Living My Life - Emma Goldman [36]
My mind was made up. I would go to New York, to Johann Most. He would help me prepare myself for my new task. But my husband, my parents—how would they meet my decision?
I had been married only ten months. The union had not been happy. I had realized almost from the beginning that my husband and I were at opposite poles, with nothing in common, not even sexual blending. The venture, like everything else that had happened to me since I had come to America, had proved most disappointing. America, “the land of the free and the home of the brave”—what a farce it now seemed to me! Yet how I had fought with my father to get him to let me go to America with Helena! In the end I had won, and late in December 1885, Helena and I had left St. Petersburg for Hamburg, there embarking on the steamer Elbe for the Promised Land.
[...] I left without regrets. Since my earliest recollection, home had been stifling, my father’s presence terrifying. My mother, while less violent with the children, never showed much warmth. It was always Helena who gave me affection, who filled my childhood with whatever joy it had. She would continually shoulder the blame for the rest of the children. Many blows intended for my brother and me were given Helena. Now we were completely together—nobody would separate us.
[ . . . ] The last day of our journey comes vividly to my mind. Everybody was on deck. Helena and I stood pressed to each other, enraptured by the sight of the harbour and the Statue of Liberty suddenly emerging from the mist. Ah, there she was, the symbol of hope, of freedom, of opportunity! She held her torch high to light the way to the free country, the asylum for the oppressed of all lands. We, too, Helena and I, would find a place in the generous heart of America. Our spirits were high, our eyes filled with tears.
[ . . . ] We had heard that Rochester was the “Flower City” of New York, but we arrived there on a bleak and cold January morning. My sister Lena, heavy with her first child, and Aunt Rachel met us.4 Lena’s rooms were small, but they were bright and spotless. The room prepared for Helena and myself was filled with flowers. Throughout the day people came in and out—relatives I had never known, friends of my sister and of her husband, neighbours. All wanted to see us, to hear about the old country. They were Jews who had suffered much in Russia; some of them had even been in pogroms. Life in the new country, they said, was hard; they were all still possessed by nostalgia for their home that had never been a home.
[ ... ] One coarse-looking fellow concentrated his attention on me. He kept staring at me all the evening, scanning me up and down. He even came over and tried to feel my arms. It gave me the sensation of standing naked on the market-place. I was outraged, but I did not want to insult my sister’s friends. I felt utterly alone and I rushed out of the room. A longing possessed me for what I had left behind—St. Petersburg, my beloved Neva, my friends, my books and music. I became aware of loud voices in the next room. I heard the man who had enraged me say: “I can get her a job at Garson and Mayer’s. The wages will be small, but she will soon find a feller to marry her. Such a buxom girl, with her red cheeks and blue eyes, will not have to work long. Any man will snatch her up and keep her in silks and diamonds.” I thought of Father. He had tried desperately to marry me off at the age of fifteen.