Ludvipol: A Modern Shtetl
A Happy Childhood
My father once went to Rovno and bought me and my sister Chava real metal skates. We were the envy of the town. Only a few other well-to-do kids had metal skates. Some even had rounded blades on their skates, which worked better when there was snow on the ice. The skates came with metal plates for the shoemaker to nail to our shoes to attach them securely to the skates. To attach a metal skate to a shoe, they drilled a hole in the heel of the shoe and attached a metal plate with a diamond-shaped hole in the center. On the skate was a diamond-shaped knob that locked into the hole in the plate. Two brackets on the sides of the skate held the shoe in place. You loosened and tightened the brackets, opening them to put your shoe in and then tightening them with a wrench. A strap went across your foot for additional stability. We did not have team sports on the ice — our play was not that sophisticated — but I was already almost twelve years old, so I used to hold hands with a girl and skate in pairs. This was the be- ginning of adolescent romance. One time, I was wearing my metal skates and saw one of my uncles, Alter Tiktin, come along on his fancy big sleigh. I grabbed hold of the edge of my uncle’s sleigh hoping to be pulled along for a ride, as children often did when a farmer came into town on a sleigh. The farmers did not like this at all. My uncle’s driver, not recognizing me, tried to get me to let go, but I hung on. When he used his whip on me, it somehow wrapped itself around my neck. I was not badly hurt, but afterwards I sported a big welt. It was customary for every household to have a garden. We had a big piece of land with a vegetable garden. The soil was dark and rich even without fertilizer. The garden was divided into sections separated by walkways. There was a big section for beans, and oth- ers for radishes, scallions, tomatoes, cucumbers, and carrots. We also had beets, string beans, cabbages, peas, and pumpkins, which we grew for the seeds. We grew a kind of squash that was twelve to eighteen inches long, from which we made pancakes on Sundays. We also grew herbs, including dill and parsley for soups.
43
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online