(no subject)
6-1-2006
When I moved into my apartment “granny C.” (the lady who owns the building and lives upstairs) kept inviting me for coffee at very inconvenient times. Right before a lecture, for instance, or while I was writing a paper. But today I took her up on her invitation and followed her upstairs for a cup of what I can only describe as sugary mud diluted with cream from a cow that died during the Gulf War. The first one. I can feel my stomach lining dissolve as I am typing, but that is not what I want to write about.
What, or rather who, I do want to write about granny C. You see, granny C. speaks a bit of German, although she keeps telling me - in German - that she doesn’t. To be quite honest, her German is probably better than mine. So although granny C speaks no English whatsoever and I am more likely to intuitively pick up on Sanskrit than be able to understand a single word of Slovene, the two of us have found a way to communicate by combining advanced miming with a creative molestation of the German language. And that’s a good thing, for, as I found out, granny C. is quite a chatty lady in dire need of a fresh audience.
Granny C’s house is a veritable ode to fifties socialism, the good chairs covered in cloth as if waiting for visitors who stopped coming years ago, a four-seater couch in every room and a kitchen that undoubtedly stores canned food produced during the time when Tito was still in power. I do not intend this as mockery. Her house is lovely, in a “Goodbye Lenin” type of way. She sat me down in the kitchen, across from a huge portrait of a handsome young man. That way we could have coffee in the virtual company of the late Mr. C.
It’s strange how photographs manage to preserve people as they were, as if that long gone person is still there in all his 32-year-old glory. Looking at that picture I understood why some people still believe that a photo camera steals a piece of your soul. I drink my coffee in the multi-generational company of Mr. And granny C, he preserved at an age young enough to be her son, she casting him sideways glances showing an affection that would be incredibly inappropriate if that were actually the case.
Fortunately, photos can be looked at but not look back in return, and they are as quiet as they are deaf. For if Mr. C could hear and see his wife now, six years after his death, his heart would surely break. Granny C is not sickly, or at least not apparently so. Her body is strong, her hair thick and her voice clear. Granny C’s illness is called nostalgia, and the pain she suffers is called loneliness.
It is sometimes said of old people that they live in the past. Granny C’s stories all hail from the wonder years during which she and her husband ran a guesthouse by the sea, entertaining guests from all over Europe and spending the summer with their extended family at the beach house. Mr. C conversed in German, English, Russian and Slovene with whoever sat at their table that night, while Mrs. C enjoyed cooking the most elaborate meals. Other stories are about the time when Mr. And granny C lived together in this house in Ljubljana, visiting their children and grandchildren and tending to their garden. Even if these stories have become embellished a little over time, even if they tend to gloss over the occasional disagreement or the times when money was tight, they are surely truthful to the extent that they preserve a time when granny C felt happy, loved and protected.
Sadly, granny C does not live in the past. Without a trace of dementia and the memory as an elephant’s, she lives every day in the knowledge that those times are gone. Granny C is not happy very often anymore. Life has become hard, “schwer,” she tells me over and over again. Living in that big house, all alone, she gets scared of noises. The house is so quiet that she can hear the littlest branch scratching against the window and metamorphing into a thief who’s after her good china, every car that drives by without stopping at her door. Granny C is an 84-year-old widow who lives in the here and now, and who is bright enough to appreciate exactly how bleak it is in comparison to the 60 years she spent with the man in the picture on her sideboard.
But granny C is also an old lady who smiles all her (own) teeth bare whenever her grandson drops by unexpectedly, who tells me that she enjoys it when I play my music just loud enough for her to pick up on it, because it means that she is not alone in the house. I don’t know whether granny C’s nostalgia is only sadness, or if it is simply the echo of her former happiness.
Tonight, while granny C undoubtedly kisses the photograph goodnight before going to sleep in that enormous, empty bed, I decide to learn to appreciate sugary coffee that tastes like artificial fertilizer and has enough caffeine to give a buffalo the jitters. Or, at the very least, I will resolve to invite granny C over for some camomile tea.
When I moved into my apartment “granny C.” (the lady who owns the building and lives upstairs) kept inviting me for coffee at very inconvenient times. Right before a lecture, for instance, or while I was writing a paper. But today I took her up on her invitation and followed her upstairs for a cup of what I can only describe as sugary mud diluted with cream from a cow that died during the Gulf War. The first one. I can feel my stomach lining dissolve as I am typing, but that is not what I want to write about.
What, or rather who, I do want to write about granny C. You see, granny C. speaks a bit of German, although she keeps telling me - in German - that she doesn’t. To be quite honest, her German is probably better than mine. So although granny C speaks no English whatsoever and I am more likely to intuitively pick up on Sanskrit than be able to understand a single word of Slovene, the two of us have found a way to communicate by combining advanced miming with a creative molestation of the German language. And that’s a good thing, for, as I found out, granny C. is quite a chatty lady in dire need of a fresh audience.
Granny C’s house is a veritable ode to fifties socialism, the good chairs covered in cloth as if waiting for visitors who stopped coming years ago, a four-seater couch in every room and a kitchen that undoubtedly stores canned food produced during the time when Tito was still in power. I do not intend this as mockery. Her house is lovely, in a “Goodbye Lenin” type of way. She sat me down in the kitchen, across from a huge portrait of a handsome young man. That way we could have coffee in the virtual company of the late Mr. C.
It’s strange how photographs manage to preserve people as they were, as if that long gone person is still there in all his 32-year-old glory. Looking at that picture I understood why some people still believe that a photo camera steals a piece of your soul. I drink my coffee in the multi-generational company of Mr. And granny C, he preserved at an age young enough to be her son, she casting him sideways glances showing an affection that would be incredibly inappropriate if that were actually the case.
Fortunately, photos can be looked at but not look back in return, and they are as quiet as they are deaf. For if Mr. C could hear and see his wife now, six years after his death, his heart would surely break. Granny C is not sickly, or at least not apparently so. Her body is strong, her hair thick and her voice clear. Granny C’s illness is called nostalgia, and the pain she suffers is called loneliness.
It is sometimes said of old people that they live in the past. Granny C’s stories all hail from the wonder years during which she and her husband ran a guesthouse by the sea, entertaining guests from all over Europe and spending the summer with their extended family at the beach house. Mr. C conversed in German, English, Russian and Slovene with whoever sat at their table that night, while Mrs. C enjoyed cooking the most elaborate meals. Other stories are about the time when Mr. And granny C lived together in this house in Ljubljana, visiting their children and grandchildren and tending to their garden. Even if these stories have become embellished a little over time, even if they tend to gloss over the occasional disagreement or the times when money was tight, they are surely truthful to the extent that they preserve a time when granny C felt happy, loved and protected.
Sadly, granny C does not live in the past. Without a trace of dementia and the memory as an elephant’s, she lives every day in the knowledge that those times are gone. Granny C is not happy very often anymore. Life has become hard, “schwer,” she tells me over and over again. Living in that big house, all alone, she gets scared of noises. The house is so quiet that she can hear the littlest branch scratching against the window and metamorphing into a thief who’s after her good china, every car that drives by without stopping at her door. Granny C is an 84-year-old widow who lives in the here and now, and who is bright enough to appreciate exactly how bleak it is in comparison to the 60 years she spent with the man in the picture on her sideboard.
But granny C is also an old lady who smiles all her (own) teeth bare whenever her grandson drops by unexpectedly, who tells me that she enjoys it when I play my music just loud enough for her to pick up on it, because it means that she is not alone in the house. I don’t know whether granny C’s nostalgia is only sadness, or if it is simply the echo of her former happiness.
Tonight, while granny C undoubtedly kisses the photograph goodnight before going to sleep in that enormous, empty bed, I decide to learn to appreciate sugary coffee that tastes like artificial fertilizer and has enough caffeine to give a buffalo the jitters. Or, at the very least, I will resolve to invite granny C over for some camomile tea.