I won the parent lottery

So, I finally began reading The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and after I read the chapter, "I won the parent lottery," I can't seem to get the phrase out of my head. Randy's story is truly inspiring as are hundreds of cancer stories. He had a mass audience. Each of us does, if we want to be heard. I truly believe that I won the parent lottery. Yes, I've fought with my parents. Yes, I've had the adolescent stage where I wished they would get divorced. Yes, I wouldn't trade them for anyone in the world. My parents invested their life into me (and my sister and nephews), but primarily me. I hope that I have the strength and courage to give my kids at least half of what my parents gave me. My mom and dad are very different, have a very different approach and both love me infinitely. My mom was the artsy one. She took me to the theater and to the ballet. She took me to Bulgaria on my 5th Birthday and to Moscow before I started school. She read me a bazillion stories and kept a diary of my perls of wisdom. My dad was the athletic and mathematic one. I knew the entire multiplication table before I started school. I played badminton and walked for miles "zagorod" [upstate] to pick berries and flowers. Hence, my love of walking and perhaps my profession, although, I enjoy reading a lot more than doing tax returns. But, I did minor in English.

Anyway, those are the little things. And right now they are incoherent, but I'll keep writing. Every day on the way home from school or on the way to Grandma's my parents would recite a new poem. By the time we were on the way back (or closer to home), I was retelling it. My parents invested all their time and energy into me. I was never too young or unimportant. My opinion always mattered, whether to buy flour in Minsk, to wear gold earrings while passing customs while immigrating to the states or buying an apartment which I'm now again sharing with my dad.

It always amazed me, but lately it's become a lot more evident for some reason how I remember a LOT more things from my childhood than most of my friends that immigrated around the same time and around the same age. I remember the streets, the way to school, to grandma's, to home (I have never been back). I remember my friends, my teacher, my doctor. I remember a ton of detail. I remember my grandpa. I remember my feelings.

Now that my mom is gone, I notice doing certain things that I was never taught, but I realize that those are things that she instilled me and they are inherent. My dad and I folded the duvet cover today. I didn't have to say anything, I just gave him the other end and we pulled in opposite directions. I remember when my parents used to do that when I was small and I would run underneath with bouts of laughter. I remember seeing my dad on TV and coming to his office. I remember him making me photocopies of a book his co-worker gave me as a souvenir. In 1980's Ukraine, that was a BIG deal. I remember visiting my mom's small library while "Дом учёных" was undergoing renovations. I made Borsch and Golubtsi last week, to taste, without a recipe. I did well in school without ever feeling pressured to. I wasn't "supposed to be" anything, despite my dad's big dreams of having a doctor in the family.

As usual, I notice that I'm rambling. Perhaps, I'll make this entry more concise when I focus, but I could write volumes about how the only thing I ever won in life is the parent lottery. I wish my mom had better luck in the longevity lottery, but she left a huge imprint on many people and the world.