Galina Shkolnikova with her aunt Rakhil Farber

This is me (on the right) with my aunt Rakhil Farber. The picture was taken in Moscow, where she lives with her daughter and grandson in Khamovniki near Lev Tolstoy's manor. I visited them when my husband died because I had to distract myself from my grief. My husband, Alexander Shkolnikov, worked a lot, even after he was diagnosed with an incurable illness in 1991. He only stopped working in 1999, when he was confined to bed. He died in 2000, to my enormous grief. He was buried in the Jewish cemetery and rests in the same grave as his father. After his death I was in a very bad condition, and only a trip to my Aunt Rakhil and cousin Eleonora in Moscow and their sympathy softened my anguish a little. Afterwards I was able to carry on. My children are already grown-ups and have families of their own. My husband liked to joke that our children corrected our mistake: we got married late, they got married early, at the age of 19. Now they live separately from me. I live alone in our old apartment.