The Ghost of My Ukrainian Mother

She reached out in the tiniest way, and I’m choosing to see a coincidence as a sign of solidarity

Today, on the third anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine, I’m re-sharing this essay I wrote when it first began. Every word is still true but I wanted to add one small addendum. Over the weekend I was in the Caribbean with my husband celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary. We went snorkeling (something I rarely do - I’m not a strong swimmer) and it was beautiful. When I jumped off the boat and put my face in the water, the very first fish I spotted was colored with a bright blue stripe at the top and a bright yellow stripe below, just like the Ukrainian flag. Coincidence? Probably…..

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February, 2022

A few years ago I lost my beloved uncle, my mother’s younger brother. He was one of the only family members who showed an interest in my accomplishments and made me laugh. He had a big personality and a sarcastic wit. He made family gatherings fun and light-hearted, two things that were in short supply in my family of origin.

Shortly after returning home from his funeral, I answered the front door of my home to find our new neighbors on the porch, visiting to introduce themselves. As we chatted, a bright red cardinal landed at the top of a tree in my front yard. The sun was hitting the bird in such a way that I had to point it out, the color of its feathers brilliant against the blue of the summer sky.

My neighbor commented that I was being visited by a loved one, someone I had recently lost. She told me that when a cardinal appears, a deceased loved one wants you to know that they are watching over you, that you are not alone. The poet Victoria McGovern said, “Cardinals appear when angels are near.” I had never heard this superstition before and told my neighbor about my recently departed uncle. She assured me that the bird was a sign from him and had obviously appeared at the exact moment that I opened the door for a reason. My uncle was near.

I was touched by this tiny moment and have recalled it often, smiling whenever I see a cardinal at our bird feeder, but I dismissed any deeper meaning. I don’t believe in ghosts or signs from the afterlife. I don’t know what happens to us after we die, but I’m fairly certain we don’t send birds into the yards of our loved ones.

I think of other ways grieving people note a strange coincidence and attach it to some other-worldly significance. People believe in angel numbers (11:11) and make note of things that occur at these magical times. Others are moved when the car radio is switched on at just the right moment and the favorite song of a lost beloved begins to play.

Many people believe that a hummingbird hovering before them, or a butterfly landing on them, is a sign from beyond the grave. I have a friend whose sister believes that their late father Gary is near when she finds a dime lying on the ground, shining up at her from an unusual spot. I once saw a dime on the floor of a fitting room while I was undressing. I took a photo and sent it to my friend, asking him to tell Gary to stop spying on me. Gary always had a thing for blondes.

I suppose it is logical to latch on to these ideas in an attempt to feel connected to the people we have loved and lost. It’s comforting and hopeful and inserts a little magic and mystery into the otherwise cold, lonely, and painful landscape of grief.

I lost my 90 year old mother a few months ago. I’ve been searching for cardinals and dimes throughout the winter, but my mom hasn’t reached out to me. She was always kind of stubborn like that.

She was also something that is suddenly very interesting to many people: she was Ukrainian. My parents emigrated to the United States after World War II. They became American citizens and lived and died here in the U.S., but they always considered Ukraine to be their home.

I was raised in a Ukrainian household where the Ukrainian language was spoken; music, art, poetry, food, books — everything was Ukrainian. I attended Ukrainian religious and cultural school every Friday night until I graduated high school and danced in a traditional ensemble, resplendent in red boots and flower crowns. When my mother and I saw the Ukrainian flag raised and our national anthem played at the first Olympics after independence, we sat silently watching the television together, awestruck.

News of the Russian invasion of Ukraine has impacted me in ways I wouldn’t have imagined. I am not connected to any family in Ukraine, if they are still living, but I have found myself near tears with regularity — heartbroken, terrified, and furious. The senseless, unprovoked aggression of the Russian government against an independent Ukraine is unbelievable. And yet, here we are.

I’ve been asked repeatedly how I feel about everything, how my mother might have felt. I certainly can’t speak for her now that she’s gone, but I imagine that she’d be as heartbroken and angry as I am. Then again, she might have also expressed a bit of shoulder-shrugging fatalism. It was really hard to shock a woman who had survived forced famine, World War II, and a refugee camp. She had seen so much suffering and cruelty in her life, perhaps she wouldn’t have been very surprised at all.

As I have pondered this question over the last few weeks, she finally reached out in the tiniest way.

My mother lived in the home where I was raised, an apartment on the second floor of a duplex, until her final days. She had tenants on the first floor who moved out last month. As they cleared out their apartment and handed over the keys, they told me that on the night of the invasion of Ukraine, they heard a loud noise, a creak, coming from my mother’s empty apartment upstairs around 4 a.m. The room where my mother slept was directly above the tenants’ bedroom.

Was it my mother pacing the room, angered by what she knew to be happening in her homeland as bombs dropped on Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Lviv? Or was it the 100+ year old house settling and beginning to crumble, as logical minds might suggest. It’s worth noting that Hitler started bombing Kyiv at 4:30 a.m. in the summer of 1941. Putin bombed Kyiv at the same time on February 24, 2022.

Around 4 a.m.

I’m aware that 4 a.m. in Ukraine is not 4 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. I totally understand that it is just a coincidence — nothing more. But if the cardinal tells me my uncle is thinking of me, and the dime suggests that Gary is still being a flirt, then the 4 a.m. “creak” is my Ukrainian mother telling me that she’s heartbroken and angry, too. Until I see a hummingbird hover at my kitchen window, or a cardinal sits on a branch in my yard, or a blue and yellow butterfly lands on my shoulder, I’ll take this as a sign of solidarity and know that my mother is with me.