Dobryd

by Ann Charney

  All this activity took place on a vast square of ground that still contained the outline of the buildings that had once stood there. As soon as it was cleared of the ruins, the first stalls appeared. These were erected practically overnight, with great ingenuity, from the materials that lay scattered about. Soon the entire square was covered with shops. When all the vacant space was used up the original builders began to lease parts of their kiosks to those who arrived after them.

  The peasants, who had at first stayed away from the town, began to explore the possibilities of trading in the marketplace. Early in the summer they began to come into town with their supplies, which they had kept well-hidden. For the first time since our arrival we saw fresh butter, eggs and vegetables for sale. These were greeted with the kind of excitement that must have welcomed the first merchant traders back from China.

  The square was filled with noise and activity from dawn till dark. Everyone came: civilians, refugees, peasants, soldiers, nuns from a nearby convent, transients making their way west towards Germany or east to Russia, the old, the young, and even the few stray dogs that had survived to return here stubbornly in spite of the harsh reception that met them daily.

  People came for food, clothes, furnishings, entertainment. They came for papers and passports. They bought new identities and acquired convenient new families. They came looking for work, for travel permits, for anything at all. Many of them came and stayed without purpose—a silent crowd of onlookers whose arrivals and departures went without notice. Whatever the need, the market was everyone’s best hope.

  Scraps of information were valued as highly as goods, and people paid dearly to learn facts concerning their friends and relatives. It often turned out that they had been tricked or lied to, but this did not prevent others from taking their place and paying for similar information.

  Sometimes it did happen that people who had given up hope of seeing each other again were reunited among the stalls. Such meetings were of course very rare. Yet everyone who came to the marketplace lived in anticipation of them. Emotions always ran high, and every new arrival quickened the hopes of the many who lived in uncertainty.

  When my aunt and I first came to the marketplace the only goods we saw came either from the Soviet army’s supply stores or from scavengers who spent their time sifting through the ruins. Then the peasants began to arrive and everything changed. They brought with them not only their farm produce but also a rich variety of luxury items, hidden or left in their safekeeping by some of Dobryd’s wealthiest citizens.

  Most of these objects were strange to me. I had no idea what function they had once performed. I approached them as displays in a museum, all the more mysterious since they lay there without any form of identification. I wandered among them, fascinated and intrigued. I vaguely sensed that I had come upon the remains of a civilization which, although quite foreign to me now, had once been a part of my life.

  In the weeks following the German retreat, the peasants realized that there was little chance that rightful owners would return to retrieve possessions stored in haste before fleeing. The few who had survived and did manage to return usually lacked the strength to assert their claim to any of their former possessions. The peasants became more and more daring. Precious, luxurious objects filled their stalls. Very quickly we all became accustomed to seeing these items displayed side by side with the more familiar vegetables and sacks of grain.

  When my aunt had sold the few things she brought with her in the morning, she would take my hand and we would wander in the alleys of the marketplace, this time as potential buyers or spectators.

  On our way we would pass stacks of fine linen, handmade lace tablecloths and samplers of intricate embroidery. All this, my aunt would explain as she identified the objects for me, might have belonged to a bride’s trousseau, started in childhood. Elsewhere, we would come upon displays of silverware with the monograms or seals of their former owners blatantly exposed. Stocky peasant women, their hair tied up in flowered scarves, sat in the midst of shops filled with the loot of war. Casually, as they chatted with each other, their hands would stray to the nearby objects, settling for a moment on some delicate silver or gold combs, picking up some small box, inlaid and encrusted with jewels, passing with indifference over the beautifully carved hair brushes, the matching hand mirrors, the gold chains weighted by pocket watches that no one bothered to wind.

  I could have remained before these objects for hours if my aunt hadn’t prodded me on. She, who had grown up in luxury and comfort, walked impassively past these riches, or so it seemed to me.

  “Look over there!” I would shout, pulling at her hand to direct her attention at something that had caught my eye. “Yes, yes, I see,” she would answer in a tone of voice that told me that she could not possibly have seen what I meant. I would become more insistent, demanding that her excitement match my own. Finally, growing impatient, she would take hold of my hand and firmly pull me in another direction.

  I could not understand her lack of interest. Yet other shoppers ignored them as well. I noticed that many people looked away when they came close to these luxuries. For the most part they were the playthings of the farmers’ children. I became certain that there was a mysterious story attached to these objects, some secret that the grown-ups did not want to talk about. It was hard not to pester my aunt with questions, even though I sensed that they made her uncomfortable. There was so much to see, however, that my attention never stayed fixed on one object for long.

  When we had finished our purchases, we usually walked over to the section of the market where prepared foods were sold. Throughout the day, the odours of cooking that came from this area pervaded the entire market. Since everyone was usually hungry, the effect of these smells was highly intoxicating. The briskest trade, the quickest turnover, occurred here.

  My aunt, who could never bear to disappoint me, would urge me to choose something, even though we both knew the extravagance would annoy my mother. The choice was not easy. There were so many things I liked. The dishes the farmers made were the kind they normally ate themselves—some combination of flour and potatoes flavoured with fried onions or cabbage. There was a dessert that I particularly liked—deep-fried slices of apple—called apples-in-pyjamas. The name was the chief reason I chose it so often.

  The day passed quickly for me. When it grew dark we made our way home. Often my mother and Yuri would already be there waiting for us. If they were not too tired, or too preoccupied with other matters, I would be allowed to tell about my day in the market. I loved those moments. We sat around the table and I held their attention with my words. It would have been hard for me to decide at that time which I enjoyed more—the experience itself or the opportunity it gave me for reworking that experience into a story.

  At this time the marketplace seemed to me all wonder and enchantment. I saw it with the eyes of a five-year-old. But somehow, while I created games and stories around it, my mind also absorbed other kinds of information which at the time I could not understand. Years later I realized that the transactions of the marketplace, the ordinary daily events that had filled my imagination, had had a deep, long-lasting influence. They were my first lessons in the rules of life and I did not forget them. Many of the discoveries I made later in life seemed to have been foreshadowed by the events I watched from my aunt’s booth in the marketplace.

  III

  We were settled in Dobryd and our life had acquired its own rhythm. We had our home, my mother worked for the Russians as a translator, and my aunt spent her days in the marketplace, selling and trading. My uncle had returned to his regiment and it was some time before he rejoined us. I had no school to go to, and so for the most part I did as I pleased.

  I was never lonely or bored. My days were filled with the excitement of constant discovery. For one thing, at about this time I became involved with other children for the first time in my life. At first there were no children in our building, but the street was
full of them—children who roamed the town in gangs of all ages, ignored by everyone else.

  Where had they come from, I wondered. Who were they? Somehow I had always known that other children existed, even during the days in the loft. But this was different. They were not as I had imagined them. Nothing in my past had prepared me for the experience of actually being with them, sharing their games, becoming a part of their world. I was something of a freak amongst them. I could read and write and recite long poems and keep still for hours, but I had no idea what children did when they played together, nor what it meant to be part of a group. I came to them with the conception of myself as a unique, solitary person, distinct and separate from all others. It never occurred to me that I might find my likeness in another being.

  But these children seemed not to notice anything peculiar or special about me. I was just another kid, in a world where the word “normal” had lost its meaning. When I was with them, running down a street, I felt that for that moment we were all alike. My own private self seemed to fall away, and I felt myself change, blending physically with other arms and legs that mimicked my own, with voices that drowned mine.

  Sometimes it seemed to me that I was two people—one running, laughing, indistinguishable from the rest, the other, hidden, watching, marvelling at their freedom and my own abandonment.

  In the days that followed I acquired two particular friends of my own. A Russian boy, Kolek, and a Polish girl, Eva. They were about six years old, as I was by then, and lived nearby. They had always played with other children and they accepted our new friendship quite casually. I, however, found myself in a constant state of excitation when I was with them. I could not grasp how they understood each other so well, or how they knew what each expected of the other. Yet, very quickly, I was behaving with similar ease with them. I became familiar with the language of children, and passed from observer to participant.

  It was understood between us that our friendship had to exist outside our homes and unknown to our families. We only sensed the hatred and the painful memories so prevalent in the minds of adults around us. We realized, however, that in our joy in each other we possessed something uncommon to the times, and we treasured it.

  We seldom visited one another’s homes. We knew very little about one another’s lives outside of our play group. Our families left us alone, thankful that we managed to stay out of their hair. In our post-war world, the distinctions between conquerors, refugees and vanquished were blurred in the common struggle to keep one’s body fed and covered and one’s bed warm. Beyond that there was little energy left over. We children were mostly ignored and forgotten.

  Our games were played in the ruins of the buildings around us, or in the streets, where the barricades of the city’s last defence became our hideout. Holding each other’s hands and helping each other over obstacles, we explored the nearby ruins. Almost all civilians lived by scavenging, and the ruins had already been well-picked for anything that could be used or sold. Yet we managed to find objects either overlooked or unwanted by previous scavengers. We treasured these and hid them in secret places. Occasionally we would bring out our finds with great caution and reverence, as we had seen the peasants bring out a treasured relic on feast days.

  Amongst our prizes there were some photographs. The people in them were strangers and they posed in happy groups at long-past family celebrations. We were especially interested in the children in these pictures, the clothes they wore, the way their hair was combed, the toys they sometimes held. We invented names for them and thought of them as our friends.

  One photograph in particular intrigued me. It showed a beautiful, elaborate merry-go-round, its arrested movement while children sat astride them, holding on to their harnesses or their necks. None ornamented horses caught in different positions of of us had ever been to an amusement park. Nor did we know what a merry-go-round was. But we needed no explanations. The expressions on the faces of the children in the photograph assured us we were looking at something which caused great pleasure. Through the photograph we somehow felt as if we were sharing this pleasure. We treasured it and took turns making up stories about what it portrayed.

  The adults in the photographs intrigued us as well. They were the visual echoes of a past we would never know. So little of it had imprinted itself on us that we could look at these photographs without nostalgia, but with the curiosity of small savages confronted with mysterious artifacts.

  In time we became quite possessive about the people in the photographs. They were no longer anonymous faces. We gave them names, and a sense of familiarity grew out of our longings. Each one of us lived in a household that represented the broken remnants of ordinary family life. The missing members were constantly evoked for us by the adults, and we lived with their faceless, ghost-like presences. In our photographs we found characters to people our ghost-ridden homes. Soon we disputed among ourselves about these smiling images, each claiming them for his or her family tree.

  A piece of flimsy white material found in the rubble of a nearby building became another of our special treasures. We did not know where it came from. Possibly it had once been a part of someone’s white tulle curtains. It became to us our magic mantle. When any one of us carried it we felt ourselves invested with the presence of the people and the events we re-enacted through our games.

  One of our favourite games originated in an event portrayed in the photographs. It was a wedding party on the point of leaving church after the ceremony. We knew little of what this meant but we understood that it was a celebration of some kind. Lacking precise details we recreated our own version of this event with immense pleasure. Our bit of tulle became a bridal veil. Around it we created a sequence of events which became increasingly elaborate and complex. After a time we began to have difficulty in remembering all the steps required in the rites we ourselves had invented.

  Unlike ordinary children we did not parody reality. Somehow we had an enormous need to forget it. Instead of recreating the roles of adults as we saw them, we preferred fantasy and invention. Yet there was little to encourage us in that direction. We had to rely totally on our own resources, and these seemed to bloom in response to our needs. Our times together were filled with rich and inventive games that I recall, even now, with pleasure.

  From that time on, fantasy-playing became an essential daily routine of my life. When my friends were not around I carried on by myself. I never thought of it as an escape or a substitute for the sad drabness of our life. For me it was part of the reality of our life, just as much as my visits to the marketplace or the stories my aunt told me about the past.

  I grew up thinking that all children spent their free time in this way, participating vigorously in an imaginary world that was as vivid as anything that they actually experienced. It came as a great surprise to me in later years to discover how different other people’s childhoods had been.

  PART THREE

  I

  Life inside our flat was beginning to change. Inevitably, like everyone around us, my family was making its adjustments to the world in which we lived. Their behaviour acquired a semblance of conformity, and I was relieved that we were no longer avoided as we had been in the army camp. For the time being, the past which separated my mother and aunt from other survivors had been successfully camouflaged.

  I began to notice a change in them. While I had been totally occupied with exploring the world of children, games, the streets, the marketplace, they had returned to life. I suddenly realized that not only could I become like other children but they too were beginning to resemble, more and more each day, other “normal” adults.

  Now when we walked together through the streets of Dobryd, they were indistinguishable from other passers-by. Like everyone else they wore drab army-surplus clothes. Their hair was long, braided and twisted around their heads in thick coronets. Their bodies were no longer skeletal, but filled out and rounded like my own. Their anonymity was further enhanced by the fact t
hat the post-war population of Dobryd was almost entirely new. People did not talk easily about their former lives. Old social and class distinctions had no meaning in this setting. My mother and my aunt were treated by their neighbours with the familiarity of equals, and they in turn were content not to evoke the past in the presence of strangers.

  When the three of us were alone, however, it was another matter. Then the present receded like a clever but flimsy backdrop. My mother and my aunt abandoned their ordinary, everyday masks worn for outsiders, and became different people. With my aunt as guide, I was led away from the familiar, in another direction: towards the past. Not the immediate past which I remembered vaguely, but to a time further back whose distance from the present seemed to me inconceivable.

  Slowly, over a period of months, through different, often unrelated stories, I became aware of a remote world, the world that had vanished before my birth. I still continued to live in the present, and in the intervals between my aunt’s stories I often forgot about the other world, but somehow I was no longer as satisfied with the present as I had been before the stories began.

  Even at that early age, I resented that other world which returned to mock my own. When I grew older, it seemed to me that all my particular problems had their source in this profound gulf between the present and the past, across which I was expected to build a new life. At different times I turned against one and then the other, pretending in turn that they didn’t matter, until I felt forced to admit that they did. In any case, in both worlds I always thought of myself as an intruder, an imposter, doomed to live in perpetual exile.