High Tide (26 page)

Keep Your Fingers Crossed for Us, Brother

 

 

Pāvil!

 

Hello, hello, hello! The college that accepted you doesn't even realize yet how lucky they are!

You're going to fly for the first time—and all the way to America… Hm… You're going to starve to death because, if we're brother and sister, then we have a lot in common, and I can tell you one thing for sure—I CANNOT eat in planes! Hopefully it'll be totally different for you, you'll stuff yourself full of hamburgers one by one.

I know you're getting ready to leave, so I won't bore you with a long letter. Just one juicy quote—yesterday some of the local women were teasing Roberts when he looked at them: Roberts is so old that the only sexual organ he has left is his eyes. Hoho!

Also—I went to a Student Symphony Orchestra concert, Inguna's friend played first flute. And in the “style of Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue!”

Really, really hope to hear back from you!

 

—Ieva

 

P.S.
I think Troyat's
Les Eygletière
is an
awful
book. There isn't a single protagonist! It's the first time I've noticed one missing. Maybe my realization is to the book's credit?

 

P.P.S.
The meaning behind our initials: I—tension, emotionality; P—shyness, distance, loneliness. Does that fit?

 

* * *

 

Greetings, American!

 

How are you? Are you already placing your hand over your heart when you hear the national anthem?

“When the euphoria of a first meeting fades, you must quickly find a new acquaintance to maintain happiness and so life doesn't lose its edge. Year after year passes by in smiles and tired jokes, and the road is littered with hundreds of temporarily—for a week or two—amused people.”

As you can see, I'm reading the ocean book again. Doncho and Julia. All alone in their watery wanderings.

If Gran and Roberts were to finally kick me out and I'd somehow have to get through life on my own, I don't think the results would be good—I'd make it to the bottom of the front steps, and that would be it. I don't know anything about the world! So many people know what pain is (right now the time is 13:10 and the radio just started to play Dārziņš's “Melancholy Waltz”—how perfect!), what misfortune is, but they live on and shine, and are happy. I'm spoiled rotten. I have everything, but I'm always depressed. Sad. Brother, it's awful. I want to understand: what's wrong with me, who am I, why is this happening?

“
. . .
people are not limited in their abilities, but are rather limited in what they demand of themselves. In a moment of need, or even if we've made the conscious decision to, each of us is capable of mustering the kind of strength we never even thought we could possibly possess.”

Hm… It's a nice thought, I'm waiting for that moment of need. I could even get angry at myself in the end. If I could… The book has answers to all of my questions, and simultaneously reprimands me for them. Because I believe books. Maybe unnecessarily?

“Fear is a product of either nerves that are shot, or a stupid upbringing.”

I don't want what I immediately write down, but my hand moves like a sailboat across the paper, on its own accord. I think my fear comes from somewhere deep down. From the day Mom and Dad decided to split us up and left me with Gran and Roberts. I can't imagine a better childhood than what I had. Books, books, books, the sea, and Gran with her muddy boots and white handkerchief in the potato field.

But each time I see Mom and Dad I suddenly feel a horrible emptiness tearing through me somewhere deep, deep down. Like in a desert. I'm not condemning their decision, I know about Mom's illness and your condition, but I still can't entirely understand the separation. We're polite, but say nothing, and I'm really scared that I'm not loved. So be it, I think, it's not within our power to end it. I'm glad you got in touch with me, and were so sincerely and from the bottom of your heart able to convince me there was no reason to be afraid. The desert sprouted plants. Now you're my flower, my brother. A wonderful gift.

I hope you're not tired of reading all these whiny letters—I can't, I don't want to, I don't know how… The only people who I respect are probably you and Gran. And Jonsy, the woman from Iceland who I met on my trip to Sweden. She's so courageous!

“Man is a curious creation. I've observed a close connection between my mood and the wind. Today, with a fresh trade wind blowing, everything in my body rejoices.”

Across the Atlantic with Dju
—yaha! Where does one find a trade wind in Latvia?

Write me!

 

—
Ieva

 

* * *

 

Hello, my dear brother!

 

Life is horribly complicated, or else horrible and complicated. I've suddenly realized—everything is happening to me and it's awful. I can't avoid it anymore, I'm not as flexible as I was as a kid or a teenager, I'm stiff as a pole, and each splash of mud lands right onto my soul. I must be destined to live the life of a lightning rod. Right now I'm just one big compromise. In my mind I want to boss everyone around. Let them call me mentally incompetent! Out of the box and without boundaries. But on the surface I'm so quiet…

. . .
the meek will be spit out…

Oh but I know, I know already! But I can't let loose, because I'm not alone anymore.

. . .
if my life was just mine and mine alone…

My boyfriend is a gloomy person with an entirely wrecked world outlook and with a cruel relationship—scores to settle—with this life. And I don't understand why this life has chosen him for me. And I agree with him on everything because I don't have the heart to hurt him (“E tu, Brute?”), I stand silently by him and hope for peace, but… I at least learned one thing during my short time in Stockholm—always look at everything from both sides. A shitty trait! It'll never let me just be.

. . .
he who comes first, to him I shall belong, and adorn him with chrysanthemums…

. . .
a lone crane flies among the clouds, completely alone, without friends it lets out a strange and fearful cry…

Brother, I want to see you so badly! Please, please!

When will you be back in Latvia?

I'll call you.

 

—
Ieva

 

* * *

 

Hello, brother!

 

I've finally worked up the energy to write to you. I got everything you sent—even that lovely little note. I knew I'd write back to you, because I really want to see you, but threshing time ruined a few of my plans. True—you sometimes only need a minute to write a letter, but for me to write to you, I also need to be in the mood.

I don't know what's going on! Sometimes I've been in the kind of mood where I can't stay put somewhere for more than three days. Now it's the same, but with the one big difference being that I'm tied down, can't get anywhere and feel a huge sense of discomfort.

It's morning, I'm eating dried plums, looking through the
Sudmaliņas
journal, and I want to cry. I want Riga and I want
Sudmaliņas
, I want it to feel like the
Baltica-88
folklore festival. I don't really know, but I suppose you're having a good time right now. Things in my life have changed, but we'll talk about that when we see each other.

 

I am as ever—your Ieva

 

P.S.
I'll call you all next week in the evening until I get a hold of you.

So I can't wait, I have to tell you—I'm going to the General Register Office today to register. July 9
th
. Good God! I'm eighteen years old.

So alright, I'll just lay it all out: I'm going to have a baby in the fall.

 

* * *

 

Hey, brother!

 

Thank you so much for your letter, which I only got once I was at the Zari house. That's why I'm writing back late.

I haven't written anything about myself all fall because the season seemed to stretch on for a lifetime for me. Getting used to a new life is the same as trying on new clothes. The fit is a bit tight in places, and loose in others. No joke, just up until a little while ago my eyes were still wide in surprise—is it really still fall?

As a result of all of it, I'm at the Zari house with Andrejs. We had a hell of a time with the repairs. We're not that far from Gran, but the wildlife is totally different. Black sand in the forest, grass to your armpits. When there's a storm the sea doesn't blow in through the windows, but instead crashes far beyond the wet fields. Gran cried when I left. Roberts has just been crying non-stop. He's survived the war and Siberia, and still can't wrap his head around the fact that Latvians once again have their own, independent state. He either cries, or sits with his buddies at the store and discusses Virza's
Straumēni.
Roberts gave me a cow for my dowry—Salna. She's a blue seaside cow, one of Zīlīte's calves. We put a string around her neck and led her all the way here along the roads through the pine forest. We made it without any problems. Now I have my own cow among Andrejs's brown cows, I can wrap my arms around Salna's neck and cry when I miss my old life.

I have to do my own cooking, draw my own water from the well and carry it, light my own stove with damp firewood.

The old collective farm stable is just beyond the orchard. There are still a lot of horses in it. The pastures stretch on until our vegetable patch. Sometimes voices can be heard coming from the old manor, but other than that we're completely alone.

At first I really missed home. I'd think of Gran and my friends, then go into the woods to cry. But then Monta was born and I didn't have much time for crying. My daughter is beautiful and healthy, born on the first day of frost. I looked at her, and only when I saw her little face did I understand what a child was. First and foremost—a huge responsibility. A person who will be by my side my entire life. That's for certain. As is the fact that one day she'll see me die. But I'm not thinking about that just yet. Old age is the last thing on my mind.

It's all work, work, work, and then it's already time for bed. So we can be up by 5 
a.m.
the next morning.

Alright, it's already 22:22, pretty late, time for me to go to bed. I'm exhausted.

Write to me, I really need it. Please!

 

—
Ieva

 

* * *

 

Brother!

 

Each letter I get from you is a reason to celebrate. My reply probably won't be the same for you.

I'm shattered into a hundred tiny pieces, glass shards. The bottom of the pot, black from soot, sometimes seems sweet and white to me, while a glass of milk sometimes pours red as blood. This letter is going to be that same kind of mosaic.

I suppose you're experiencing some breakage right now, too. I'll give you one piece of advice, though—don't drop out of school! Like the sun needs the moon, like a plant needs its roots, like a leg needs a foot, like a star needs its shine, so does every thing and every being need a foundation. Education will give you the foundation you need to stand tall. Once you finish, you can be a romantic, an anarchist, an artist, a mathematician—whatever your destiny may be. But for now, build your foundation and don't, don't drop out!

I'll admit that my hair stands on end when it suddenly hits me that right now I live in a harsh, base, and simple world in which Andrejs and I constantly ask ourselves questions, but don't bother trying to answer them or even hear them. And there's no joy in the mirror, in the birds, in nature, they're all a bunch of lies. The word “joy” itself is a lie.

People like us fall in love with unrealistic people who have a strange glow about them. Because I came to the conclusion—the only reason I like my husband is because he's my star with his own shine, some kind of special (maybe dark) internal shine. A person isn't yours, no, it's their glow or their shine—that's what's yours. The soul, not the body! You wrote—how can you like him, you don't even know what he's like! Yes and that's the thing, I don't know him—maybe that's why there won't be any disappointment?

Even if there are others, even if I'm with them, he'll still be my ideal. And to be with him together in life—it's the most I could ask for. See, I have nothing to give to the world if I have nothing to give to love.

And in the end I've kind of “lucked out,” my grasp on life isn't as complicated and refined as yours. I can only be amazed by how you express yourself, the picture you sent of yourself, and feel sorry for myself. I can tell you that you are one of the rare wonders I know of. You absolutely have to finish what you started, absolutely.

There's a forester's house not far from Zari, where this odd woman named Stase lives. You can probably tell from the letter that I've been to visit her a few times. She scares me, but I'm drawn to her keen mind and her opinions. Each time I promise myself that I'll never talk to Stase again, but I quickly forget, and it's deathly boring around here. My husband isn't big on languages, we talk about planting, cows, mechanics, but sometimes whole days pass where we don't speak a word to each other.

Stase has a son, Aksels, who's our age.

He's a bright guy and—sort of peaceful. The last time I sat with Stase until midnight and Aksels walked me home. It's funny, at the gate he watched after me until I went into the house—and then I felt guilty because of Andrejs, who'd stayed home with our daughter. It's the first time I've felt like that. Strange. And SO WHAT!!!—as Jonsy, my Icelandic friend, would say. What was that look for when I told him I'd been to visit Stase and Aksels? Can't I have friends?