A Much Better Life

A Much Better Life

Inspirational Stories about Love, Family, Corporate and Personal Lives

Roman Litovsky

Illustrated by Art of

Alexander Litovsky

Copyright © 2024 by Roman Litovsky

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

First Edition.

ISBN - 979-8-218-45193-6

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Contents

Preface

1. My Girlfriend

2. Invention Journey

3. To Biz or Not to Biz

4. Clarus

5. The Evolution

6. Life is Good

7. Divertimento

8. Safety Net

9. Attitude

10. It is My Business!

11. The Year After

12. Consulting

13. EMCTD

14. Nirvana

15. Bud's Jam

16. Khalyava and Carrot

Epilogue

About the Author

About the Artist

Illustrations List

This book I dedicate to my children and grandchildren.

Preface

A few years before I left my full-time job, I was asked to make a stage presentation for our corporation’s employees. The topic was The Invention Journey, where I talked about my experience as an engineer and inventor working for a corporation and trying to change its course by inventing, prototyping, and marketing new ideas. Some of my stories greatly interested a much broader audience, so I included them in this book. But my life was much more interesting because, throughout my productive life, I have been running my home business, which was a consulting business at first. Then, I converted it into a corporation, inventing, designing, and manufacturing real engineering products.

The symbiosis of my two activities and the inevitable friction between them initiated by the corporate machine resulted in many instructive lessons that made me more competent, educated, and resilient to all disruptive life perils.

Life is not only about work, even if this work represents the ultimate fun. I wrote here about my family: my wife, Larisa, and our two sons, Konstantin and Alexander. Here, you can glimpse how I managed to intertwine my personal and business lives into something I call a much better life. My ultimate message to my readers is to do something similar for themselves and become much happier campers!

The last but not least reason I wrote this book was to show a wide audience of readers the art of our talented son, Alexander (Sasha) Litovsky (1984-2020), who left us his The Magic World of Imagination. Enjoy!

Roman Litovsky.

Sarasota, 2024.

1

My Girlfriend

Apopular behavior is to look back on your life and say: It was that accidental event that influenced all my life thereafter. But think for a moment: if that single event affected your life, and you had many similar events having a significant impact on your life, too, then you lived an unpredictable life that was totally out of your control. Is that what you wanted to happen? Where were your education, experience, and common sense at a minimum?! The answer to all these questions is on the surface: despite all the external influences, we still get where we want to be, or, at least, where we belong, based on our physical, intellectual, and moral qualities. A decent and honest person doesn't cheat, not because he never had an opportunity to do so, but because he selects the right path in every situation.

In contrast, a crooked person without moral principles would do bad things, no matter how serene and sterile his environment is. Therefore, when the chance does throw in front of us many seemingly random events, our choice, in most cases, is predictable. The variety of these events, in their diversity and richness, makes our lives exciting and full. It gives us a unique opportunity to discover ourselves and find those exceptional people we want to be with. There is nothing to be afraid of - it is a part of the journey called - life.

So, the next time you lose the keys, get late on your flight, or have to change the itinerary, meet new people in an unexpected place, make friends, and eventually - start a new life because of this chain of events - enjoy it! But remember that at every fork in your path, the decision for the next move and the responsibility for the consequences - were yours. Even though life threw a bunch of roadblocks, slippery roads, and random nuisances your way, your mind, instincts, and intuition led you through this maze. And the final result would be exactly what you deserved. Don't blame anyone and take it for granted. You always had a choice! That is how I look back at my most important action in life - finding a woman to spend my life with.

One of my mother's friends was Genia, a petite woman, about the same age as my mom, with black hair and a somewhat foxy face, having no husband or children. She has lived in the apartment with her two elder sisters, a classic three sisters plot. We used to visit them once in a while when I was a kid, but I still kept friendly relations after my mom died in 1970. One day, my aunt Rosa said, Why don't you come with me to Genia tonight? She invited us for supper. I agreed and showed up in their apartment at night after work. As expected, the supper was boring, and the age difference between me and the elderly people around precluded practically all meaningful conversation.

But there was a planned surprise for me - why I was invited to this social event. Among the guests was one of Genia's acquaintances, Fanya, who was also, like my mom, a doctor and had a daughter. Her daughter was about my age but one year younger. She was a student of the far away Pedagogical College in Daugavpils, Latvia, because in Ukraine, in antisemitic Kyiv, the colleges educating the future teachers did not accept Jewish students. She has been living in Daugavpils during her freshman year but has already transferred to a mail-in division to live at home. This allowed her to work as a secretary in the office at a local plant and support herself. That night, she was about to come, and the main reason she did - was me. She knew about that, while I did not. I would have no problem with an arranged meeting between a boy and a girl; annoying was the fact that I was not informed upfront. Fanya was very eager for her daughter to meet someone suitable for her and was afraid that this meeting may fall through for whatever reason.

Very soon, her daughter showed up: an adorable Jewish girl with brown hair and hazel eyes that she tried to hide away from everyone, avoiding direct eye contact. We both immediately felt some attraction to each other and, at the same time, were ill at ease, maybe, of the awkwardness of the situation and the presence of all the other people in that room where we both didn't belong. Imagine when someone comes into the room, and it gets filled with the light of joy, energy, and happiness. Here, it was just the opposite - the girl was radiating sadness, unhappiness, and insecurity, trying to hide it by pretending to be independent and in control. I immediately felt that she was in great need of somebody she could love and who could love and take care of her in return, and, believe me, or not, at that moment, I had no doubts that I could make it happen. As a physicist, I can say that our first meeting showed a resonance between us - we were on the same wavelength and looked at each other as the right fit. We talked briefly that night and agreed to meet the next day.

The history of previous relations in our lives was as follows: she had never been in a relationship before and felt very sad about it. At some point, there was one young guy who she liked - a friend of her older brother. But, sadly enough, they were not destined for each other - when returning from military duty service, his airplane got into a crash, killing all the passengers inside... As for me, my high school love relationship ended with sorrow and great relief at the same time, and I was looking around to find a girlfriend.

My aunt Rosa realized what was happening in the room and felt betrayed. She had her ideas about who should be the right girl for me, and this one she didn't consider acceptable. Well, whatever her reasons, I couldn't have cared less about it: it was my life, and I filtered all advice from my relatives and friends through my senses of right and wrong.

We started seeing each other, walking in the parks, and watching movies. I introduced her to the circle of my college friends with whom we still met regularly, having various cultural events that we arranged on top of ordinary birthday-type table gatherings. But most of the time, we spent together in the apartment where she lived with her mother and grandmother. She had her small separate room where we could be alone and enjoy the presence of each other... well, to the degree of freedom we had in the place with other family members.

I felt that I was in love with this girl. Our understanding that we both wanted to be with each other grew more profound. We thought we had a chance to make a family and live together. It looked like my girl was in love with me too, and more - she had absolute trust in all I could do for both of us. This empowered me and gave me deep satisfaction, but at the same time, I knew that from now on, I would be fully responsible for her, and every move or decision I make should be made with her benefit in mind.

Times change, as do people's morale and attitude toward many things, especially in relations between men and women. When we were growing up, sex before marriage was considered acceptable when there was a feeling of deep love and both partners truly believed that they would be together. I've heard that among girls of high school age, the loss of virginity at school was perceived as an indication of the girl's attractiveness and the basis of some pride status among her peers. But among good girls, especially from Jewish families, there was just the opposite trend: these girls brought up in a middle-class traditional family were not in a rush to start an adult life. They were saving their love for the future, were waiting for their Prince Charming, and wanted nothing less. I also had a rather conservative view - I thought that the first sex is the most incredible event in someone's life, and it deserves to be done after the wedding when it can be done appropriately, celebrated, and memorable.

Looking back, I must acknowledge my naive delusion - excellent sex life is an ongoing process, and it can bring joy and happiness for as long as love exists. The first one is never perfect because of the inexperience of partners and the associated female pain of a torn hymen. My girl, contrary to all of the above, had no constraints, and she would do whatever I decided and was confident that it would be right. Also, that was the straight road to family and kids - all she eagerly wanted and mentally was ready for.

Now you would understand why we didn't have sex in her apartment; we just caressed each other to exhaustion until she got wet, hot, and languished, while I often got my orgasm while being fully dressed... I thought that I was doing the right thing, but now I realize with some sorrow that it may have been torture for my girl that probably made some negative imprint on our sex life in the future.

One day, we walked in the botanical garden - a large park with winding allies, dark green trees, and occasional fall flowers with almost no other visitors around. By impulse of passion, we lay right on the grass under our feet, my hand unzipped her pants, and dived into a warm and wet paradise garden. This time, she had no restraints; her body was shaking with convulsions as she reached her intense and satisfying orgasm - the first one, finally instigated by me. I was lying on her (we both had our winter jackets on) and was shaking, catching up with her.

Interestingly enough, either because of our upbringing or because of the unwritten moral code of the society where we lived, we never talked about sex or any related issues. That sounds strange and was probably bad - because we still had a long way to go about our sexuality and each other, and some instructive and inspiring discussion with the Kamasutra book in hand could have been constructive. Well, these books were primarily unavailable to us at that time.

The second memorable love encounter was when, one night, we decided to come to my apartment. I shared it with my dad then, but he had been living with his wife at her place, so I was alone. It took us about forty minutes on a trolley bus to get there. In the end, we were passing by the pharmacy, but because I was a shy person, I didn't dare to tell my girl, Let's step out for a moment to buy condoms. I thought that would be too pushing. Still, instead, it happened to be plain stupid as I realized half an hour later, when we were lying naked in my bed, I was on the back and my girl - on the top of me, trying to rub her genitals against my member, while I was trying to move her up, away from it, even though most of all at this moment I wanted to penetrate her and give to both of us the most beautiful pleasure while seeing her closed eyes and hearing the sobbing from her mouse...

Because she studied in Latvia, we decided to spend a short vacation in Riga. Riga is a lovely, old-fashioned city with distinct architecture, narrow streets pointed Gothic cathedrals, and numerous monuments from the past. We spent the whole day walking and looking around and then - found someplace to eat - something, between the restaurant and public kitchen, the main dish of which were the famous sausages, nothing special from today's perspective, but yummy and exciting when we had them in 1976.

We checked into a hotel, and an attendant asked for our passport ID. When she noticed our different last names, she asked if we were married. I said, No, but very soon we may be. The attendant found Solomon's solution for the hotel regulations - she gave a double bedroom for my girl and a bed in the common room for me, knowing perfectly that we would be in her room together. That night, my girl was able to get the most exciting orgasm I have ever seen her have... she was pleased - after many years of solitude, she finally felt like having a boyfriend whom she loved and wanted to be with. On our way home in the train sleeping compartment, she was amicably smiling and cuddled up to me as a child, having her best dreams come true. How little and how much we need to be happy!