DieterM
07-17-2010, 05:37 AM
I had been dreading this moment for several years. Ever since I had moved to Paris. I had foreseen the doom, had sensed a fatal foreboding, imagined the sordid details with a sort of masochistic meticulousness. The phone ringing. The long, heavy silence after the horrible announcement. The line crackling. The words whirling around in my head but almost meaningless. The sheer impossibility to assemble them into sentences, expressions of grief, of consolation. The feeling of utter emptiness.
Sometimes, I had even dreamed about it, waking up with my face touching a pillow wet with tears. I had always known that the tragic moment would come, sooner or later.
Strange, though, that I had always imagined it would be my mother who’d be concerned.
Strange, too, that a day bearing such an awful weight could have such an inconspicuous, almost peaceful start. There was no warning when I stood up. I prepared coffee, opened the door of the flat to let the dogs into the garden. From the kitchen, I saw them run around joyously, piss on the grass, sniff in the corners. I shivered. The frosty morning had decorated the garden with a silvery white film of wafer-thin ice. A small, forceless sun began to rise behind the stone-wall in the back of the garden.
I watched a tiny, fluffy sparrow jump from one scrawny leg on the other. It perched its little head and seemed to look directly at me for a second with surprising intelligence reflected in its eyes. It reminded me of one of its brethren that I had found the previous summer. It had been lying in front of the dustbins, tweeting miserably, ailing, its two wings broken. A cat had probably played with it. I had asked Mister P. what to do. He had panicked and told me to shut up and cope with it. I had been forced to kill it, putting it in a plastic bag before turning its neck. It had continued to flutter around, and I had continued to turn and turn and turn. Finally, at the edge of tears, I had thrown the plastic bag with the bird’s still moving body into the dustbin.
I shivered again.
When the dogs had come back, frolicking around my feet and begging for their morning cookies, I heard Mister P. light his first cigarette. I poured the coffee into two mugs, stirred in the sugar, walked back to the bedroom with a mug in each hand and a dog at each foot.
‘Morning,’ I said and handed Mister P. his mug. The room smelled as it always did: of cold cigarette smoke, incense and candle-wax, with a light scent of mildew. Ground-floor flats in Paris are damp, you cannot do anything about it. I kissed Mister P. lightly on his lips and said: ‘We’re going to be late. You’d better get going.’
Mister P. left the bedroom without saying a word. I heard him rummage in the kitchen, probably mixing the first gin with orange juice of the day. I lit a cigarette, threw some cookies into the dogs’ bowl and sat down on the bed. When I took up the book I was reading, the phone rang.
It was in 2003. It was 7:30 in the morning. I was 31 years old. I had been dreading this moment for several years; yet I wasn’t prepared at all. There is no preparation for tragedies like these.
On the phone, my mother was sobbing so violently that I didn’t understand a word of what she was trying to convey. But I understood the essential message. Immediately.
At last, my sister took over. The contrast to my mother, who I still could hear weeping in the background, was stark. My sister was calm and composed, explaining matter-of-factly what had happened. All I could do was sit on the bed. Stare at the cover photo of the book I was still holding in my hand. Listen to her familiar voice.
‘I’ll take the first plane to Vienna,’ I finally managed to say. I was surprised to find my own voice rather calm and composed, too. I was surprised that there had been no crackling of the line. That there had been no words whirling around in my head. Nothing but an overwhelming sensation of emptiness, loneliness, fatigue.
I felt like a tree that had just been chopped off its trunk.
We hung up. When I lifted my gaze, I saw Mister P. standing in the door with a worried expression. ‘Who is it? What’s going on?’ he asked.
‘It’s my sister. I have to leave at once,’ I answered. ‘Yesterday, my father and three of his friends have been buried under an avalanche. My father is dead.’
****
Mao claims that if you want to know the true nature of an apple, you have to bite into it. If you want to understand the essence of something, you have to transform it.
One of the last times that my father and I went for a father-and-son afternoon-stroll, I asked him: ‘Did you have a particular dream when you were young? I mean, something you wanted to do with your life…’
My father chuckled his familiar chuckle, looked at me and said: ‘When I was young? I wanted to go to Africa and help the poor.’ He laughed again. ‘You know, like the missionaries.’
‘Why didn’t you do it?’ I wanted to know.
‘Well, it wasn’t really an option for me,’ he answered. ‘It was but a dream, you know. I would really have loved it. But I had to find a job when I was sixteen. I had to earn money. I’ve always been a bit jealous of you, son. You have been at university. I would have liked to continue learning things, like you did…’
‘So, basically, at sixteen you started to work in the coal-mine, like your dad?’
‘Oh no, I began an apprenticeship as a painter.’ He still smirked, with those deep dimples creasing the corners of his mouth. The sun was in our eyes as we set out between the fields at a fast pace. ‘But as you know, I’m colour-blind. The clients didn’t like to find out that their kitchen, instead of being green, had been painted pink. I had to find something else. So I followed my father’s path and started to work in the mine.’
We walked on for a moment without saying anything. We listened to the wind rush through the trees, to the birds sing, to nature sparkle. The silences between us were comfortable now. We were at ease, at peace with each other. We enjoyed each other’s company. The high corn was undulating, giving off a dry late-summer perfume, rustling lightly in the warm wind. ‘You remember that you always said you’d bring home a black girl?’ he asked after a while and laughed again.
‘Of course I do,’ I giggled. ‘I think I wanted to prepare you. I wanted you to get used to maybe not seeing me with a person you would have chosen for me…’
‘You should have brought a black girl, though,’ he said and winked at me. ‘I mean, your boyfriend is alright. You prefer men, that’s okay, too. But a black girl… she would have been perfectly fine, walking through the village at her father-in-law’s arm, now, wouldn’t she?’ He leered and laughed.
‘You bet,’ I said. ‘You’d have shown her off like a trophy, old pervert!’
‘Oh yes,’ he replied and put an arm around my shoulder. ‘But I think your mother would’ve been jealous.’
We shared a silent giggle.
‘You do love her,’ I remarked then.
‘Oh yes,’ he sighed. ‘She’s the perfect woman for me. You know, I wouldn’t have wanted to be with someone else. So many friends have left their wives for a young lassie, you know, a thin, sexy little bimbo. I’ve never understood them. Okay, who am I to judge anybody? It’s their life, after all. It’s their decision. But for one, what would I do with one of those skinny young girls, can you tell me? I like round, ample women.’
‘And Mom who always thinks she’s too fat…’
‘No, no, she’s perfect. I don’t like skinny women. I want to have something to hold between my hands,’ he said and winked again.
He was the centre of my mother’s universe. It had always been him, and my sister, and me. All that counted in her life. All that could make her happy.
I was glad and reassured that he loved her so much, too. And he never said it. But even without the words being uttered, I simply knew that he loved me, that he loved my sister. It was so obvious. It just showed in everything he did, in everything he said.
You have to transform something in order to understand its essence, as Mao claimed. You have to lose someone, forever, before you realize with your whole being just how much you’ll miss him, just how much you love him.
****
There was no seat available in any of the planes leaving for Vienna until 4 p.m. Moreover, the one-way-airfare cost me 300 euros. I paid without thinking. In light of my current personal tragedy, any amount of money had lost its significance. My face was a mask of polite, stony indifference. I proceeded immediately to the international zone, where I sat down on a bench, almost exhausted. The huge airport clock read 10 a.m.
I felt strange, as if I was outside my body, outside my mind. Numb, unable to mourn, unable to cry, unable to think. The day seemed grey and dreary and airless. But it might as well have been a bright, sunny morning. I didn’t notice anything. My vision was thickly fogged by unwept tears. My throat was hoarse with unvoiced sobs.
I kept sitting on that darn, hard bench, emotionless, without will. Strangers were continually rushing by dragging their suitcases, carrying their bags, their rucksacks. Voices and languages mingled around me, blended into an exotic din. Announcements were made over the speakers; schedules and delays, last calls. Exits were promoted. People searched. Airplanes, mostly Air France, arrived and docked. Others left; I cold see them take off in the distance. Policemen and soldiers with machine guns were strolling around looking bored. Customers were entering and leaving the Duty Free Shop near which I was posted. Families were chattering excitedly.
My own family had been annihilated. With my father’s demise, there were only three of us left. My mother. My sister. I. A trunk of a family. A sad relic. But I was unable to realize that. I couldn’t think of my dad being gone forever. It was something impossible.
What I knew, the only thing I felt with a stabbing pain: the quiet, little existence I called my life had come crumbling down. Everything had been called a sham. The seemingly nice way I had been leading my life had been torn apart. All those compromises, masquerades, all the lies I had been telling myself about everything had been revealed with a frightening suddenness.
The wait at Charles de Gaulle airport seemed like an eternity; simultaneously, though, it went by in no time. Because I had lost any notion of seconds, minutes, hours. What importance has time when you’re unable to gather your spirits? When you’re lost, completely lost, living, breathing, but without any real existence? As if you were swimming through a never-ending nightmare…
My cousin Fiona came to Schwechat airport to pick me up. She looked sad bud remained her same, chatty, cheerful self. ‘Let’s go and have a coffee,’ she proposed. ‘You’ll be able to smoke a cigarette, too.’
We sat down in the airport café, lit a cigarette and ordered capuccinos. Fioana’s proposal hadn’t been made without afterthoughts. ‘I hope you don’t mind, but Robert will be arriving in twenty minutes,’ she explained. ‘I’d like to see him before he goes back home to his wife.’
Robert was Fiona’s long-time lover. A married man and well-off management coach who used to travel around a lot. Fiona’s request reminded me that life was going on for the rest of the world. That life would go on for me, too, eventually. I didn’t dare imagine what I should make of it. That thing called my life. My cousin was talking about trivial things. She even made me laugh out loud twice. She had always been a great talker. She had always been an excellent storyteller.
After she had said ‘Hello’ to Robert, we headed towards her flat. She prepared some pasta with Pesto and fresh Parmeggiano di Regiano for me. I was ravenous but unable to eat much.
I spent my night in the visitors’ room. Fiona’s cat came to see me several times and made me long for my dog’s presence.
The next morning, I took the train home. I sat in my compartment, hunched and slightly shivering, watching the snow-covered landscape glide by. I gazed at the stern mountains, the dark-green conifers. I dreaded the moment of my arrival. I dreaded the moment when I would find myself face to face with my mother. I didn’t call Mister P. although I had brought my mobile. He would be no help, no relief. He was unable to cope with death because it reminded him of his own mortality. He had thrown a fit after I had told him what had happened. It had been me who had been forced to soothe him, to support him. Leaving our flat had been like a flight from his show of narcissistic grief.
The Semmering, Bruck, Leoben, Knittelfeld passed by. We were due to arrive in Judenburg anytime soon. I was getting more and more nervous, anxious. I had been silently mourning all this time, in my fashion. How could I find the strength to cope with my mother’s surely much more obvious mourning? What should I do, what should I say if she had a sobbing breakdown?
All I wanted to do was stay where I was, go on, never leave the train.
****
My mother offered me a photo of my father. It has its place of honour in one of my bookshelves. She has chosen this photo because it shows everything my father was.
He’s sitting on a rock. Around him, a parched mountain prairie. In the background, a white, cloudless summer sky. He’s wearing a thick, red hiker’s vest. Grey trousers, sneakers. He’s holding his binoculars in his hands. The sun tanning his face is reflected by a receding, white shock of hair. He’s smiling broadly, his teeth showing, his eyes small slits. You can see his famous dimples. The photo respires serenity, love, joy, human warmth. How he seems peaceful, happy to sit there, on that rock, gazing over his beloved Austrian mountains!
I can virtually hear him explaining the different flowers that can be guessed in the dry grass. I can imagine him pointing out the different mountain peaks, telling me their names. Even the names of the summits I cannot see. ‘Now, there,’ he’d say, ‘behind that big one there, on the left… You can’t see it, but just behind and hidden, there’s that other Kogel, and behind that, hidden too, that other Berg.’ My sister and I always laughed at that. And he was glad when he had, once again, succeeded in making us laugh…
My father was a strong, calm and positive man. I think that in all my life, I’ve never heard him say anything nasty or judgemental about someone else. He’d always find an explanation, an excuse. He’d admit it when he didn’t understand an action, an attitude. But he’d never draw hasty conclusions. I must have inherited that trait from him; I’m always weighing the pros and cons, too. I’m always trying to look at everything from different angles before making up my mind.
What defines him above all: his joy. He was happy to live, he was happy to walk on this earth. He was happy to be able to go hiking or skiing or climbing. He was happy to have his family. He was happy to be in our company. Why, he was even happy to stand up each morning! I’m no morning person, I need some time before I feel remotely human and capable of interacting with my fellow humans. But he seemed to jump out of bed thinking: ‘Great! Another day!’ He’d always whistle and sing in the morning, much to my own displeasure because I wanted to have tranquillity.
Today I’d give anything to hear him whistle and sing again…
****
For my father’s funeral, I dressed all in black and dropped a pill. A tranquilizer. The church bells’ noise started at 9:30 a.m., reminding me, reminding the village, reminding the whole earth that my dad’s last voyage would begin in a few minutes. I knew that he wouldn’t have wanted a religious ceremony. He had never been religious, mystic, just an admirer of nature’s beauties. He had surely never appreciated the catholic church.
But somehow, my mother had had no choice.
Three alpinists had been killed in the accident, only one had survived. Traumatized for the rest of his life, I suppose. He had been carried away at the edge of the avalanche. Had managed to struggle free despite some broken bones. Had succeeded in localizing his three friends thanks to their emergence devices. Had started digging at once like a madman. But the snow had been so compact, the missing three buried so deep under it that after an hour’s effort, he had been forced to give up, weeping, shivering, in pain.
The three dead men, including my father, had been local celebrities. They had been organizing hiking treks, ski tours, climbing excursions for many, many years. It had been utterly impossible to go through the village at his side without being greeted or talked to. My dad had been extremely popular; his friends as well. There was even an article about their tragic accident in the newspapers. So, the widows had decided to have a religious ceremony for the three of them. When I had asked her why, my mother had explained dryly: ‘Of course he wouldn’t have wanted it. But to prevent it, all he had to was not dying under that damned avalanche!’
She was constantly torn between heart-breaking grief, hot-tempered anger, calm acceptation. I found her very composed, very dignified. She had overheard her brothers- and sisters-in-law discussing her ‘frailty’. One aunt had said: ‘We’ll have to take care of her. She’s always lived for her husband. Now that he’s gone… She’s so weak…’ My mother had stood up and told them: ‘Stop treating me like a child! I can be and I will be much stronger than anyone of you would have dreamed!’
The church was situated a short way from my parents’ flat. I was walking like in a bad dream, dumb and numbed by the tranquilizer. It felt like running the gauntlet. People in black were flocking from everywhere, heading towards the church. They all recognized my mother, wanted to express their sympathy, their grief, shake hands, reach out to her. My sister, my aunt, my cousin Fiona and I were walking around my mom like bodyguards, fencing off those who were insisting too much.
The square around the church was packed. I saw ancient teachers of mine, friends of my father’s. The whole family clan had assembled, too. My aunts, uncles, cousins had come from as far as Germany and Switzerland. We entered the church heads held high, clinging together, holding on to each other. We’ve always been welded together. A family where bonds have always been strong. For the best, for the worse.
The ceremony had to be broadcasted on speakers for the village church couldn’t hold all the mourners. I didn’t listen to the priest’s words. He was new, after all; he hadn’t known any of the dead men. My eyes were fixed on the three coffins in front of the altar. Then, in the middle of the mass, a men’s choir started to sing. It was my dad’s favourite song: ‘Hörst du das Lied der Berge? Die Berge, sie rufen dich…’
Do you hear the song of the mountains? The mountains are calling you…, the song said.
I sat on the hard wooden bench, petrified, listening to the words, shivering with the mingling of the male voices, tears streaming down my cheeks. Realization had come at last: my father would never hear this song again. He would never hear the song of the mountains again, either. He had heard them call him once too often.
When all was over, the coffins were put into black limousines. My father was to be cremated in the afternoon. My mother asked me to go and thank a man she pointed out to me. It was the village policeman who had come to announce the tragic accident and its outcome to her. He was what you’d call a manly man, with a moustache, tanned face, hard handshake. The typical no-nonsense, no-sissy guy. He listened to my words of thanks weeping like a little child.
****
Whenever I’m in the village, I put a candle on my father’s grave. On his birthday, on his death-day, I light an incense stick. But I don’t need any of these subterfuges, any of these rituals to think of him. Whenever I look at his photo, there on my bookshelf, I greet him, smile to him, reach out for him, no matter where he may be now.
I know he’s watching over me.
Sometimes, I had even dreamed about it, waking up with my face touching a pillow wet with tears. I had always known that the tragic moment would come, sooner or later.
Strange, though, that I had always imagined it would be my mother who’d be concerned.
Strange, too, that a day bearing such an awful weight could have such an inconspicuous, almost peaceful start. There was no warning when I stood up. I prepared coffee, opened the door of the flat to let the dogs into the garden. From the kitchen, I saw them run around joyously, piss on the grass, sniff in the corners. I shivered. The frosty morning had decorated the garden with a silvery white film of wafer-thin ice. A small, forceless sun began to rise behind the stone-wall in the back of the garden.
I watched a tiny, fluffy sparrow jump from one scrawny leg on the other. It perched its little head and seemed to look directly at me for a second with surprising intelligence reflected in its eyes. It reminded me of one of its brethren that I had found the previous summer. It had been lying in front of the dustbins, tweeting miserably, ailing, its two wings broken. A cat had probably played with it. I had asked Mister P. what to do. He had panicked and told me to shut up and cope with it. I had been forced to kill it, putting it in a plastic bag before turning its neck. It had continued to flutter around, and I had continued to turn and turn and turn. Finally, at the edge of tears, I had thrown the plastic bag with the bird’s still moving body into the dustbin.
I shivered again.
When the dogs had come back, frolicking around my feet and begging for their morning cookies, I heard Mister P. light his first cigarette. I poured the coffee into two mugs, stirred in the sugar, walked back to the bedroom with a mug in each hand and a dog at each foot.
‘Morning,’ I said and handed Mister P. his mug. The room smelled as it always did: of cold cigarette smoke, incense and candle-wax, with a light scent of mildew. Ground-floor flats in Paris are damp, you cannot do anything about it. I kissed Mister P. lightly on his lips and said: ‘We’re going to be late. You’d better get going.’
Mister P. left the bedroom without saying a word. I heard him rummage in the kitchen, probably mixing the first gin with orange juice of the day. I lit a cigarette, threw some cookies into the dogs’ bowl and sat down on the bed. When I took up the book I was reading, the phone rang.
It was in 2003. It was 7:30 in the morning. I was 31 years old. I had been dreading this moment for several years; yet I wasn’t prepared at all. There is no preparation for tragedies like these.
On the phone, my mother was sobbing so violently that I didn’t understand a word of what she was trying to convey. But I understood the essential message. Immediately.
At last, my sister took over. The contrast to my mother, who I still could hear weeping in the background, was stark. My sister was calm and composed, explaining matter-of-factly what had happened. All I could do was sit on the bed. Stare at the cover photo of the book I was still holding in my hand. Listen to her familiar voice.
‘I’ll take the first plane to Vienna,’ I finally managed to say. I was surprised to find my own voice rather calm and composed, too. I was surprised that there had been no crackling of the line. That there had been no words whirling around in my head. Nothing but an overwhelming sensation of emptiness, loneliness, fatigue.
I felt like a tree that had just been chopped off its trunk.
We hung up. When I lifted my gaze, I saw Mister P. standing in the door with a worried expression. ‘Who is it? What’s going on?’ he asked.
‘It’s my sister. I have to leave at once,’ I answered. ‘Yesterday, my father and three of his friends have been buried under an avalanche. My father is dead.’
****
Mao claims that if you want to know the true nature of an apple, you have to bite into it. If you want to understand the essence of something, you have to transform it.
One of the last times that my father and I went for a father-and-son afternoon-stroll, I asked him: ‘Did you have a particular dream when you were young? I mean, something you wanted to do with your life…’
My father chuckled his familiar chuckle, looked at me and said: ‘When I was young? I wanted to go to Africa and help the poor.’ He laughed again. ‘You know, like the missionaries.’
‘Why didn’t you do it?’ I wanted to know.
‘Well, it wasn’t really an option for me,’ he answered. ‘It was but a dream, you know. I would really have loved it. But I had to find a job when I was sixteen. I had to earn money. I’ve always been a bit jealous of you, son. You have been at university. I would have liked to continue learning things, like you did…’
‘So, basically, at sixteen you started to work in the coal-mine, like your dad?’
‘Oh no, I began an apprenticeship as a painter.’ He still smirked, with those deep dimples creasing the corners of his mouth. The sun was in our eyes as we set out between the fields at a fast pace. ‘But as you know, I’m colour-blind. The clients didn’t like to find out that their kitchen, instead of being green, had been painted pink. I had to find something else. So I followed my father’s path and started to work in the mine.’
We walked on for a moment without saying anything. We listened to the wind rush through the trees, to the birds sing, to nature sparkle. The silences between us were comfortable now. We were at ease, at peace with each other. We enjoyed each other’s company. The high corn was undulating, giving off a dry late-summer perfume, rustling lightly in the warm wind. ‘You remember that you always said you’d bring home a black girl?’ he asked after a while and laughed again.
‘Of course I do,’ I giggled. ‘I think I wanted to prepare you. I wanted you to get used to maybe not seeing me with a person you would have chosen for me…’
‘You should have brought a black girl, though,’ he said and winked at me. ‘I mean, your boyfriend is alright. You prefer men, that’s okay, too. But a black girl… she would have been perfectly fine, walking through the village at her father-in-law’s arm, now, wouldn’t she?’ He leered and laughed.
‘You bet,’ I said. ‘You’d have shown her off like a trophy, old pervert!’
‘Oh yes,’ he replied and put an arm around my shoulder. ‘But I think your mother would’ve been jealous.’
We shared a silent giggle.
‘You do love her,’ I remarked then.
‘Oh yes,’ he sighed. ‘She’s the perfect woman for me. You know, I wouldn’t have wanted to be with someone else. So many friends have left their wives for a young lassie, you know, a thin, sexy little bimbo. I’ve never understood them. Okay, who am I to judge anybody? It’s their life, after all. It’s their decision. But for one, what would I do with one of those skinny young girls, can you tell me? I like round, ample women.’
‘And Mom who always thinks she’s too fat…’
‘No, no, she’s perfect. I don’t like skinny women. I want to have something to hold between my hands,’ he said and winked again.
He was the centre of my mother’s universe. It had always been him, and my sister, and me. All that counted in her life. All that could make her happy.
I was glad and reassured that he loved her so much, too. And he never said it. But even without the words being uttered, I simply knew that he loved me, that he loved my sister. It was so obvious. It just showed in everything he did, in everything he said.
You have to transform something in order to understand its essence, as Mao claimed. You have to lose someone, forever, before you realize with your whole being just how much you’ll miss him, just how much you love him.
****
There was no seat available in any of the planes leaving for Vienna until 4 p.m. Moreover, the one-way-airfare cost me 300 euros. I paid without thinking. In light of my current personal tragedy, any amount of money had lost its significance. My face was a mask of polite, stony indifference. I proceeded immediately to the international zone, where I sat down on a bench, almost exhausted. The huge airport clock read 10 a.m.
I felt strange, as if I was outside my body, outside my mind. Numb, unable to mourn, unable to cry, unable to think. The day seemed grey and dreary and airless. But it might as well have been a bright, sunny morning. I didn’t notice anything. My vision was thickly fogged by unwept tears. My throat was hoarse with unvoiced sobs.
I kept sitting on that darn, hard bench, emotionless, without will. Strangers were continually rushing by dragging their suitcases, carrying their bags, their rucksacks. Voices and languages mingled around me, blended into an exotic din. Announcements were made over the speakers; schedules and delays, last calls. Exits were promoted. People searched. Airplanes, mostly Air France, arrived and docked. Others left; I cold see them take off in the distance. Policemen and soldiers with machine guns were strolling around looking bored. Customers were entering and leaving the Duty Free Shop near which I was posted. Families were chattering excitedly.
My own family had been annihilated. With my father’s demise, there were only three of us left. My mother. My sister. I. A trunk of a family. A sad relic. But I was unable to realize that. I couldn’t think of my dad being gone forever. It was something impossible.
What I knew, the only thing I felt with a stabbing pain: the quiet, little existence I called my life had come crumbling down. Everything had been called a sham. The seemingly nice way I had been leading my life had been torn apart. All those compromises, masquerades, all the lies I had been telling myself about everything had been revealed with a frightening suddenness.
The wait at Charles de Gaulle airport seemed like an eternity; simultaneously, though, it went by in no time. Because I had lost any notion of seconds, minutes, hours. What importance has time when you’re unable to gather your spirits? When you’re lost, completely lost, living, breathing, but without any real existence? As if you were swimming through a never-ending nightmare…
My cousin Fiona came to Schwechat airport to pick me up. She looked sad bud remained her same, chatty, cheerful self. ‘Let’s go and have a coffee,’ she proposed. ‘You’ll be able to smoke a cigarette, too.’
We sat down in the airport café, lit a cigarette and ordered capuccinos. Fioana’s proposal hadn’t been made without afterthoughts. ‘I hope you don’t mind, but Robert will be arriving in twenty minutes,’ she explained. ‘I’d like to see him before he goes back home to his wife.’
Robert was Fiona’s long-time lover. A married man and well-off management coach who used to travel around a lot. Fiona’s request reminded me that life was going on for the rest of the world. That life would go on for me, too, eventually. I didn’t dare imagine what I should make of it. That thing called my life. My cousin was talking about trivial things. She even made me laugh out loud twice. She had always been a great talker. She had always been an excellent storyteller.
After she had said ‘Hello’ to Robert, we headed towards her flat. She prepared some pasta with Pesto and fresh Parmeggiano di Regiano for me. I was ravenous but unable to eat much.
I spent my night in the visitors’ room. Fiona’s cat came to see me several times and made me long for my dog’s presence.
The next morning, I took the train home. I sat in my compartment, hunched and slightly shivering, watching the snow-covered landscape glide by. I gazed at the stern mountains, the dark-green conifers. I dreaded the moment of my arrival. I dreaded the moment when I would find myself face to face with my mother. I didn’t call Mister P. although I had brought my mobile. He would be no help, no relief. He was unable to cope with death because it reminded him of his own mortality. He had thrown a fit after I had told him what had happened. It had been me who had been forced to soothe him, to support him. Leaving our flat had been like a flight from his show of narcissistic grief.
The Semmering, Bruck, Leoben, Knittelfeld passed by. We were due to arrive in Judenburg anytime soon. I was getting more and more nervous, anxious. I had been silently mourning all this time, in my fashion. How could I find the strength to cope with my mother’s surely much more obvious mourning? What should I do, what should I say if she had a sobbing breakdown?
All I wanted to do was stay where I was, go on, never leave the train.
****
My mother offered me a photo of my father. It has its place of honour in one of my bookshelves. She has chosen this photo because it shows everything my father was.
He’s sitting on a rock. Around him, a parched mountain prairie. In the background, a white, cloudless summer sky. He’s wearing a thick, red hiker’s vest. Grey trousers, sneakers. He’s holding his binoculars in his hands. The sun tanning his face is reflected by a receding, white shock of hair. He’s smiling broadly, his teeth showing, his eyes small slits. You can see his famous dimples. The photo respires serenity, love, joy, human warmth. How he seems peaceful, happy to sit there, on that rock, gazing over his beloved Austrian mountains!
I can virtually hear him explaining the different flowers that can be guessed in the dry grass. I can imagine him pointing out the different mountain peaks, telling me their names. Even the names of the summits I cannot see. ‘Now, there,’ he’d say, ‘behind that big one there, on the left… You can’t see it, but just behind and hidden, there’s that other Kogel, and behind that, hidden too, that other Berg.’ My sister and I always laughed at that. And he was glad when he had, once again, succeeded in making us laugh…
My father was a strong, calm and positive man. I think that in all my life, I’ve never heard him say anything nasty or judgemental about someone else. He’d always find an explanation, an excuse. He’d admit it when he didn’t understand an action, an attitude. But he’d never draw hasty conclusions. I must have inherited that trait from him; I’m always weighing the pros and cons, too. I’m always trying to look at everything from different angles before making up my mind.
What defines him above all: his joy. He was happy to live, he was happy to walk on this earth. He was happy to be able to go hiking or skiing or climbing. He was happy to have his family. He was happy to be in our company. Why, he was even happy to stand up each morning! I’m no morning person, I need some time before I feel remotely human and capable of interacting with my fellow humans. But he seemed to jump out of bed thinking: ‘Great! Another day!’ He’d always whistle and sing in the morning, much to my own displeasure because I wanted to have tranquillity.
Today I’d give anything to hear him whistle and sing again…
****
For my father’s funeral, I dressed all in black and dropped a pill. A tranquilizer. The church bells’ noise started at 9:30 a.m., reminding me, reminding the village, reminding the whole earth that my dad’s last voyage would begin in a few minutes. I knew that he wouldn’t have wanted a religious ceremony. He had never been religious, mystic, just an admirer of nature’s beauties. He had surely never appreciated the catholic church.
But somehow, my mother had had no choice.
Three alpinists had been killed in the accident, only one had survived. Traumatized for the rest of his life, I suppose. He had been carried away at the edge of the avalanche. Had managed to struggle free despite some broken bones. Had succeeded in localizing his three friends thanks to their emergence devices. Had started digging at once like a madman. But the snow had been so compact, the missing three buried so deep under it that after an hour’s effort, he had been forced to give up, weeping, shivering, in pain.
The three dead men, including my father, had been local celebrities. They had been organizing hiking treks, ski tours, climbing excursions for many, many years. It had been utterly impossible to go through the village at his side without being greeted or talked to. My dad had been extremely popular; his friends as well. There was even an article about their tragic accident in the newspapers. So, the widows had decided to have a religious ceremony for the three of them. When I had asked her why, my mother had explained dryly: ‘Of course he wouldn’t have wanted it. But to prevent it, all he had to was not dying under that damned avalanche!’
She was constantly torn between heart-breaking grief, hot-tempered anger, calm acceptation. I found her very composed, very dignified. She had overheard her brothers- and sisters-in-law discussing her ‘frailty’. One aunt had said: ‘We’ll have to take care of her. She’s always lived for her husband. Now that he’s gone… She’s so weak…’ My mother had stood up and told them: ‘Stop treating me like a child! I can be and I will be much stronger than anyone of you would have dreamed!’
The church was situated a short way from my parents’ flat. I was walking like in a bad dream, dumb and numbed by the tranquilizer. It felt like running the gauntlet. People in black were flocking from everywhere, heading towards the church. They all recognized my mother, wanted to express their sympathy, their grief, shake hands, reach out to her. My sister, my aunt, my cousin Fiona and I were walking around my mom like bodyguards, fencing off those who were insisting too much.
The square around the church was packed. I saw ancient teachers of mine, friends of my father’s. The whole family clan had assembled, too. My aunts, uncles, cousins had come from as far as Germany and Switzerland. We entered the church heads held high, clinging together, holding on to each other. We’ve always been welded together. A family where bonds have always been strong. For the best, for the worse.
The ceremony had to be broadcasted on speakers for the village church couldn’t hold all the mourners. I didn’t listen to the priest’s words. He was new, after all; he hadn’t known any of the dead men. My eyes were fixed on the three coffins in front of the altar. Then, in the middle of the mass, a men’s choir started to sing. It was my dad’s favourite song: ‘Hörst du das Lied der Berge? Die Berge, sie rufen dich…’
Do you hear the song of the mountains? The mountains are calling you…, the song said.
I sat on the hard wooden bench, petrified, listening to the words, shivering with the mingling of the male voices, tears streaming down my cheeks. Realization had come at last: my father would never hear this song again. He would never hear the song of the mountains again, either. He had heard them call him once too often.
When all was over, the coffins were put into black limousines. My father was to be cremated in the afternoon. My mother asked me to go and thank a man she pointed out to me. It was the village policeman who had come to announce the tragic accident and its outcome to her. He was what you’d call a manly man, with a moustache, tanned face, hard handshake. The typical no-nonsense, no-sissy guy. He listened to my words of thanks weeping like a little child.
****
Whenever I’m in the village, I put a candle on my father’s grave. On his birthday, on his death-day, I light an incense stick. But I don’t need any of these subterfuges, any of these rituals to think of him. Whenever I look at his photo, there on my bookshelf, I greet him, smile to him, reach out for him, no matter where he may be now.
I know he’s watching over me.