Leap Year Language

Superstitious Russians — 99 percent of my acquaintances — believe that any високосный год (leap year) is an unlucky year. I scoffed until 2020. Pandemic, quarantine, economic woes, wars, civic unrest, death of democracy (pick a country), deaths of beloved cultural icons… the list is apparently endless. No one is happy, everyone is worried, and some people are really struggling to keep body and soul together.

In the old days — seven months ago — when you asked someone how they were, you’d get a range of responses, from the candid Честно? Хреново! (To be honest? Crappy!), through the middle ground of не очень (not so good) or так себе (meh), right up to не могу жаловаться (can’t complain). True, rarely do people declare that everything is great, but that’s probably due to superstition: чтоб не сглазить (to keep from jinxing it).

Now you don’t even ask Как вы? (How are you?) First you ask: Как семья? Все здоровы? (How’s your family? Is everyone healthy?) And then, if all is well on the health front, you can ask about everything else. 

Now even a good answer is cautious and jinx-proof. Держимся.  (We’re hanging in there.) Пока – ничего. (For now – okay.) Справлюсь. (I’ll manage.) По сравнению с другими, грех жаловаться. (Compared to how others are doing, it would be a sin to complain.)

You might hear the response: Вашими молитвами!  (literally, with your prayers). Some people maintain that this old way of thanking someone for praying for their health and salvation can still mean that, but most people say it’s rather jocular and just means, “Not bad, thanks for asking.”

And then we descend into confessions of deep unhappiness. In Russian, the center of sorrow is the heart or soul. Как живёшь? (How are you doing?), you ask a friend. Душа болит! (Such heartache!). Or they might say У меня камень на душе or на сердце (literally there’s a stone on my soul or heart). In English we generally say, “my heart is heavy.” You can also say that in Russian — с тяжёлым сердцем (with a heavy heart) — but this expression is usually said when someone has to do something that they don’t want to do or that is deeply painful. We’d probably translate it a bit differently in English. С тяжёлым сердцем пошла выяснить как моя тётя, которая попала в больницу с ковидом. (With my heart in my throat, I went to find out how my aunt was after she was put in the hospital with COVID.) 

You might even hear the vivid сердце кровью обливается (my heart bleeds): Смотрю новости о лесных пожарах, думаю о жителях и сердце кровью обливается (I watch the news about the forest fires, and my heart really goes out to the people who live there).

Emotional misery can manifest as physical discomfort. Пандемия началась, жизнь перевернулась, и с тех пор я сама на своя (The pandemic began, life turned upside down, and since then I’ve been beside myself). Иногда эти скорби бывают очень странные, у человека всё, кажется, в порядке, а покоя нет, ему скучно, ему грустно, он не находит себе места (Sometimes grief is expressed strangely — it looks like person is all right, but he’s restless, he’s bored, he’s sad, he doesn’t know what to do with himself).

People are at the breaking point. Ничего нельзя с этим поделать, хоть плачь (You can cry all you want, but nothing will change things).

The only bright light on the horizon? 31 декабря этот проклятый високосный год закончится (On December 31 this cursed leap year will come to an end.