I asked my friend Pat Prather, a talented photographer for 8 Eyes Photography and a brilliant artist, to create a memory board that I could mount in my kitchen. It would be a place to put precious photographs and mementos so that I could see them every day.
Pat Prather’s Steampunk/Nouveau Memory Board. (Photo by 8 Eyes Photography)
Pat created not just a work of art, but a story told through the steampunk sculpture that surrounds the handcrafted frame, a story about a fairy who breaks time so that the memories can remain alive forever. (You can read about his process here.)
Close-up of fairy. (Photo by 8 Eyes Photography)
I’m nostalgic, increasingly so as I get older. I often think back fondly to people I’ve loved, places I’ve called home, adventures and conversations that have had an impact on me. I’m grateful for them, really grateful for these experiences. They are treasures, and even as I look forward to the future, I am gratitude for everything and everyone who has brought me to this point.
“The Greek word for “return” is nostos. Algos means “suffering.” So nostalgia is the suffering caused by an unappeased yearning to return.”
― Milan Kundera, Ignorance
I wanted the memory board to be a place to mount those sentimental treasures, and they are frozen there, snapshots into important moments. I’m slowly printing out photographs to affix to the board. Some are obvious choices: the dearest of family and friends. Others inspire, challenge or remind me, like the photograph of Gene Wolfe and me that I added last week.
Close-up of Pat Prather’s Nouveau/Steampunk Memory Board
On May 7th, I met Gene for lunch to celebrate his 82nd birthday. Each time we meet, we chat about our lives and works in progress. I always enjoy Gene’s stories about writers he’s known, places he’s traveled, stories he’s read–so many memories, so much history. On the drive back to Chicago, I’m often lost in some Gene-inspired reverie or creative provocation.
This time, Gene mentioned an exercise attributed to Benjamin Franklin called “Imitating the Style of the Spectator.” The idea is that a writer should choose a piece of writing by an author he/she admires. After reading it over many times, the writer should hide the original text away and attempt to write the story from memory. Once it’s completed, the writer should refer back to the original and note the differences: the places where he or she forgot a detail, or did not capture the same mood or character, or had trouble with dialogue, and so on.
Gene did the exercise early on in his writing career with one of his favorite Lord Dunsany stories, The Assignation. He explained that there is much to be learned by studying the craft of the masters.
He’s right, of course. Gene Wolfe is a Master. This weekend,Gene Wolfe will be honored by the SFWA with the Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Awardfor his contribution to the literature of Science Fiction and Fantasy. I am grateful for lessons I’ve learned not just from his writing, but from his friendship.
Just below the photo of Gene and me is a photograph taken from last year’s Fuller Awards to honor Gene Wolfe. That one has a group of people who are both dear and an inspiration. They each inspire me in their own way: to keep writing, to strive for excellence, to learn from the examples of the past, to connect with others. That night was one of those important moments in my life, a night to remember.
Unlike Pat’s fairy, we cannot break time (except in stories). Time will continue with or without us.
But I find that nostalgia can work like a touchstone. Memory and nostalgia motivate me to reach for the stars, to step into the chaos of creativity, knowing that I am grounded in the past and am part of a continuum that stretches backward and forward in time. Just like Gene’s exercise about writing from memory, there’s much to be learned from the intersection of what is and what is remembered.
Some months are so full they rush by in a blur. April 2013 was like that. After ICFA, there was a Spring roadtrip, followed by C2E2 and a wonderful meeting (resulting in an exciting announcement to be made in the near future). In between, there were family obligations, book club and school visits, beloved dead to be remembered, and deadlines to be met.
Then came May and finally Spring. Warm weather arrived, and with it the joy of open windows and fresh breezes that make a morning cup of coffee taste even better.
Yesterday was Ukrainian Easter (celebrated according to the Julian calendar). We began our day with the traditional breakfast of eggs, rich egg bread, beets mixed with horseradish, “lamb” butter, cheese, ham and sausage. All of it was blessed in baskets adorned with embroidery on the afternoon before in the church parking lot. I love this tradition, probably because it’s tied to food, and the sharing of meals is so important to me and my family.
I remember our first Spring in Frankfurt, Germany, in 2003. I was able to find a small Ukrainian community that had services out of a Roman Catholic church. That year we blessed our basket in the courtyard alongside Ukrainians born in Germany and those recently from Ukraine. Our baskets were nearly the same, adorned with varying styles of Ukrainian embroidery.
Looking around, that was my first experience of how important community must have been for my grandparents transplanted to Chicago from Ukraine after WWII. There is comfort is celebrating beloved traditions, even on foreign soil with people you do not know.
Food also helps us to connect–an ocean between us, on different land, we can still eat the same kind of foods, the same basic recipes, passed down from grandparents to parents to children and on and on.
Recipes are a lot like stories: they can be carried and shared; they can be written down or remembered; they vary from region to region, incorporating the influence of the land and people around them. Recipes also have the ability to transcend time and space, to connect us to those who have gone and to those who are yet to come. Like stories, they’re a little bit of magic. They provide us with opportunities to remember and reconnect.
Over the last decade, I have been slowly building up my recipes. I’m not very organized and I’ve never scrapbooked, but this thing I have somehow kept up. I don’t usually print them out, choosing instead to write each recipe on a card, adding notes, crossing things out as I adapt a dish.
It’s always been important to me. My box of recipes is one of the few things that has travelled around the world with me. Maybe it’s because I see it as a sister activity to writing and storytelling? Maybe it’s because I hope that someday those recipes will provide my children and grandchildren with a window into my life–the treasured meals I have been able to share with them and other people I hold dear. Maybe it’s because writing a recipe down feels like preserving a little of the magic.
If you have ever shared a meal with me, I thank you.
If you’ve ever given me a recipe, rest assured that it is treasured.
If you’d like to share a recipe, I would be honored to add it to my collection.
When I do interviews or visit with book clubs, people often ask how I could write about an elderly woman in The Silence of Treeswith such authenticity.
Sometimes I answer with a variation of, “She’s certainly inspired by people I’ve known.” This is true, but…
Other times I give the more esoteric (but slightly more honest in my opinion) answer of , “I don’t know. She came to life in my imagination and is as real as a memory.”
There are fragments of me in Nadya’s character, although most are subtle.The biggest connection that we share is our nostalgia. Nadya revisits the Past like a heartbroken lover. She holds onto people, stories, scents, songs. She’s sensual and her memories are triggered by the most simple cues, like the smell of the tomato plant.
I understand this. For me the past is a definite touchstone.
Yesterday I went with my parents to visit my grandparents—my father’s parents in Chicago’s Ukrainian Village. My Baba is 88, my Dido is 93. They still live together in the small house where they have lived for as long as I’ve been alive.
When I walked in my grandfather was sitting in his recliner, by the window. The seat goes up and down to help him when he needs to stand. He is frail, but solid. He has always seemed grounded to me, substantive. Even as he grows more thin and withdraws into himself, he still seems sturdy.
“Hi, Dido!” I said loudly (He’s nearly deaf.) I gave him a big hug and kiss, then kissed the top of his bald head for good measure.
“Chih taw, Valya?” he asked in Ukrainian. (“Is that Valya?”)
I shouted in his ear, “Tak!” (“Yes.”)
He smiled, and it was the same smile he has given me since I was a little girl. I didn’t notice that he didn’t have his teeth in. All I saw was the way his face lit up, his eyes brightened, and the wrinkles faded for a moment. Everything shifted except those eyes and that smile. It was easy to see him the way he exists in my mind’s eyes, the way his will always be in my memory.
His eyesight is not failing, but his memory is beginning to fray a bit. Luckily my round face still resembles the face of my youth.
“Oh, Valya! Deh deetih?” he asked me. (“Where are the children?”)
I explained loudly that they were at school, and we were only staying for a short visit.
My father was dropping off a new walker for my Baba, my grandmother. It matches the one my grandfather has. She was pleased.
“It’s very good,” she said to my father in Ukrainian. “I promise to use it. Even in the grocery store.”
Twice while we were there she walked off without it, leaving the new walker in the kitchen. My father scolded her, reminding her that it’s there to be used. My Baba has fallen too many times, her bones are fragile now, her curves faded into the hanging folds of skin beneath her clothes.
My grandparents 1996
There was a time when my Baba was the epitome of a robust, curvy grandmother. Always cooking and baking, she welcomed guests into her home with an abundance of food set before them. Yesterday she looked thin, and it was unlike her. Again the reality did not match up to the memory, and while my grandfather’s health is worse than hers, he seemed more solid than she. She seemed more fragile.
Although we all live in Chicago, I haven’t seen my grandparents in weeks. I’m ashamed to admit it. It hasn’t been often enough. There has been so much else going on with the holidays, my projects, my sister’s challenges, and general life happenings. It hasn’t been enough.
“I miss my family,” my Baba said in Ukrainian. “It gets lonely all alone here. Your Dido,” she motioned with her hand in his direction, then shrugged, “he doesn’t hear me. His life is eating and sleeping now. I miss my children, and their children.”
My aunts and uncles and cousin visit. Several work and live nearby, but it must be such a contrast to their lives before, when the house was filled with 6 children, then with even more grandchildren often stopping by after Ukrainian school or dancing practice or church.
They are still at the roots, my grandparents, but how much further away are the branches of our family tree as our lives veer off and grow in new directions?
We only stayed for a short visit this time, long enough to hear about the latest funerals, my grandparents’ health, the state of their pantry and icebox.
“Just a few more minutes,” my Baba asked as we moved to leave.
“If you had your way, we’d stay here until 6 in the evening,” said my father.
“No!” said my Baba, “If I had my way, I would keep you here until midnight. When the devils come out.” She grinned.
“Do you have any devils?” my father teased back.
“Just that one,” she said, and motioned to my grandfather in his recliner, gazing out the window.
Earlier that day, my father had asked me how many copies my novel had sold last year. I couldn’t tell him the numbers for paperbacks and hardcovers, but I know that my kindle sales were over 45,000 ebooks sold in 2011.
I knew he wanted to share this with my grandmother.
“Mama,” he said, “Guess how many books Valya has sold?”
“Maybe 150?” she offered.
“45,000!” he said.
Her eyes got wide, and then she said to me, “You know, you get that from me. From my family. Not from him,” she gestured toward my grandfather.
She then went into the story of how her grandfather was mayor of their town back in Ukraine, and her father a musician who taught her how to read by copying poetry in her notebook.
I had heard the history before, of course. When my father was a State Senator, my Baba used to tell me that he got it from her, from her family. It was nice to see that same pride in my Baba’s eyes, to see that spark I remembered. My Baba was always a force to be reckoned with.
“Can you believe it, Mama?” my father asked. “45,000 people have read about a Ukrainian woman who came to America after WWII. They read about our traditions, out stories. Can you believe it?”
She smiled. “Is it translated yet? Into Ukrainian?”
My heart sank a little. I had always hoped my grandparents would be able to read my writing. I told her not yet, but I hoped it would be soon.
After a few more minutes, we said our goodbyes. We had limited time and planned to visit the Displaced Persons exhibit at the Ukrainian National Museum before I had to get home to pick up the kids from school.
“Come back,” my Baba said with a hug, “and bring my great-grandchildren.”
My Baba waved in the doorway, the same way she has waved for decades, and I wished that we had more time.
My parents and I next stopped at the museum to see “From DP to DC, Displaced Persons: A story of Ukrainian Refugees in Europe 1945 – 1952.” Many people had donated items from their time in the DP Camps, or things they had inherited from their parents or grandparents. It was eerie, to see physical manifestations of things I had written about, to see so many photographs and letters, sketches and legal papers from WWII and the time after.
When I began to research The Silence of Trees in the 90s, I didn’t have access to this much information, to this level of detail. Some came from oral and written communication with former DPs, some came from books. This was the real thing.
My parents walked through pretty quickly, but I felt like I had slipped back into the world of my novel, except instead of inside my head, here it was in fragments under glass.
The items were mostly in display cabinets, but oh how I wanted to touch them! They seemed so familiar, as if they were the very items handled by my fictional characters in their fictional experience of a real war and a real immigration. What an odd feeling, as if suddenly I stood before the Mad Hatter’s hat or the magical wardrobe or Pooh’s honeypot. Only these were characters out of my own imagination.
Eerie and sacred and strange.
I had woken up that morning with a lump in my throat and had gone through the day in the oddest mood, emotional and near tears for no apparent reason. It was one of those days when I just felt raw. Perhaps for that reason, the visit with my grandparents and the visit to the museum were so provocative, so emotional.
I had lunch with my parents at Shokolad, a really wonderful Ukrainian restaurant in Chicago. The meal was excellent, but I didn’t feel like small talk. I was already taking notes in my head—for this blog entry— to try and hold onto the day, to hold onto the experience of a glimpse into my own fictional world, to hold onto something precious even as it was slipping further away.
I believe in the inscription I sign into copies of The Silence of Trees: What is remembered—lives.
It applies for places, people, ideas, and characters. So I write this, as a reminder.
A picture of my Baba with the kids last Fall 2011.My Dido with the kids last Fall 2011.
