Lullaby for the Girl in the Landscape

~ To you and for me again ~

If I could show you this picture, would you recognize the place? There is nothing spectacular or breath-taking about it. It's just a hill covered by a thick forest, except for a bald spot on one side, and a corn field with a couple of trees below it. An anonymous place. One of possibly hundreds or thousands of such places in eastern Serbia, and yet it was exactly this place I set out to find that day, because you were there too.



I woke up in your old room. Jet-lagged, still smelling of western latitudes, I opened my eyes where you greeted each new day for many years. Is this where Grandmother brought you downy yellow chicks into bed to wake you up in the morning? The window opposite the bed was wide open, the flimsy curtain falling over Grandmother's old "Singer" sewing machine perfectly still in the absence of air currents, announcing another bright summer day. Unhurried, I lay in bed for a while, looking through the window, wondering if you ever lay here and imagined you'd grow up and have someone like me one day.



As I was dressing in the pleasant early-morning freshness of the day pouring through the open window, I remembered how cold this room was in the winter. I only visited a few times in the winter -- most times I took the train from Belgrade. Once the train was stuck in the snow for 6 hours, and in the idle emptiness of the landscape surrounding us, I somehow got into a long conversation with the engine-driver, whom I saw once more after that: on my birthday that (or the following?) year, when he gave me, of all things, a Bible as a present... My grandparents' house never had good insulation. The principal source of heat in the winter was (and still is) a wood stove in the kitchen, which would turn into a blazing inferno when in full blast, but only a few meters away in any direction, glacial regions reigned. When my brother moved here from Bosnia, this room was heated by means of a small, futuristic-looking petroleum furnace with a round window in the front; I don't know if you had it too while you lived there? This summer I saw it in the yard, in a heap of old metal.



In the kitchen, Grandmother was already awake. We chatted a little, then I told her where I'd like to go, pointing at the picture above her head on the wall. The kitchen walls are covered with family pictures but this particular picture is special. I have loved it and looked at it for a long time.






You in Grandmother's arms. You must be 2 or 3, and Grandmother around 20, still a girl herself. The striped woollen dress you're wearing, she knitted for you, her first baby, her daughter. You are so small (this must be your first picture?), but you are so unmistakably you. Even in the way your right thumb and index finger are bent, I recognize your hand; that almost imperceptible curve of your mouth is something I know well; those round eyes are my brother's. The back of the photograph says "1943? 1944?"




After we looked at it for a while, Grandmother told me the picture was taken next to the Church in the village of Oresac where you lived at the time. It was just after some religious celebration, and someone snapped this picture of you two, with a hill in the background. When I told Grandmother I'd like to go to that exact spot, she took it as the most natural thing in the world, and I was glad she understood, and I didn't have to explain. So, after we visited the remaining family and acquaintances in Oresac later that day, we drove by the Church. The freshly cut grass around it was dotted with white and blue field flowers. Luckily, there was no one around since Grandmother said she had to pee right away. While I was holding her steady by the underarm on the edge of the corn field, I had a sudden glimpse of myself in the classroom, the first day of school. Grandmother had brought me to my first ever class (both you and Dad must have been working), and when all the children sat down and all the parents left, I would not let go of her hand. I held on to her, maniacally, mutely, not wanting to stay there. I let go only after the Teacher intervened, and promised Grandmother would wait for me outside.



When she was done, I took the picture from my bag and started looking around, trying to see where exactly she and you were standing. It didn't take long: despite the addition of the corn field and a few trees to the landscape, the hill remained the same; the bald spot was smaller -- the forest must have gradually taken over -- but it was easily recognizable. Then we stood still, Dad took a picture, and there we are. Without you in the photo, but with you between us, your presence lingering in that landscape even after 65 years.





This is a lullaby for the girl in the landscape. Any of the three.




(Thank you Coko, my friend and godmother, for this song)