Member-only story
I have been sponsoring a young (in their 20s) Ukrainian couple.
They arrived in the U.S., after a lengthy trip from Kyiv, in which they took buses, trains, and airplanes, on September 19, 2023.
In Ukraine he was a software programmer in Ukraine. She designed websites.
They communicate regularly with family in Ukraine. I see unfiltered videos of incoming missiles and bombs. All I can do is commiserate and be glad I am helping keep them from direct harm themselves.
News helicopters fly overhead on occasion.
I hear them but don’t even look up.
To me they are part of life.
To them they are part of life, too.
But in a different way.
When they hear a chopper, their instinct is to cower and quickly seek shelter somewhere lest a bomb or missile fall near or on them.
This reaction was foreign to me but I understood why they reacted this way.
With time, I hope they have learned to relax a bit when a news helicopter flies overhead.
But maybe not.
That instinct may remain with them forever.
It may be a small but forever scar from what’s happened to their country.
