For many people—many more than Arutyunyan realized at the time, when she was reveling in her “freedom to”—the future ended when the Soviet Union collapsed and the narrow hallway disappeared. Others struggled on, but the anxiety caused by uncertainty rendered them incapable of meaningful action. In the early 2000s, with the arrival of Putin, whose simple rhetoric made the world comprehensible again, and with inflation receding under the force of high oil prices, many of these patients felt better. They could function again. They were sure that Putin had something to do with it.
