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November 1997

From Good Housekeeping (US edition):

EVERYTHING REMINDS ME OF SERGEI

by Joanna Powell

Two years after her husband's shocking death, Ekaterina Gordeeva finds solace on the ice, and in their precious daughter, Daria.

The leafy village of Simsbury, CT, is a world away from Moscow's Central Red Army Club where Ekaterina Gordeeva first fell in love with Sergei Grinkov, her ice-skating partner and soul mate. But here in this quiet New England enclave of colonial mansions and Yankee antiques, the painful memories of her late husband still lurk at every turn.

"Everything reminds me of Sergei," Gordeeva says solemnly, as she looks out onto the ice at the International Skating Center of Connecticut. "The car. Where we live. Every ice rink. Every dressing room. There is no day when I don't think of Sergei. And I don't know when that will go away."

On November 20, it will be two years since Grinkov, just 28, crumbled at his wife's side during a rehearsal, stricken with a fatal heart attack. And while Gordeeva has done a lot of healing, partly by sharing her memories in the best-selling book My Sergei: A Love Story (now out in paperback from Warner Books), she is heartbreakingly honest about the sorrow that lingers, despite her courageous efforts to rebuild her life.

The 26-year-old Olympic champion stands in a glass-enclosed observation room scanning the rink below for a glimpse of her 5-year-old daughter, Daria, a blond angel who possesses her father's sparkling eves and playful smile. The child, who began skating at 2, is practicing with her best friend, a spirited 9-year-old named Lizzie. Catching her eye, Gordeeva waves and basks in the joy of watching Dasha, as she affectionately calls her. "She is a gift from God," Gordeeva says. "When Sergei died, she was such a help because she needed attention and I had to take care of her. She couldn't understand how terrible it was. She understood that something bad had happened and that was why everyone was crying. But she's a child. She was smiling. She needed me u, play with her. I think she drove me hack to a normal life."

In the aftermath of the tragedy, the waiflike widow captured the hearts of Americans--and found herself increasingly grounded in her adopted country. Surrounded by a community of warm and supportive friends, many of whom she met through her daughter's school, Gordeeva is striving, little by little, to distance herself from her loss while keeping Grinkov's memory alive. "With each day I'm getting stronger and more independent," she says. "I'm at the point now where I'm trying to depend on myself. I know I must take care of myself and my daughter."

Perhaps the most important move in that process has been her return to skating. Katia, as her friends call her, had spent most of her life with Grinkov on the ice, beginning when she was 11. As their bond grew, so did their power as competitive pairs skaters. Together they won two Olympic gold medals, in 1988 and 1994, and four world championships. "There was something very special about us," she reflects, speaking in modestly fluent English. "We never changed partners. I never skated with anyone else, I never touched anyone else, only Sergei. After we became lovers, our skating started to become more sensitive and more beautiful. And when we were husband and wife, I think it showed how much we enjoyed to skate with each other."

Little wonder, then, that after her husband's death, Gordeeva was at first inclined to give it up: "I thought I was never going to skate again. But I didn't know what else to do. I couldn't think of any other job to do. After about two or three weeks it was like needing to eat. I felt like my body needed to come back on the ice again and feel the skates and how you can flow on the ice."

That first day back (in Moscow at the old rink where the couple trained as youngsters) was difficult; she endured several bad falls and an avalanche of emotions. But, surprisingly, skating made her feel much better. "It was helpful to keep my mind a little hit busy. If you don't, your thoughts can eat you up inside." Still it took time and determination to redefine herself as a singles skater. "I preferred to learn to skate alone rather than get used to a new partner," she says. "But it meant learning new routines and jumps and building something by myself which was very difficult."

The figure-skating community was stunned when Gordeeva made her first solo appearance in February 1996, at a tribute to Grinkov in Hartford. For the first time in 14 years, she was skating alone, and her elegant fusion of raw emotion and gentle, ballerina-style grace brought down the house. "It's fairly rare to succeed at troth pairs and solo skating," says fellow skater Rosalynn Sumners, a former world champion now with Stars on Ice. "And it's been interesting to see how Katia developed her own style. For many months after she began to skate again, it was hard for those of us who knew Sergei to watch her. It was bizarre and sad without him, and she was left quite raw and vulnerable. But we saw her build her own inner strength."

Since making her solo debut, Gordeeva has established herself as a topflight figure skater, contributing to the growing popularity of a sport that has soared in recent years to become a one-hundred-million-dollar industry. She now successfully competes with such Olympic champions as Kristi Yamaguchi and Katarina Witt. "People are mesmerized by her," skating luminary Brian Boitano has said.

In addition to a 60-date tour with Stars on Ice beginning Thanksgiving weekend, Gordeeva has two television specials planned. The first will he an original musical, Snowden on Ice, in which she stars as a young, single mother who returns to her childhood home with her daughter, to be played by Daria. This will he the first time Daria will skate on television with her mother. In this unique melding of figure skating and acting (airing on CBS, November 28), mother and daughter will he joined by all star skaters Scott Hamilton and Kurt Browning. Also on tap for winter 1998 is the TV movie adapted from My Sergei, also on CBS. At Gordeeva's insistence, the movie has been made as a docudrama that combines original skating footage of the duo, interviews with family and friends, and narration by Gordeeva. "I felt it was very important we include as much skating as we could," she says determinedly. "It's still a love story, but I wanted people to understand how skating made us the kind of people we were."

No matter how rewarding these new ventures prove, Gordeeva still says that life on the ice will always be inextricably and agonizingly entwined with Grinkov. There was always that moment in the tunnel backstage before they went on, when he would wrap her in his arms and kiss her, instilling confidence and serenity. "Some days I feel terrible without that kiss, missing him so much," she says. "Every time I go on the ice, I still question it: `Should I be here hat Daria alone or not?' I will probably always feel that way. I always felt so calm and solid with Sergei, and now I just never feel the same."

As she talks, Gordeeva twists the antique emerald-and-diamond ring that she now wears on her right hand. It is the ring Grinkov bought for her in Germany before they were married--the one piece of jewelry she says she never takes off, whether she's skating, showering, or sleeping. Given her loveliness and palpable vulnerability (everyone who meets her seems to want to hug and protect her), you would think that new men would he circling around her. But in response to the inevitable question about whether she has started to date, Gordeeva responds wistfully. "I have a friend. He's a good friend. But it's very hard for me to take anything seriously. Even though I know that I should. I know that Daria needs a father, needs a man. But it is a decision I must make on my own and it's very difficult. Maybe in time I can be more relaxed. I will always think of Sergei as the first man. I'm always comparing. It will take a long time. We weren't perfect. We had problems. But still, he was the only man for me."

Gordeeva has just bought a new five-bedroom house in Simsbury--in the hopes that she can escape the memories that enveloped her in the picture-filled condo she and Grinkov shared in their last year together. "I felt I couldn't start anything new while I was there," she says. "It reminded me too much of him." Still daunted at the thought of living alone, she hopes to fill her house with friends and family. Her parents have already moved in; her mother cares for Daria while Gordeeva is on the road. And she looks forward to visits from her sister Maria; Grinkov's sister and mother; and her longtime choreographer Marina Zueva. During the past two years she has come to treasure her family with new fervor. "I want to support them however I can" she says. "These people I feel will never leave me."

Life in Simsbury was full of promise for Gordeeva when she and Grinkov moved there in 1994. She looks back with new-found wisdom at the cocoon she lovingly created with her husband and child. They "didn't need anyone else" she recalls. But now she's learning to reach out to others. "I've started to be more open to people," she says "to care more about their lives And now I'm happy to have many friends."

When she was trying to decide whether to buy her house and worried sick about making the wrong choice she consulted nearly everyone in Simsbury.

That sort of sharing would never have happened when Grinkov was alive. "I feel like everyone in town knew what kind of trouble I had" she says laughing at herself. "When the inspection was when the mortgage was due the closing date. Now I'm so happy I have a big house because everyone can come and enjoy it."

Gordeeva returns to Russia once or twice a year to visit family and friends. It may serve to reconnect her with her history, but for the most part she considers herself American. Daria who was born in New Jersey hats dual citizenship. Gordeeva plans for her daughter to attend school in America, because she feels educational standards are superior here. While Daria shows promise as an ice skater her mother wants her to explore other career options and have a well-rounded knowledge of computers business end polities.

Like anyone in mourning Gordeeva wrestles with her share of questions searching for reasons why "God gave first, then took away.... Perhaps God wanted me to be stronger and to grow tip," she muses. "Maybe I wasn't strong enough for life."

Though she was tempted to wallow in her sadness Gordeeva says her mother set her straight. "`You have a daughter' she told me. `She needs a healthy mom. I'm not going to live forever. You have to raise her. So you better take care of yourself so you can take care of her.'"

Now Gordeeva longs to share her life with more children. "I never wanted it so much like I want it now" she says. When her friends and neighbors, Ukrainian skater Viktor Petrenko and his wife Nina stop by the rink with their newborn Gordeeva looks as smitten as the proud parents.

For Daria grasping the finality of losing her father isn't easy. When she asks why she can't see him, Gordeeva assures her that he is still nearby. "I always think that he's around not that he's actually dead. I think he's just in different material in a different world. Sometimes I can see him in dreams and sometimes I can't. I believe that when he's thinking of me and Dasha he comes and visits us. Maybe it's stupid of me to think this way hut even when I go to the cemetery in Moscow and look at this piece of ground I don't believe that he's there. I feel that if I want to believe he's going to help me tonight I can ask. I can ask every day for him to please watch over US. But I think he can feel when I really need help. He watches over me and over Daria and we feel his spirit around us. We will always share what we had."

As she talks the soundtrack playing throughout the rink changes as if on cue to Celine Dion's romantic ballad "Because You Loved Me." Daria has grown tired of skating and asks her mother if she can go to her friend's house for dinner. A hit reluctantly Gordeeva agrees to pick her up later and tenderness floods her luminous gray-blue eyes. "There was something special there that will never be repeated " she says softly. "Some days go by fine. Other days I wonder what I am living for." In the meantime she believes the key is learning to look outward. Talking to people. Looking at the sun. And seeing how it always rises.