired and hungry, we walk around the parks newly paved paths.

Is that marble? I ask my father.

Limestone. Its a summer school organized by City Hall, and the statues will stay here in the park.

My father always speaks as if there are many people listening.

A young man in an undershirt, a red kerchief on his forehead, is chiseling away at a square block. Theres dust all around him, on his bare arms and his face, which is too wide, with blue eyes almost sunken under a wide forehead. When he lifts his right arm, I can see his shoulder musclethe poster in the biology lab flashes in front of my eyes, was that the deltoid? then the bone when he lowers it again. He stops to light up a cigarette; he smokes filterless Carpaithe stuff that stinksunlike my father, who smokes Kent. I want the man to keep working, so I can keep watching his shoulder.

My parents and Teo are walking away.

And what does this statue represent?

My voice comes out whiny, high pitched, pretentious. I want to sound older.

He turns around and takes a good look at me before answering, and is it just me or does his gaze linger on my chest and shoulders, where the straps of my purposeless bra have left pale lines?

Nothing, he answers in the end, in a voice that sounds sad and gentle.

I try to return his gaze, and I succeed for a moment, then I lower my eyes. My parents have walked away.

Great! I scream. This statue represents nothing!

I run toward my mother.

Ileana! my mother exclaims, louder than necessary, so that the young man can hear her disapproval.

I take my brothers hand and walk behind my parents.

At night, I dream of laying my cheek against a mans shoulder, protective, vulnerable. The next day, during the ten oclock break, blowing bubbles with the pink Balonka bubble gum Emilia shared with me, I tell her and Laura that I spoke with an Older Guy.

Arad, Romania, November 1988

We took too long to get ready, or maybe it was too cold and we didnt really want to leave home. Probably my mother insisted that we still go. She believed that once people decided to do something, they had to go through with it. My father suffered from heart disease and the doctor recommended that he lose some weight. I too felt like I needed some exercise. The previous summer I had jogged, swam, TV exercised, and dieted away twenty-five pounds, which were slowly creeping back. I was my fathers daughter. Not only did I look like him (I frowned often, hoping that people would notice the resemblance), but I shared my fathers love for desserts, midnight treats, and afternoons spent lying comfortably on the couch, reading a novel.

I imagined Florin in a foreign city, walking clean sidewalks under abundant lights, and a pang of envy and painthis would never be my future, I could never go thereshot through my whole body, bringing tears to my eyes.

We hadnt made it even half a mile on the promenade along the river before we contemplated turning back. It was already getting dark, and rumors had it that the park was dangerous at night, that there were thieves and gangs and that someone had been killed the previous year. The park was less than five minutes away from the better neighborhoods of our town, yet the lights didnt work, or kids had thrown rocks at them, or there was another blackout, as so often happened in those days. I was lucky I was with my father, who was six foot three and big. By myself I would have made a dash toward the end of the park, near the apartment buildings where people could hear me in case of need. I mostly avoided being out at night, especially by myself, especially in winter. Winter evenings were cold and dark pretty much everywhere in the late eighties, but at least you were safer if you were at home.

We passed the modernist sculptures made out of white limestonea stylized ancient heros head, a woman in a long dress, a cube balanced on its side. I recalled the earlier summer when we had watched the young artists carving them. I remembered looking forward to our dinner of roasted eggplants, tomatoes, and telemea cheese, the usual summer fare. Now the limestone gleamed in the fading winter light. The river, to our left, exuded its familiar muddy smell, now subdued by the cold.

We walked in silence. I always thought I had a lot of things to talk about with my father, but when we spent time together, which wasnt often, I rarely knew what to tell him, or worried that I might say something he wouldnt like.

This time he was the one who broke the silence.

Are you and Florin Popa good friends?

I tried to remember what my father could have known. In sixth grade I had had a crush on himbut then, in sixth grade Id had crushes on almost every guy who spoke to me. Florin was now in Munich, and according to my classmate Eli, who knew him from the polo team, hed called his parentsour neighbors from the first floorto tell them he was alright and had managed to cross from Hungary into Austria, then West Germany. He wanted to go to Paris, that was his dream. He hadnt told anybody about his plans, not even his parents (Especially not his parents! Can you imagine? Eli had said during the ten oclock break, rounding her eyes and mouth in amazement) so that when they would inevitably be interrogated by the police, they could honestly say that they didnt know anything about their sons plans. For me and Eli, Florin, whom we had watched at the swimming pool, had now become a romantic hero. In the past few days Id imagined him in a foreign city, walking clean sidewalks under abundant lights, among smartly dressed crowds, and a pang of envy and painthis would never be my future, I could never go there, never be or belong thereshot through my whole body, bringing tears to my eyes.

We didnt talk very much. You know, just saying Hi. Hes older, I said to my father.

You have to be careful. Some people spend too much time gossiping. Its never a good idea.

Did that mean that we would be interrogated too? It didnt make any sense. Florin had left by himself. I hadnt even talked to him in years.

I hated it when my father spoke to me like that, moralizing, as if I were a child. He was a great storyteller, who could make the ordinary meaningful. He could walk into a room and fill it with his voice, his energy. At house parties, he enjoyed singing with his coworkers and college friends. While my mother and grandmother gathered dirty dishes and brought out coffee and desserts over which they had labored for daysincluding waiting in line for hours for rationed sugar and buttermy father would tell his stories ending in a punch line, a comment, or a moral that I would sometimes think about for days. Yet when he talked to me, all I got was dull advice in a slow, ponderous voice.

Once he came home from a late meeting and told us about how the secretary of the county Party organization had concluded an hour-long speech: Comrade Ceauescus thinking is solid, its so solid, its like concrete. My father repeated that a few times, shaking his head.

Thats what he said: its like concrete.

And you didnt laugh? I asked.

Of course he didnt laugh, nobody ever did.

Once my father told us about how the secretary of the county Party organization had concluded a speech, Comrade Ceauescus thinking is so solid, its like concrete. Of course he didnt laugh, nobody ever did.

It was dark now. We had a choice, to continue walking on the alle by the river and go past the sports complex where Id played tennis a few summers before, or turn right, walk up the marble steps, and walk back home on the promenade. It was too cold to sit and rest on a bench, not that wed overexerted ourselves.

Are we going any farther?

Maybe we should just go home, he said.

On the other side of the promenade, the buildings were dark. Maybe he anticipated that I would complain about the blackout.

You know, your mother told me that you havent been helping lately. Whats going on with your room?

Its just my desk. I have a lot of homework, because of the math tutors.

While other kids like Eli could have posters in their rooms, I had my grandmothers needlepoint in a golden frame on the wall, and my mothers knickknacks, including a set for serving mulled plum brandy (yes, plum brandy!), on the bookshelves. And I had better grades than Eli.

You know, when I was in high school, only the kids who failed had tutors, the ones who had to repeat a class.

He just liked saying that. He had of course been very good at math when he was in high school, although he didnt need that anymore. He was now technical manager of the factory where he had once gotten his first job as an engineer, right out of college.

I guess its for the entrance exam?

There would be seven to nine applicants for each spot at the engineering school my parents insisted I choose. That wasnt bad: there were usually more than twenty applicants per opening in the medical or law school. All my classmates went to multiple tutors, and some parents could afford college professors in Timisoara.

Then he added, almost as an afterthought: You should also join the Party while youre in college.

I didnt say anything, and it was understood that I agreed. I was going to study engineering in college because my parents thought it was a good idea. I didnt like math or physics, but that didnt matter. I liked reading novels. My parents kept repeating the factual statement that literature teachers were usually sent to teach in the countryside, while engineers could get decent jobs in cities. I could still read novels as much as I wanted in my free time, just like my father did.

Jokes and stories aside, I sense that my father had somehow shared that night what he really thought about socialism and the future and our place in both.

Nor did it matter that I didnt believe in the Romanian Communist Party anymore. I had of course joined all of the Party-run organizations for school children: the Fatherland Hawks (preschool and first grade), the Pioneers (second through eighth grade), the Union of Communist Youth (in high school). Schools organized the initiation ceremonies, and everyone played along. But joining the Party was different. You had to apply, get character references, and if accepted it was an honor and a smart career move. But if the Party was so great, why did we have all the blackouts? No heat in winter? Why was food rationed? Why were all the television shows, newspapers, and radio broadcasts about Ceauescu, the genius of the Carpathians? And why did everybody lie all the time and pretend everything was normal? I could foresee an added layer of boredom and lies caked on the already existing, rather thick ones covering everything I did: that I actually wanted to be an engineer, that I cared about math, that I was my parents dutiful daughter. There was a meager joy in all this, knowing what my father wanted and that I could please him. I could make a career as an engineer and a Party member, I thought. The Party and the lies were never going to end. They would go on in perpetuity, dulling every moment of joy for the rest of my life.

Within a year, though, and before I even graduated high school, the Romanian Communist Party didnt exist anymore. Six years later, when I was about to graduate college (I ended up studying languages after all), my fathers heart finally gave up. Now, after almost three decades, on a different continent where I went to make a new life, I dont know why I remember that particular evening. It could be that, after all, I didnt spend that much time with my father during those years. Or possibly, jokes and stories aside, I sense that he had somehow shared that night what he really thought about socialism and the future and our place in both. At that moment, as the limestone statues reflected the dying light of the day, it seemed like my father, whom I trusted to make decisions for meand Romanian socialism itself, which I associated with blackouts, cold, and lieswould last forever, unchanged.

Arad, Romania, July 2016

Its a windy day, and the blue paint theyre spraying in the street blows in all directions.

Theyre wasting the paint, Sean, my husband, says.

Continued here:
Walks in the Park: On the Foreignness of the Socialist Past - Boston Review