So… where was I…?
Seriously, for some of you who are new since I dropped out of site.. I used to be a “regular” on here, and then went strangely silent. Those of you who like exposition and background … I posted a trip report back in April. I’m not sure, but I think it still has the dubious distinction of being one of the longest trip reports ever. What can I say… I’m loquacious…
Anyway, I am by no means a veteran. I have been to St. Petersburg. I have written many women. I have placed a couple of personal ads. I have not found a wife. This was, to some degree, my decision. The lady I met in St. Petersburg certainly would have come over if I had asked her….
But, let me pick up where I left off – many months ago…
Maria and I met and spent several days together in St. Petersburg. I threw the trip together last minute. (Against Jack’s advice. BTW, I am one of the many guys on here who have received help from Jack… I paid him for some of it, but he helps you much beyond what you pay for. He does seem genuinely interested in “matchmaking”… not fee collecting…)
The reason I went was basically to decide if the prize were really worth the effort. I mean, lets face it, the photos look great, and you will hear all sorts of things… but if you are a thinking reasoning human being… you have to have doubts.
I know I did.
And I decided that the only way I could know for sure was simply to go over and meet some Russian women for myself. I was NOT expecting to fall in love, or get married from my first trip. I just wanted to see if it made sense to pursue it…
So, with my schedule freeing up, and LOT airlines offering a $400 special to St. Petersburg… off I went. Prior to going Jack got an ad placed for me in St. Petersburg. It yielded a couple of interesting contacts. I also purchased a few addresses, and Jack set me up with a local agency in St. Petersburg.
And… in the midst of all of this… I “met” with Maria.
Our email’s started innocently enough – she told me she was writing to me simply to correspond, but not because she was interested in an American husband. Over time, the emails changed, and before we knew it, we were on a romantic collision course.
After a few days (and, yes a couple of nights) together we parted. We were both very unsure of what the next step was. There still seemed to be a lot of things keeping us apart – mutual attraction notwithstanding.
I also want to add – now that I have some distance and perspective – that there is a certain romanticism about all of this that is overwhelming. On both of our parts. I mean, I was in a completely different world. Not only did I not speak the language, I didn’t even know the alphabet. She was my one link to this world. She was young, and pretty, and very interested. Coming out of a divorce… that was a powerful combination.
For her part – here was an American who had traveled seven thousand miles to meet her. How can she not feel like a fairy tale princess? And she goes out to eat at nice restaurants… she is taking taxis, instead of walking like she normally does. She watches a movie with him on a portable DVD player… so many things swirl around, and it is easy to idealize the one another, and get caught up in the moment.
I know there has been much discussion on whether you should expect sex when going to visit your FSU girlfriend. I would say that A) a true gentleman never expects sex – no matter what continent he is on. And B) Unless you don’t hit it off at all, forces are at work that are very powerful… Be careful. It is easy to get swept up in it all.
Anyway, ultimately, I went home. We promised to keep in touch. And we did, until eventually, we decided to end it.
Why? What happened?
I’m not sure that anything “happened.” We were very different. The age gap was larger than I even knew. (She lied and told me she was 25 – my absolute bottom… when in fact she was 23). There was a bit of communication problem. But, more than that, there was a rather large cultural one.
I know that every woman is different. But, Maria had a lot of what I call “Russian Pride.” The fact is that she was very much thinking about leaving Russia and starting over somewhere else… but she could not admit this to me. She actually admitted it to me in an email after we had “broken up.”
Yes, she loved her family and her friends. But she knew that Russia did not offer her the opportunity that America did. And she did her utmost best to keep from admitting this to me. (And also to herself.) In fact, she would seemingly take every opportunity to point out to me about how my culture was so motivated by money.
The problem, of course, is that she was not completely wrong in her assessment. And, I am often times troubled by a materialistic society. But American are more than just money and things. As I tried to explain to her once – 189 men didn’t lay down their lives at the Alamo so they could make more money…Life in America – at its best – embodies much much more. And I think the tragedy of September 11 illustrated that point very well.
But she spent so much time trying to convince me that Russia was so wonderful, that I viewed it as a real reluctance on her part to leave. I certainly was not about to force someone to leave their home. It kept me from engaging deeper in our relationship. Had she been more honest with me at the beginning… who knows? But I always felt that she really didn’t want to leave. (Even though, as it turns out, this was not the case…)
But… there were other things.
Let me tell about one, since it was the proverbial straw on the camel’s back.
If anyone goes to Jack’s website and looks at my ad (you have to go to the Russian page) you will see a picture of me with my german shepherd. I adored that dog. He was with me through my divorce – sometimes, it felt like he was the last truly good thing in my life. Those of you who are not dog lover’s can’t know what that dog meant to me – and those of you who are don’t need me to explain. But, he truly was my best friend.
Six months after I got back from Russia, he got tragically ill. He was in prime health one day, and within 24 hours he was fighting for his life. (He was only three years old). No one knew what the cause of it was.
I spared no expense. I had him at a 24 hour pet hospital here. It was costing me about $600 a day– not counting all of the tests that we were running.
Of course, in veterinarian medicine, it sometimes comes down to cost. As much as I was crazy about that dog, I couldn’t bankrupt myself to save him. After days of costs, and spending thousands of dollars, I had to finally face the fact that nothing we were doing was getting him better, and he was still paralyzed, and would be for life… even if he managed to somehow survive. So, I had to make the decision to put him to sleep.
It was a very large moment in my life. One I needed to share with someone. I didn’t have a girlfriend, or wife, here – I had one in Russia.
And as I poured out my heart to her about it, her response was something like: “Only in America could a pet’s life be measured in terms of dollars. Here, I would not put him to sleep. I would take him home and take care of him myself until he was better.”
She just didn’t understand. And nothing I could tell her could make her understand. The truth was that Rook (my dog) as receiving better care here than many humans do in Russia. Everything that could be done was being done. In Russia, he would have been dead on the second day. She just didn’t get it.
And more than that, I didn’t need to be challenged – again – about America’s materialism. I needed someone who could understand and share my grief.
So, as that all ended – rather badly. I started thinking…
The problem was that I had written with several women. Maria was the only one who came even *close* to being someone I could communicate with.
And I started thinking: if she were the best… and we were still so far apart… what hope is there I finding a Russian Wife I can share my American life with?
So, I more or less gave up the quest.
And now… you’ll note, that I am sort of back.
So, what happened?
Well, more time passed… I was involved with two more American women. My luck with American Women has been somewhat better, I think, than many men here. The one woman I dated was 30 something and gorgeous. She was actually a part-time model, a Phd student, and a licensed physical therapist. I am not making this up. She also spoke three languages (her family was from Argentina…) But, ultimately, I broke it off. Why? Because she has a kid. An adorable little girl… and the problem is that in order to pursue a lasting relationship with my girlfriend, it meant that I was ultimately going to have to take a little girl away from her father. (She didn’t live near me…) Being a father to a little girl myself, and having fought very hard to have custody of my daughter, I couldn’t bring myself to take another man’s daughter away from him.
And, although this is an extreme case, it does symbolize the problem. There seems to be three categories of women I meet here… 1) The woman who is bitter, and unattractive 2) the woman who is young and attractive – and wanting men 15 years my junior or 3) the attractive women – who have had their lives interrupted, and who have issues that have to be somehow reconciled.
That’s OK.. and there are some wonderful women in category three... But I do wonder wistfully if somehow there were a woman out there who was young enough, attractive enough, and who was not burdened by life’s disappointments enough, that we could “start over” together, and start a life together – not finish someone else’s life – but start a new life together…
I don’t know the answer to that. But, I thought that the FSU deserved another look. After all, if I look at my dating life here, I dated about 8 or 9 women seriously before I got married. I have dated one Russian girl. Will it be eight more before I find my next wife? Who knows. But I need to give Russia more than one look, I think.
So, I am starting to plan my next trip. I am planning for spring this time. As interesting things happen, I’ll still post. You can all rest assured that I will not be able to resist posting another mini-novel trip report when I do finally go.
But, as for the day to day stuff… I don’t have much to say. I’ve fought my troll battles. I’ve discussed the age old issues of sex, age differences, and scammer alerts. I have nothing more to add. Honestly, there is so much stuff I the archives, I wonder why the issues still need to be debated at all…
Anyway, for those of you who have been kind enough to write and ask what happened… I wanted to tell you. For those of you who don’t care what in the world did you read this for then?
For now, I will lurk usually and post occasionally.
Good luck to you all,
MarkInTx
