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Eastern European girls, even the most unprepossessing of them, are welcomed by western men with open arms. So every way you looked at it, she just had to go. Marina was particularly staggered to discover that a Yale University study had concluded that the three most important signs of a well-adjusted child-the adoption of a socially acceptable approach to gender roles, success in school, and moral development-correlate directly with the presence or absence of a father. Could the male's moral infantilism, she wondered, be the result of their having grown up in broken homes? Since Eastern European girls are at the epicenter of the family, their existence, unlike that of men's, will always have meaning no matter what disaster may befall. But unemployment compounded with divorce is for an Eastern European man the last straw, an utter catastrophe, one might say. Marina didn't want any catastrophes.
Once in the US, she threw herself into her work. The equipment was a pleasure to work with and the salary was very nice too, especially by Eastern European girls standards. But the best was that she did not feel like an out-of-place old maid. No one seemed to pay any attention to her age or marital status or, for that matter, to lots of other things, like the color of one colleague's skin or another's evident handicap. No one acted horrified, heaved a bitter sigh and asked how she could still be alone, or offered to set her up with "a real catch." All that counted was professionalism and knowledge and self.
After a while, Marina fell in love. He was clever, tall, good looking, blue-eyed-the very image of a real American-and she was afraid to approach him. She just gazed at him from afar. But eventually this American found her and now Marina's story is a family's story, just as with many other Eastern European girls who travel abroad to meet western men.
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