"Don't you see how much you resemble our Grandpa Milan?" My brother is asking. "I have been watching you: it's almost as if, with age, you are coming closer to him," he was saying, his hazel eyes smiling teasingly.
"What do you mean?" I am asking, hoping to encourage him to say more, while actually thinking, "I know. I have been observing myself, too."
But, my brother Milan, named after our father's father -- according to the good old Serbian tradition -- is never quick to answer, just like our mother. It is so much like him to sit there watching me and smiling, knowing that, after a while -- a very short while -- I will explode telling him what I think. My brother is patient and quiet, like our Grandma Lenka (or our mother Milica); I am quick and explosive like our Grandpa Milan and our bubbly, jovial father Nikola.
As I am sitting here in the flat, bountiful Kansas, talking to my graying brother, I remember Grandpa from our childhood in that other flat, bountiful land of wheat and corn, the province of Voivodina in Yugoslavia. I remember our Grandpa mostly from the time when he was already old, but still tall, slender and erect, his gait unusually fast, a characteristic that both my father and I inherited, too. Even at an advanced age, Grandpa Milan was still attractive and distinguished looking, with his silvery hair and rich mustache, a traditional look for a Serbian man of his age. He, however, had a personal touch: always impeccably groomed. I have watched many a time how the village barber gave Grandpa a haircut and a shave. The ritual would open with Grandma's white, crisply starched and perfectly pressed linen towel brought from the squeaky chest that smelled of ripening quinces and was off limits for the children. Grandpa would wait; sitting still (which was in itself unusual for him), while "Chika Djoka Berberin" ("Uncle Joe, the Barber," as all the neighbor kids called him) took his razor out, checked its brilliant, sharp edge and laid it aside. Then he mixed soap in a small dish, all the while discussing world politics and high market prices.
When the leather was just right and all the political issues settled, the real ritual started. Chika Djoka had a variety of fast, magician-like strokes adapted to Grandpa's features with lines, furrows, hilly nose, bushy mustache and a grassy chin area.
Pirouetting around Grandpa, Chika Djoka shaved the cheeks off first, employing tiny strokes in all directions around the nose and the mouth, asking, "Shall we trim the mustache now, just a tiny little bit?"
Not able to say anything, Grandpa growled and moaned, making irritated gestures: Don't touch the mustache! His head was pushed far back to expose the neck, making him look like the chickens drinking water. I suppressed giggling, knowing this was not a laughing-time but a serious, adult, man-business: Grandpa's life was in Chika Djoka's hands.
Gradually, the strokes became longer, relaxed, carefully climbing upward over the protruding Adam's apple. By now the gray stubble, mixed with soap, had turned into a thick cream, quickly and professionally being wiped off with Grandma's clean linen towel. It was unusual to see Grandpa forced to sit without a word for so long, told to do this or that, turned around by Chika Djoka, a man younger than himself: our Grandpa, the pater familias telling everybody what to do in short, quick commands, always so impatient to see it done immediately and correctly. Our Grandpa Milan, an epitome of perfectionism!
With an aura of class and good taste, Grandpa had a vocabulary including an amazing number of dukes, archdukes, bishops and other high nobility. He was only too happy to tell, over and over again, about the time when he had served in the Austro-Hungarian army. It seems that the pomp and grandeur of the Empire captured my Grandpa's imagination and stayed imprinted there for ever. For a while, during his service, Grandpa had been assigned to the head gardener of some high military personage in Hungary. There, he must have learned about plants and gardening. I feel sure he also had a natural talent, love for the greenery and color, and a need to create beauty around him.
I remember him so often bent over some vines or tree limbs broken by the wind or children playing the ball. Embracing the plant with both hands, like a woman around her waist, a string of raffia in his mouth, he was getting ready to tie the plant's slender body to a home-made pole or some other kind of support. He would wrap the plant with a piece of soft cloth or rubber first, and then fasten it with the string very carefully, almost tenderly. Much later, I realized he had done that to avoid bruising the plant's tender tissue.
He never liked to cut flowers to arrange them in vases or give them away. My Grandma, on the other hand, easily gave them to anyone who would ask: for the weddings, hospital visits and funerals. Without thinking, I considered it a nicer gesture. It took me some time to realize: Grandpa was not stingy; he just didn't like to kill plants or to hurt them. He nurtured and grew them, and always successfully healed them when somebody else had broken them. (As Grandpa had done before, now I collect the broken, dying plants that other people throw away because they do not look beautiful anymore. Most of the time, I win the battle with decay and dying, successfully nursing them back to life and their natural beauty).
Grandpa watered his large, lush garden early in the morning or the evening, after the hot sun had set. It smelled so fresh after the watering, as if thanking him for the thirst quenching, cool blessing of the fresh water, so necessary for the survival and well being of each tiny member in that earthly Garden of Eden: the cactus, aloe, eucalyptus, iris, geranium, carnation, lily, chrysanthemum, calla, rosemary, peony, passion flower, jasmine, violet, daisy, marigold, hollyhock, calliopes, calendula, hyacinth, verbena, narcissus, nasturtium, pansy, and other unknown to me flowers offering their beauty so freely and so quietly, their deep, magic secret waiting to be opened. They grew, flourished, and reproduced as if by Grandpa's mere presence, as if to please him and thank him for his care. And he loved them dearly. Wherever he saw a plant that he did not have yet, he would bring it home and plant in his garden that was turning into a Noah's Arc. He knew all the plants by the name, like his own children or friends. The names he used were old-fashioned and pretty. No one else used them, it seems, and they still sound to me like the beautiful music of the times before me.
In the autumn Grandpa would go from one plant to another collecting the seeds and placing them in the dried gourds of all shapes and sizes hanging in the "vajat," the large storage room always so cool from the earth floor, with two separate stairways, one leading down, to the cellar, the other above, to the attic.
I loved that "vajat." It attracted me powerfully for no known reason, except that it actually was off limits for children. The reasons were not quite explained, and all adults were using it all the time, carefully closing the door behind them. There were too many risks there, I suppose. One could fall down the stairs, for instance. But even the sound of that unusual Turkish or Hungarian word held a magic secret for me, just like the place itself: cool and semi-dark, saturated with the concoction of scents emanating from the drying herbs hanging on the walls in bunches and various seeds in the finely shaped, small gourds. Naturally, the steps to both the cellar and the attic were to be taken with caution. They always reminded me I was young, three years younger than my brother (and "only a girl," as he sometimes added).
The cellar attracted me with its dark, musty smell of the unknown. Although scary, it did not keep me away. On the contrary, I had to find out what there was in it: my curiosity was insatiable. I had to know. That cellar, for some reason, became a mental picture of the secret "lagumi" (underground passages) people claimed existed under the River Danube from the old times. I found the same image in adventure stories for children, like Tom Sawyer's kind.
In our cellar, during the season, there were huge and heavy dark green watermelons waiting to be cooled enough for eating. I loved them. They sat there, like a hope, a promise, waiting to be picked when the time comes. Once, however, when the Danube over flooded, we had water in our cellar. It repulsed me, because it smelled bad and looked dangerous. The heavy door to the cellar was closed to shut it off for the children.
The attic, on the other hand, once I had secretly climbed there, revealed a spacious, warm, light and clean area full of neatly stacked old books and magazines with beautiful pictures of wild animals, exotic lands, and famous personages. That was something I have always craved for. Nobody could keep me away from reading! I had overheard that my father, as a young men, worked hard on their land with his father, my Grandpa. During the night, secretly, instead of sleeping and resting for the next day of work, he would read. He finished his high school and college that way. When he ended up as an outstanding student, his parents were proud, of course.
In this attic, I spent many hours reading (clandestinely, I believed) the stories of the exciting times and places before my era.
From time to time, Grandpa would send me to "vajat" to bring some of the gourds with the seeds he wanted to use. I felt very privileged and "adult" then. Perhaps, I believe now, he wanted to introduce to me the vast, bounteous and exciting universe of herbs, plants, flowers and trees. I was so proud when I was useful to him, getting exactly what he wanted. In the late fall many of the plants had to be potted and moved into the house. They spent the winter on the shelves and end-tables (made by Grandpa), window-sills and chests, while many of them "dozed" through the winter in the cozy semi-darkness of the vajat-storage with the rest of the seeds, big plant pots, and the garden tools waiting for their spring revival.
There is an anecdote about Grandpa, often repeated in the family. When he returned from World War I, after a long absence from home, the first thing he noticed on entering the front yard was that the big aloe plant was missing. "Bozic vas vas, di je aloj?" ("By George, where's the aloe?") He exclaimed, enraged, even before he embraced his wife and children. Poor plant had ended as one of the War victims, frozen during the long, severe winter.
Grandpa's gardening skills went further than his large, lush flower garden. Behind the house was "bashcha," a much larger plot, with a neat strawberry patch, lettuce, tomatoes, green beans, peas, melons, honeydews, cantaloupes, gourds and some grape-vines. Here, again, were colorful flowers neatly lined, like soldiers, all along the path. But that was not all.
There was a large vineyard, too, quite a distance from home, on the other side of the Danube River in the hilly Srem region, known for good wine. The vineyard had been in the family for generations, the acres of it spread down the slope of the hill, in Dumbovo, not far from the Beochin cement factory. Next to the road leading toward the forest was the old family-house, built many generations ago. It had thick sod walls that made it comfortably cool in the summer. The floor was dirt, always perfectly clean and so pleasant for walking barefoot. The whole three-room house smelled of herbs and drying fruits that our Aunt Lubitsa (Violet) had collected for the healing of all kinds of ailments: camomile flowers for calming the nerves and bringing sound sleep, linden flowers for colds and coughs, mint leaves for good digestion. She always had milfoil for the open wounds, rose petals for clearing the skin. Between her and our mother, with their "secret" recipes, we hardly ever needed a doctor.
Two old, huge walnut trees, erect like sentinels, offered deep shade for the whole area around the house, a rich harvest of delicious walnuts every fall, while the fresh, fragrant leaves, scattered under the beds kept insects away. Those same leaves, once dried and boiled in a dark-brown tea, offered an excellent rinse for my hair, making it lustrous and silky, accentuating the red, chestnut streaks in it, while smelling fresh and natural.
The broken limbs, turned into a rustic table with two benches, next to the open-fire stove (all Grandpa's handiwork), offered a favorite spot for the family meals and repose.
About one hundred feet or so, up the hill, led a path to the "upper quarters." That was another, simple but more contemporary house with a leveled roof for sunbathing. Always neatly whitewashed, it had been built by Grandpa after we children were born. That's where we spent many happy summers during our growing years. Our mother was there with us, while father would come through the weekends.
The path between "the lower" and "the upper quarters" looked like a rich tunnel created by the heavy mass of blooming wild roses, reminding me of the story "Sleeping Beauty." The whole area was enwrapped in heavy, intoxicating aroma of mixed flowers, herbs, and ripe fruits. The overpowering noise of the humming bees feeding on the sweet nectar, the chirping birds and the busy crickets joined in a natural orchestration added to the almost too-intense-to-be-real beauty of the place.
All that unusual beauty was a part of our everyday life. Now, when I go back in my memories, I can still smell my Grandpa's garden and the flowers whose petals my brother and I used to pick and dry. Making "cigarettes" was his idea, of course. We attempted to smoke clandestinely, behind the bush, I silently choking, coughing, tears in my eyes, sure I was going to die from smoking as well as from the guilt and shame. I never complained or told on my brother, though. I never admitted that smoking was not exciting at all; for fear that he would never share anything with me again. I already knew his opinion: I was "only a girl" and "younger." Not much of a playmate. He played with me only when there was nothing better to do, and no other boys around. Our games would often end in screams (on my part). While he strongly and masculinely squeezed my arm, I softly and femininely scratched his hands till they bled. The outcome was a tie, and we went our separate ways to heal the wounds till the next fight.
There was, however, a boy of Milan's age with whom he often played. The family of the engineer Dushan Shainovic had a spacious, modern weekend house half a mile from ours. His wife, just like our mother, spent the summer vacation there with two children: a boy and a girl, just a little bit older than Milan and I, while their father worked in the city and came over the weekends. Our mothers had plenty in common and were good friends, too. I especially loved their grandma, commonly called Kaka (baby talk for Baka, grandma). She was a kind, warm woman, with hairs where men were supposed to have mustache and with cookies and cakes always ready for the visiting children. It was still obvious that she must have been a ravishing, dark eyed, Slavic beauty in her younger days. I could almost feel the warm radiation enveloping everyone in her presence.
In the evening, after the day of hard work, our neighbors would call each other shouting from one hill to another (no telephones needed) to gather around the bonfire till late into the night baking the corn-on-the-cob, whole potatoes, and apples. Men boasted about their homemade wine and "rakija lozovacha" (brandy made of the grape pulp), its color, clarity and the bouquet. Women exchanged some recipes, complained about the children and mosquitoes, and gossiped. Children spent their time best: enjoying the freedom from having to go to bed early, playing with the fascinating fire, and eating the juicy, sweet corn.
There was one spot in Dumbovo for which I felt fascination mixed with an unexplained fear. Grandpa often took me with him to bring water for drinking and cooking. The source of our water supply was the spring. Partly covered with lush, deep-green foliage, healthy and huge in size because of the moisture, overgrown with burdock, fern and moss, it was the coolest spot in the hot summer days. Coming out of that dark, shady, mysteriously quiet spot, the spring turned into a clear, wide and shallow stream jumping over the clean pebbles of all shapes and sizes, while following the road. I loved to take off my sandals and wade through the fresh, cool water of that shallow brook. During the long, heavy rains, though, water from the neighboring hills rolled into the stream turning it into a strong, muddy river that cut the country road in several places making transportation impossible. I liked to watch the Nature's interference with human plans, not understanding why Grandpa fretted and worried.
It was a great joy to go with Grandpa to bring water for the household use. Large earthenware jugs were used for the drinking water and metal buckets for the cooking and washing supplies. I had a tiny replica of a traditional rustic water jug that kept water fresh and cool, while the surface of it became dewy with perspiration. Grandpa had often explained: water had to be used sparingly because it meant life, and was not to be wasted. The water from washing the fruits and vegetables would be re-used: Grandpa would wash his feet and then pour it over the thirsty plants around the house. Never wasted!
I loved everything about going to bring water. The first part was easy: just running down the hill. The climbing up was much harder. Climbing up the steep path with the jug full of water appeared endless, especially as the sun scorched mercilessly and the hot dust burned my sensitive "city" feet.
The other option would have been to go through the field of tall, erect, lined-like-soldiers, corn. I liked to touch the silky, blond hair hanging from the tip of the cob. But, the corn was much taller than I, quite dense, and every one looked the same: it was so easy to get lost!
I never quite understood why I had felt awe and fear around the spring, yet it attracted me powerfully. Many years afterward, as a college student, I read that beautiful, magic poem "The Snake" by D.H. Lawrence and understood it immediately, recognizing something that I have always known, something that Nature silently had taught me.
Another spot that filled me with awe was the dark, big forest, distant from our vineyard. We children have never actually entered it, just touched its outskirts. Yet, that is where I imagined the stories like "Little Red Riding Hood," "Goldilocks," "Hansel and Gretel" taking place. There were a lot of blackberries there, I knew, because Grandma and Aunt Lubitsa often picked them for the homemade jam and preserve. Grandpa went there even more often for wood.
Our vineyard was large enough for all kinds of fruit trees planted and skillfully grafted by Grandpa. His apples, pears, plums, apricots and peaches were much larger than usual, with a vibrant color and healthy look. Their delicious aroma is still present in my memory. There was such an abundance of fruits that we ate them all the time, fresh from the trees, and then preserved for the winter. Mom, Aunt Lubitsa, and Grandma made jars and jars of marmalade, jam, preserve and other delicacies. My mother was especially good in preserving the natural color and aroma of the fruits. Her canning includes not only fruit but vegetables as well, especially pickled beet, cucumbers, and green tomatoes. Not one jar ever went bad. She was so proud about it, emphasizing that all it took was perfect cleanliness. But there was much more to it. The whole life-style, life philosophy that our family promoted, and we, children absorbed unconsciously, was that total approach: love and respect for nature, use but never abuse of it, promotion of the clean, natural, healthy life in all its aspects. Stemming naturally from it was a need to create healthy and naturally beautiful species. That's what my Grandpa has done all his life. A good-looking man, he had married a beautiful woman, our Grandma. Their children, my father and two aunts, were remarkably healthy, attractive and multitalented people.
There was a story that my Grandpa enjoyed telling and retelling. Only now do I fully understand how much it tells about him, too. The story was about a Montenegrin diplomat sent to Hungary on a mission long, long time ago, probably during the Austro-Hungarian occupation of the Serbian provinces. The diplomat had two children, tall and handsome, as it usually is the case with that proud, mountainous breed. Hungarian people, not commonly as tall, stopped in the streets to look at the young Montenegrins, exclaiming "Elyen a Montenegro!" (Long live Montenegro!) in admiration of their natural beauty. I understand now: just as he spent his life creating and developing healthy, beautiful species, Grandpa proudly, with great dedication and love nurtured his own off-spring: children and grandchildren.
He grew specific fruits for each of us. There was a patch, close to the old home in our vineyard, that had large, firm, white grapes, similar to the Californian white, that was called debreciner -- if I still remember it right -- like the city of Debrecen in Hungary where it must have been cultivated. Not knowing any of this, the kids simply called those grapes "kozje sisice" (goat's tits). While it grew and its white color gradually turned into an amber golden hue, my Grandpa watched it closely, so it wouldn't be eaten by the birds, before I could enjoy it. Next to it grew my other favorite sort, hamburg. Both children, Milan and I, as well as the rest of the family, loved it for it firmness, size, and delicate aroma. Plemenka and slankamenka were common local sorts, white and rosy, good table grapes, used for winemaking as well. These sorts, together with debreciner and hamburg, were sturdy enough to last throughout the whole winter, if picked carefully and hung separately. (Mother always emphasized the need for vitamin source through the bleak winter). There were some black grapes that I didn't eat, preferring the amber and pink colored sorts, especially as they were combined with the firmness of the fruit. Mother usually ate black, thick-skinned otello, used for wine because of its unusual aroma and high tannin content. Portogizer was small, skimpy looking black grape, appreciated only by Mother. It was sweeter than the rest and grown for wine rather than eating, but now I believe she ate it because she wanted to save the better sorts for her children.
The summer vacations that we didn't spend in Dumbovo vineyard, Milan and I spent in Futog, with our grandparents. Often, while we were still asleep, Grandpa would get up around 4:00 o'clock in the morning and walk about two to three miles to the bank of the River Danube. A ferry was crossing the river at 5:00 AM, usually filled with people going to their vineyards in Srem, some of them headed to the market place in Cherevich or Beocin. Grandpa would have to walk a long way before he reached Dumbovo and our vineyard. Then, he worked there all day, picked the fruits he wanted to take home with him, then walked all the way back to the ferry, loaded with heavy baskets, hanging on the wooden yokes that chafed his shoulders all along. If the ferry was not full, he could probably sit and rest while crossing the wide Danube, but that was not always the case.
The ferry returned in the evening when the sunset, and the cattle returned home from grazing. Milan and I would be playing with other children in the street. I would spot my Grandpa from the distance, approaching, his proud, fast gait changed under the heavy load. Seeing him, we would abandon the game and run to greet him, I always challenged to outrun my brother and embrace my Grandpa first. Breathing heavily but immeasurably happy, I would watch Grandpa stoop to take the baskets off his shoulder, embrace each of us, then slowly unwrap the big burdock leaves still cool and dewy, keeping the fruits fresh. Each of us would get the biggest, freshest, the most succulent fruit from the basket. It still smelled of all the inexplicable charm that our vineyard held for us. Then, all three of us, together, would walk home, excitedly chatting about the day's events. And so it would go each time Grandpa came from the vineyard. A warm, loving ritual then, a treasured memory now.
While Grandpa was in the vineyard, Grandma would get up early in the morning, too, and go to the farmers' market. Among other things, she would buy homemade cottage cheese and sour cream, also fresh buns and crescent rolls, and bring them home still warm. It was a treat to wake up to the enticing aroma of fresh rolls, the kitchen warmed by Grandma's nurturing love.
Everything was calm and rounded about Grandma, sharp and fast about Grandpa. His clothing was a black pinstriped three-piece Sunday suit, his impeccably clean, shiny shoes, freshly pressed trousers and, in winter, black coat with Astrakhan lamb collar and a matching fur hat.
There is a folk saying among the Serbs: you will recognize a good head of a household if all his knives and other cutting tools are sharp at all times. If that is so, my Grandpa definitely qualified. He always sharpened his knives while I watched in awe. Then, he would place a big bowl of homegrown cabbage in his lap and shred it for the coleslaw. Futog, where my grandparents lived, has always been known for an outstanding quality of cabbage (probably because the rich Pannonian soil came from the long gone Pannonian Sea).
Grandpa shredded his cabbage so finely, so patiently, yet so quickly, no machine could have done a better job. I never saw Grandma do it. Grandpa was good for any detailed work and therefore did his own darning and manual sewing as well. Only now I realize how it was unusual and revolutionary for his time. From some short, personal and vague remark that my aunt once had made, I -- as an adult -- realize now: he had no reason to worry about his image. Women had always found him attractive and nobody doubted his masculinity, although it was not of the common coarse, robust cussing and spitting type. Grandpa Milan was a sensitive artist and a beauty-lover amidst simple, good-natured farmers. His outstanding good looks had not passed unappreciated in the women world.
In spite of his quick, demanding ways, and his short temper, sharp like the knife he used to shred the cabbage, people knew Grandpa had a soft heart. His commanding tone probably was just a habit from his Austro-Hungarian army days. Yet, everybody went to our soft-spoken, practical Grandma for decisions and "the final word." Grandpa was respected for his artistic, imaginative, lacy woodcarvings and, especially, for his large, lush garden that, like the Garden of Eden, contained all the existing botanical species. Many of them were rare and exotic, their sweet, heavy fragrance intoxicating the air otherwise claimed by the presence of chicken coops, pig pens, horse stables, and manure mounds in the neighbors' back yards.
Simple, hardworking people lived on Povrtarska Street, commonly known as Chaira, whose name came from the Turkish word for the large pond at the end of it, where the fields started. The pond was useful to the farmers: there they washed young potatoes, before taking them to the market place; the ducks and geese, with their whole families, glided peacefully on its surface, dipping their little heads from time to time to catch a quick snack. The children, too, learned to swim, cooling themselves during the long hot summer days.
Each house in our neighborhood had children. We all played together, and although the older ones had to work in the fields during the day, at least the evenings were there for the adults to sit and relax together, while the children played. The street was swept clean, sprayed with water to cool, and the neighbors set on the benches in front of their homes discussing the crops, world politics, and the weather. This was a community time that was set aside for the exchange of the news and for keeping the close neighborhood spirit alive. Even without television, people were informed, some weddings planned, business transactions concluded, joint, community decisions made.
Next to my grandparents' home was a large Nazarene family whose pater familias Todor Stefanovic, commonly known as Tosha Chepchev, had a screechy loud voice and a big belly folded over his sagging pants. His wife, Martha, a small, mousy woman, with warm blue eyes and a pious smile, had raised nine children, a year or so apart. The youngest were running around barefoot, always chewing on a big piece of home made bread with lard on it, sprinkled with paprika. Their faces usually had traces of the previous meal, too: dark purplish homemade mulberry jam.
The whole street was lined with the mulberry trees, free food for the kids, chickens, ducks and geese, all of them eating this free nature's offering and leaving behind the inky liquid that was hard to wash off from the foot soles. A city child, as the natives of Futog often remarked, I had to wear sandals and eat bread and butter. That vaguely gave me a feeling that something must have been "wrong" with me, although people were kind not to mention it. I would have envied my playmates for their bare feet smeared with mulberries and the mouth red with paprika, but -- somehow -- there has never been enough time for that. Life in the country was too exciting and always full of new, fascinating things to experience and learn while we were there on our summer vacation.
One of my favorite things in the country was when the children acted out a real wedding. The bride was elected democratically: standing in the street, we would passionately shout the name of the prettiest girl till our voices left us and we got so tired that anyone seemed good enough. The bride got to wear her mother's, or her older sister's, real wedding gown or, at least, the headpiece and the veil. The mother would bake a real wedding cake and the preparations were long and exciting. The bridegroom was selected among the best looking and the most popular boys. My brother Milan was a bridegroom once and I was so proud. The bride was the youngest daughter of our neighbors, family Bugarski. Her name was Katherine, Katitsa (Katie, or "Little Katherine"). She really liked Milan very much, and spent long hours playing with me, although I was younger, just to be able to talk about him. She used to draw tall, beautiful women with large bust and tiny waist, on the ground in front of her house. I learned the skill from her. I just added a more urban touch: my beauties also wore high heels and had long, wild hair. So, Katitsa and I were the forerunners of the Serbian prototype of the Barbie Doll. No village girl looked like it, that's why we thought it was a "real" beauty.
I doubt that Milan ever noticed Katitsa's shy interest in him. Boys never notice anything. He was into the horses and horse riding then. And he was playing with the boys, of course. In spite of the differences, both Milan and I were very popular with the village kids. They admired our clothes, especially shoes, since they walked barefoot (except to church). On the other hand, we almost envied them: the feel of hot dust or cool mud was a memorable experience that we were not exposed to. Our mother was afraid that we might get a bad cut, so she insisted that we wear shoes or sandals.
We were fascinated by the country games and toys. They were so exciting. Our toys appeared so uncreative and we gladly replaced them with the homemade ones that we learned to make while in the country. There was a big stack of wood in our grandparent's home, used for heating in the summer as well as for cooking throughout the year. That was our favorite playing spot where we built homes made of mud, brick, and old, discarded pots and pans. Shoeboxes served as beds and baby prams, dolls made of candle wax with handmade clothes.
I will never forget the Halloween nights in the country. All the neighbors had large gardens with plenty of pumpkins and gourds to cut the Halloween masks. We would light a candle inside a carved face with big eye sockets and gaping jaws. Then, we would wrap white bed sheets around us and go around scaring people. I don't think we ever scared anyone so thoroughly as ourselves. A child's imagination is limitless and at work at all times: we never were quite sure if one of the apparitions was real, just mixed with us, kids.
The neighbor children never thought of coming to scare our Grandpa. They were in awe of him. He was different: ever so clean and neat, doing things other people didn't know how to do, and speaking about things others have never seen or heard. He had traveled in his younger days and has always been an avid reader.
The stack of old magazines kept in the attic went many years back before I was born. That is where I learned some of the exciting details of the Serbian history romanticized to the taste of the readers. How else would I have ever learned the love life and some scandalous details about King Alexander Obrenovich and his beautiful wife Draga Mashin? This was the first adult literature I put my hands on, and some details lingered in my mind for a long time. I never forgot the fact that Draga had been known to have applied fresh beef steaks on her skin and bathed in mare's milk to keep her skin soft and youthful, that she had more than one husband in her life (the second one made her a queen), and that the Queen and the King had reasons to doubt her morals!
To this day I remember another, more respected Serbian Queen, the Rumanian princess Maria, from her picture in the magazine "Illustrations." The stately portrait of the dark-eyed Queen Maria with a string of pearls around her forehead and her calm, motherly beauty touched some cord in me. Her three chubby little boys did not look any different from my brother and me except that they were princes. Later on, as a college student I found myself studying English in London, where the Serbian royal family had emigrated when World War II broke out. The three chubby little boys were grown adults, Peter (who would have been the King if it were not for the War and the political change), was often on the pages of the daily newspaper for his visits to the night clubs and bars and romancing a certain young lady. He later lived and died in the USA, much before I found myself in Kansas.
But then, when I secretly read my Grandpa's old magazines in the attic, all of this was not known to any of us yet. During the workdays our Grandpa worked and we played, on Sundays we went to church with him and Grandma stayed to cook the dinner for us.
Religion was not much discussed with the children. Grandma did teach us about right and wrong, proper and improper, though. While she was dressed in black calico, her gray hair always covered with a black headscarf, she wanted me to wear white dresses, especially to church. Somewhere in her chest of drawers she found a bolt of fine white linen that she had saved for a long, long time, only for special purposes. She had a village seamstress make me a dress with a matching white slip. She would look at me, love and pride in her eyes, dressed in white ("like an angel," she claimed) and ready to go to church.
Grandpa never missed a Sunday service. In the morning, he would take out his Sunday clothes, brushing and cleaning them to perfection. Sometimes he wore a pair of black gamaches over his shoes. I don't think anybody else wore them. People were not exactly elegant in that small village community.
My Grandpa had an unusually fast gait, but to church he went slowly, using his walking stick. That was part of the ritual, just like preparing his "Sunday clothes," or the greeting of the folks on our way.
I did not really like any of it. There was a reason, of course. Grandpa and the rest of our family, especially my mother and my grandmother, insisted that the children greet the adults with "Ljubim ruke" ("Kiss your hand") -- the proper greeting for the children "from the better homes," probably derived from the German "Küss die Hand." I had a feeling that, since the adults among themselves used "Good morning" and "Good day," the old-fashioned "Kiss your hand" was left for the little kids and other inferiors. I would usually mumble and mutter it so that nobody knew what I was saying. I thought I had found a smart solution, but it didn't work with Grandpa. He had me repeat it till it was clear and loud.
I found it so humiliating to declare the readiness to kiss people's hands (when I never sincerely meant it), that it made me very impatient to grow up and say "Hello" like everybody else. I simply detested going to church on Sunday mornings because of too many people whose hands I was supposed to kiss on my way there.
And that was not all. There was at least one more reason why I disliked going to church. First of all, it was a long, long walk from home, which was tiring in itself. Next, I had to stand still for over two hours and listen to the old Church-Slavic language of the service that I knew by heart but could not understand. All the while I was itching to talk and goof around with the rest of the children who were there nicely dressed, tightly combed and braided, washed, starched and ironed, stiff, awkward and bored, too.
My Grandpa was one of the distinguished elders with his seat first in the right row facing the altar. That was the best seat. That also was the seat that enabled him to see the area where the children stood. I knew he could see me among other kids whispering, giggling, moving around, and just showing plain impatience and boredom. I always thought the service was too long. Turning around, I would see the older folks in their seats praying or singing, the middle aged crowd standing in the middle of the church, married couples together, and the younger, single ones separated in two different corners. Nobody seemed to have had fun. I was not the only one. I would pray a little, sing a little, and still have too much time left for all the things I was not supposed to do. Grandpa, being just a little behind me, could see me whatever I attempted to do. Darn it!
Then, when the service was over, we would have to walk all the way back home greeting people left and right, I repeating my blasted "Kiss your hand," while my stomach was growling from hunger. And so it went every Sunday.
The best part of Sunday was the family dinner. It was a ritual, starting with the chicken-noodle soup, golden yellow, with big pools of chicken fat floating on the surface, steaming hot in Grandma's big tureen with a lid. Naturally, Grandpa would be served first. Without tasting the hot soup, he would add a lot of salt and pepper. Since nobody else used pepper, I understood it was a sign of male supremacy. Impatient to get to the other courses that included my favorite dishes, I would have liked to skip the soup, but it didn't work that way. Much later, I realized that my grandma's soup, as well as my mother-in-law's soup would become the best soups I have ever eaten in my life.
The chicken had been home grown, and the noodles always freshly made and cut by hand. The whole process of the noodle making was fascinating. First, Grandma would bring her large wooden board with the long pin, and clean its already perfectly clean surface, then sprinkle it with flour. She would take her bowl and mix flour and eggs with some water, then knead the dough and spread it very thinly with the wooden pin. It never broke while she wrapped it around the pin, and then sliced in quick gestures, ever so thinly, like the angel hair. Her nails were so close to the dough and the sharp knife that I did not dare to breathe, afraid that she might cut her fingers off! She would laugh and say, "Don't worry, it never happens anymore. Do you know how many times I have done it? I could almost do it in the dark." That would usually calm me down. After all, Grandma knew the best! I observed my grandma and my mother (later my mother-in-law, too), while they went through the whole process from making the dough to cutting it masterfully, always marveling at the skill resulting from years of practice. Grandma told me it was one of the talents that identified a really superior homemaker from the rest.
After the soup, on our Sunday menu, came the meat: cooked chicken with the vegetables from the soup, mainly carrots, celery, and potatoes. On some occasions there would be cooked beef as well. Everything was well cooked, tender and delicious, but I was still hard to contain, waiting for my favorite. The usual sauces served with the meat were tomato, white sauce, or horseradish. All of them -- naturally -- based on homegrown vegetables from the garden behind our back yard.
Following came fried chicken, fried potatoes, pork chops and schnitzels, "bechke i pariske," Vienna or Paris-style. Milan liked them breaded, crunchy on the outside, tender and juicy on the inside (Wiener Schnitzel); mine had to be tender and juicy altogether, therefore they were dipped in egg first, then fried, Parisian style. With this came coleslaw from Grandpa's garden. He was the one who cut the cabbage before lunch. Big cabbage heads, clean and healthy looking, would be stripped of their outer leaves, cut in half, first. Then Grandpa put a big clean towel in his lap and a large "vajndla" (German, for a metal bowl), and cut the cabbage manually, thin as Grandma's noodles. It was almost as if they competed in skills! Next, it was sprinkled with salt, vinegar, and oil for dressing, and was deliciously refreshing with the rest of food.
Grandma prepared more than just one chicken, because it was a ritual to get exactly what was known to be one's favorite part. I was a champion, since I loved it all, especially the legs, thighs, wings, and the neck. The white meat was my brother's. I considered it too dry. Often, when I saw my Grandma eat the head and feet, I thought, what a strange taste! Now, I am ashamed: I didn't recognize another act of love: Grandma gave us the first choice, she took the last. Years later, as a mother, I naturally left the best pieces for my daughter.
During W.W.II, people had to find creative ways of survival. All of a sudden, almost everyone had rabbits. Milan and I wanted a pet, too. We got two. In no time at all, we had to build more and more cages. There were more rabbits than in a zoo. There were silvery-gray ones, white angora, fluffy and red-eyed, white shorthaired, all kinds you could think of. The tiny little babies were so adorable. Milan and I regularly cut fresh grass to feed them. There were alfalfa fields, too, all around. That was their favorite feed.
We had to clean their cages, of course. I did not like that part. Grandma had warned us ahead of time, however. She also told us, one day, that we were getting dangerously overcrowded. That is when she started preparing them for food: cooked, broiled, baked, and fried... you name it. They tasted just like chicken, if you had not been told what they were. But, they were my pets, I knew them by their names, grew to love them, and could not eat them.
The same was with the baby-pigeon soup that Grandma cooked. When they didn't tell me what I ate, everything tasted much better. I cried and left the table a few times. "You'll be back when you are hungry," Grandma casually commented.
"We will see," was my stubborn, unpronounced response, but Grandma knew better. Hunger precedes and eliminates everything else. I was back, but they did not force me to eat what I found repulsive. I could not quite understand how my Grandma, that loving, good woman, could be so casual about killing for food. The neighbors were like that too. In the evening, sometimes, Grandma would plan the next-day meal and think aloud, "I suppose I will kill the old rooster for dinner tomorrow. He makes too much noise, and we already have two young ones." Grandpa would reply, "M-m-m," behind his newspaper, and that would be it. The next day, during the dinner, he would add salt and pepper to his soup, without checking it first, and eat with pleasure. The fine noodles would stick to his mustache and he would wipe them off in a casual, masculine gesture: left mustache with the left hand, right with the right hand, as if giving them the deserved respect.
The deserts in my grandparents' home were many and delicious: fruit compote; cherry, apple, poppy-seed strudels; schne-nockels (floating islands), crème pita (custard pie), and numerous kinds of cookies and small pastry. The real treat were cottage cheese crepes with raisins, baked in the oven, sprinkled with sugar and cinnamon. Nobody has ever made as delicious as my grandma or my aunt. It stays in my memory as a symbol of love and nurturing painfully missed.
After the Sunday dinner, all we could do was to crawl to the bedroom and take a nap. Since it was hard to even think, we never remembered that somebody had to clean after us.
Sunday dinners were memorable occasions, my favorite part of Sundays. That is, except when Grandpa had to tell everybody how it had been at church. Grandma would usually ask. She wanted to know who was there and who wasn't. That's when Grandpa remarked on my behavior, too. I dreaded that part as the only unpleasant thing in my whole "country experience" with my grandparents. The rest was pure, continuous joy.
One of the greatest funs were country fairs. Nobody wanted to miss them: there was something for everybody, from merry-go-rounds for children, to fortunetellers for women and horse-trading for men. I was fascinated with the ginger bread booths. Everything was so colorful! It was hard to take my eyes off the ginger bread horsemen, so proud and erect. I never saw them as colored pictures pasted on the shapes cut out of rather tasteless, cheap dough. There was no trace of ginger in them, either. Especially attractive were little slippers of all sizes, small and large red hearts with little mirrors in the middle, an appropriate gift for the village girls from the boys who didn't dare verbalize the symbol of their gift. The dolls resembled Egyptian mummies in shape, but the picture glued on the top of them showed ravishing beauties. The other side, pale, colorless and devoid of any taste, was almost like the belly of a dead frog I had seen once. I had to chew on the corner, just a tiny bit, and was quite disappointed.
"Why did you do that?" Grandma asked. "That's not for eating. You have better tasting cake at home. This is just an ornament." I didn't quite understand what she meant by "ornament," but could tell that there was a lesson about life in it. Grandma sounded upset, perhaps she didn't want me to find out about this other, colorless, tasteless, and wrinkled side of life. I didn't regret finding out. The fairs still stayed fascinating, anyway.
Nearly as exciting as the country fairs were village peddlers. In the days of my childhood they were quite rare, usually older men, often impaired at war or farm work. They traveled from village to village with a wooden box that opened into a showcase carried on the man's shoulders. That showcase contained a wonder-world of beads, ribbons, mirrors, combs, barrettes and cheap perfumes. It also contained laces, threads, needles and thimbles. Everything a village girl may want. When a peddler came to Futog, and that was not often (good things do not happen often), children would flock around him and watch in awe how his box turned into a display.
Whatever a girl, or a woman, could wish for, it would appear, not from that limited in size box but from a wonder world. The children followed the peddler mesmerized, from home to home, from street to street, forgetting their play, food, or time to go home. Often, they would wander off too far from home and get in trouble.
If the peddlers belonged to the women's world, the criers were part of the men's. They too were older men, unable to do heavy farm work, but capable of reading and memorizing the text of daily news and government regulations. They always had a little drum, which they beat to summon people to the street corners and squares. The official, bureaucratic jargon of the announcements sounded so fascinating, that I just had to follow the crier and hear him over and over again.
Once I got lost. That was not because of the village criers, however, but because of the gypsies. A group of them was passing through Futog once. They even had a big, shaggy bear tied with a heavy chain to the wagon full of chubby, dirty little gypsies. A skinny, old man was leading a bony horse, while a bunch of pretty, young gypsy girls in wide skirts and big earrings, scattered to tell the fortune and collect some food.
While the girls entertained the females, the old men untied the bear and took a tambourine. He was making some kind of noise that the old bear must have mistaken for music, because he started moving his old legs, stepping from one to another. It was interpreted as dancing, and the children cheered. Some men threw a few coins in the readily provided greasy hat. The old gypsy put more enthusiasm in his tambourine beating, but the bear couldn't move faster. He had no use for the coins, and nobody offered food or rest.
After a successful introduction, the old gypsy started pulling out of the wagon some popular products of the gypsy folklore: wooden bath tubs, dough pins, walking sticks. Men moved closer. Some of the older women approached, too, the younger ones still busy with the fortune telling. They were just at the point were a dark, tall men with mustache, rich and from a distant village, was going to propose, when an old local woman ran into the scene screeching that her best hen has disappeared and she knew whom to blame. In the overall pandemonium of the dogs barking, village girls nervously giggling, some babies crying and the women yelling at one another, the gypsies quickly packed their possessions and retrieved in somewhat challenged dignity, verbally still defending their positions, while moving away.
I was moving with them, still negotiating with a dark-eyed girl of my age. She was trying to trade her pumpkinseed necklace for my new sandals. I was quite ready for the transaction: I liked the necklace. The sandals were my mother's choice: always a bit larger ("You are still growing"), wide and comfortable ("Feet must have enough room. You are not a Japanese"). In short, although expensive, they were nothing to be proud of. (I didn't need shoes. No other child wore them in the country, except to church). I was disturbed, however, knowing that neither Mom nor Grandma would see my point. So, I offered two barrettes, even my favorite ring that left a dark circle on my finger. The gypsy girl was adamant: shoes or no trade!
We were out of the village when my Grandma appeared like Deus ex Machina and solved the problem.
She snatched my hand and dragged me from the scene, all along destroying my romantic dream about gypsy life-style. She told me how they have been known to kidnap children, cripple them, then have them beg for food and money, while they wouldn't feed or clothe them. She kept talking, scolding, and dragging me home, but -- in all the confusion -- forgot to spank me.
I was hoping it would stay that way, but life has a strange way of making it even in the end. I was not spanked, that is, my behind wasn't hot, and my head and neck were. Something itched, and burned, and I scratched and scratched, so that, in spite of her mood, Grandma noticed.
"A-ha, those dirty, lousy gypsies gave you something to remember them by," she fumed and fretted. "Don't worry. We'll fix it." As soon as we got home, she seated me on a chair, covering my shoulders with a big white linen towel. While I was waiting in silence and apprehension, she left in search of her best, strongest glasses. Now, that was unusual in itself, because Grandma had several spectacles, usually misplaced somewhere in the house. They all had something wrong with them, being either too weak, with one lens missing, falling off her nose, or broken. There was one pair, however, that was considered too special to be used. It was still intact. Grandma kept it in her chest of drawers. They have not been misplaced yet, since they have not been used at all.
The chest of drawers was special too. It contained Grandma's linen smelling of lavender and ripe quince, and it squeaked while being opened. There was a mirror on it, carved in wood (Grandpa's work) and it had a little drawer in it. I was dying to play with it, but it was off limits like the chest of drawers itself. I could play with anything in the house but that.
Here I was perched on the tall stool with a large clean towel around my shoulders and all kinds of worries in my head. I was waiting quietly for my Grandma, knowing I was in trouble. Not only because of the gypsies, but because I was aflame for an unknown reason, and Grandma was going to use her new glasses on me.
Suddenly, she came in, glasses and all, and in her hand there was something that I have never seen before. It looked like a comb, but it was made of wood and had very tight, dense teeth. I knew it was some kind of torture tool and it was going to hurt me.
My hair was always hard to untangle and combing it always hurt.
Grandma had told me that a woman's hair was her pride and mine was going to be, one day. I could tell: that day was not there yet. Grandma was not in good mood and she was getting ready to comb my hair!
"Now sit still. This comb has not been used since the War, but it will do a good job. Trust me," she said, and it sounded like a threat. Somehow, she was not talking to me. Did she talk to the gypsies? She didn't really like them, I knew. "They will steal, rather than do honest work," she had often repeated.
Right away, Grandma started savagely plowing through my already burnt scalp. I understood why she hadn't bothered to spank me. And what did she mean by the gypsies giving me the gift of "lice?" What's "lice?" They never gave me anything.
There was no arguing with Grandma, now. She was busy. Evidently, she hated the gypsies, the lice, and maybe me. She used to love me, though. But, it was before the gypsies. And, no, she didn't like my hair anymore. She's been treating it like an enemy.
Everything's changed, and I didn't understand it. I clenched my teeth, resolved not to show pain. But, I knew now: life is not fair. She could've just spanked me.
"A-ha. I knew it. A fat one," Grandma exclaimed, satisfied.
"Probably trying to raise a family," she added, and killed it. Whatever it was, she actually enjoyed killing it. My own Grandma!
When she applied a heavy coat of something greasy and stinky, it did feel better. "Kerosene," she called it. It certainly stank. But, no scratching anymore. No way I could go to play with the kids, however. I was punished all right.
But, as I always say, life has a way of making it even. The episode with the gypsies placed me automatically in the Hall of Fame in our community. Long after that children and women would be heard saying, "It was that summer when Grandma Lenka's Mira went with the gypsies." I marked the whole era. Became a landmark in my own time. The pain is easily forgotten when one is famous.
The summer was coming to an end, the crops and fruits harvested, and we had to go back to the city, to school. Like everything else, my glory tarnished and soon was forgotten.
Our grandparents had a very important role in our growth and development. I see now that they have been our role models much before we realized it. Other children, our friends, feared spanking. We didn't have to. Grandpa never disciplined us. Grandma broke her wooden mixing spoons on Milan's behind. She had a certain meaningful way of calling him when he was in trouble,"Mee-ee-lah--nay..." we knew unmistakably that she would break another mixing spoon on his shiny spot where the pants stretched to the bursting point. But, it was easy to forget, too.
Everything else outweighed those small, negligible inconveniences.
Grandpa died when I was fifteen. He lived seven years after Grandma had died. Only after her death it became obvious how much he needed her. He became so quiet and unnoticeable, weakening gradually. He was not tall and erect as before, and he walked slowly, carefully. My proud Grandpa Milan! Walking miles to the vineyard was too much for him anymore, and he could not carry the heavy load on his shoulders either. He wanted to go there, though. Even to just sit on the warm ground, supported by the house wall, basking in the sun and guarding the vineyard, always keeping busy, always fixing something. An old friend of his, the city commissioner's father, often came to visit.
"Have you been turned out of the house, too?" he would ask naively. "They are telling me I cough too much and bother the children. Oh, well, that's all right. I do cough too much, I know. But they give my son's clothing all the time. That helps. They feed me, too. Life is still good."
Grandpa always told us what they talked about. Quite a character, that old man. Reminded us vaguely of Balzac's "Father Goriot." We didn't mind if Grandpa gave him food and shared some of our fruits. We had no time to think about it, then.
High school students, our heads full of significant formulas and famous quotations, we felt things were becoming serious and important. There was less time for Grandpa and the country. In the summer we started going to the student camps in Dalmatia.
Gradually, everything changed. Grandpa and his garden, too. He did not go to church anymore. It was too far. When Grandma died, our Aunt Lubitsa moved in with Grandpa to take care of him. She cooked for him, using the same old wooden spoons broken by Grandma disciplining Milan.
When Grandpa died, we sold his home, his garden, everything. No, not the vineyard. Grandpa used to say: "When I die, the weeds will take over." But, it did not happen. My father left his law office early on weekends and holidays to take care of the family vineyard. Like Grandpa, he always carried some baskets back and forth. He cleaned the bushes and the greenery growing wild. He replaced some old vines with the new, better sorts. But, the old family home, "the lower quarters," started falling apart. The plants and flowers deteriorated. The apples and pears did not grow so big and wholesome anymore. Even the spring of water shrank, dried up, and nearly lost in the lush greenery.
The forest had been partially cut down. There were rumors that the whole area would be turned into a resort. A large artificial lake would be built and a few modern hotels.
But, the road to the vineyard has never been built, as Grandpa and Dad hoped all their lives. It wore out so it could not be used for vehicles, especially after some rain. It was harder and harder for Dad to get there. He was not young anymore.
Returning from a long trip to USA, to see his son and his grandchildren, he went to the family vineyard. It was sunny and mild, in August of 1975. My husband and I, with our ten-year old daughter were at the Adriatic Coast on a vacation. A big storm came over the hilly Dumbovo area, while my father sat in his favorite wicker armchair to rest after hard work. "I'm like the old Forsythe watching his property with pride," he had often remarked. The rain was coming down heavily. Some neighbors, rushing home, called, "Get into the house, Chika Nikola." Everybody liked his sunny nature and sense of humor.
Hours later, after a big storm, when they came out, he was still sitting in his chair, smiling.
It saddens me to know that, after my father's death, I had to break the family tradition and sell the vineyard. There was no one left to take care of it. Like my brother, I too moved to the United States. I could take with me only the valuable memories and leave other possessions behind. Somebody else will enjoy them.
But my brother is right: with age, I do resemble my Grandpa Milan more and more. That, and my memories of my happy childhood with my grandparents, nobody can take away from me.