Zadie sighed over her fan, making a twirling motion at her temple. “Sam is ludi.”
Roberta, not even moving from her lounging position, giggled.
“I love ludi Sam,” I said. “Ludi Zadie. Ludi Roberta.”
Roberta sat up now and slid her glasses over the crown of her head. “Ludi,” she said to me. Then, plain as day: “Crazy.”
I hugged her suddenly and hard, American style. I knew her sisters had been drilling her in English. Zadie clapped. “Good job, Roberta!” she cried.
I’d been honing my own Croatian in preparation for having Roberta alone for the first time. If she needed something from me, she couldn’t ask for it, and so the night before, I sat in my rocking chair and studied important phrases, such as “Are you hungry?” and “Are those Italians bothering you?” I wanted things to go smoothly so Roberta would have good memories of the day. Roberta was a tough little girl who wheeled around Mrkopalj on a tiny bicycle. She was shy, which made her appealingly quiet, and she kept Zadie entertained. This meant I spent significantly less time in public restrooms. I loved Roberta.
Jim returned to our table with drinks and surveyed our group. “Looks like everybody’s peaceful,” he said. “This is probably our most low-stress beach trip so far.”
As such, this realization was our first triumph of the day. We’d gotten at least as far as our first coffee break without incident. Though we’d passed through dread Rijeka, we hadn’t even gotten lost.
We left the café and arrived in Mošćenička Draga (I couldn’t even begin to tell you how it’s pronounced), where we whipped into a parking spot, only mildly scraping the Peugeot’s bumper against a small boulder. Between the lot and the water was a long, tree-lined promenade, set up with kiosks. I held hands with the girls and we slowly made our way down the shady path, browsing tchotchkes. Roberta, Zadie, and I looked at one another with big eyes when a group of young Italian men in tight Speedos tried to order ice cream. There was much gesturing as they argued over flavors and pricing. One of the men walked away in disgust, brushing past Zadie. The girls watched him go, pointing at his tiny swim suit, dissolving into giggles.
Jim and Sam hurried away from us, toward the beach. By the time the girls and I caught up to them, they’d rented a beach umbrella and chairs from an enterprising guy on the boardwalk. We staked our claim on a patch of white cinder shore. Jim and Sam waded into the water, snorkeling around in search of fish that in America we’d have to drive to Petco to see.
The girls stripped down to their swimsuits and wandered a few steps away to where the water lapped the shore, picking through the rocks to find the perfect one.
And then … I sunbathed.
I stretched out my toes at the end of the lounge chair. My skin prickled in the late-summer sun. I closed my eyes and basked. I thought, This is the kind of thing I’ll daydream about when I’m in the retirement home, smoking Camel Wides and drunk on gin.
Yes, I sunbathed on that beach for more than ten minutes. Less than fifteen, but definitely more than ten. Every now and then, the girls would need a potty break or an ice-cream cone. But mostly, I tanned.
This was the second triumph of the day.
The third triumph was Sam’s. After we’d dried off, gathered our things, and piled back into the Peugeot, the kids announced that they were starving. I had to concur.
It would take us about a half hour to get to the beachside restaurant we’d read about on the Internet. It was my habit to interview the children to pass the time in the car. I’d ask questions like “If Earth faced total destruction, what would you miss most, our dog or our cat?” or “If you could forcibly dominate any planet, what planet would that be?” The usual lighthearted Mom stuff.
“Sam Hoff, first question,” I began, just as the whining in the backseat threatened to ruin our good day.
“Yes!” Sam perked up.
“What are your favorite activities?” I asked.
“Number one is taking Bobi the dog for walks,” he said. Jim and I exchanged looks. Number one had always been a television-related activity.
“Number two is snorkeling.”
Jim gripped the steering wheel. Number two had always been a toy of some sort. This was getting good.
“Number three is swimming. Number four is reading Diary of a Wimpy Kid books.”
Both a mental and a physical activity! Crazy!
“Five is riding my bike. Six is when me and Zadie roller-skate in the driveway with Roberta.”
Jim and I exchanged a silent high five when Sam finished his list. I looked back at Roberta, who was holding hands with Zadie and grinning at Sam with her white kernel teeth. “Ludi,” she said.
I’d count the dinner on the pier overlooking the Adriatic in a restaurant that bordered on nice as a triumph, but I didn’t get to sit through my whole plate of pasta with fresh scallops because the kids kept wandering over to the lobster tank. Since Jim lives in constant fear of our children being stolen by pedophiles, we had to take turns keeping vigil over them, though that tank was only about nine feet away.
Still, I think a nice meal with both cloth napkins and kids makes for a solid bonus point, if not a full-on triumph.
chapter twenty-nine
As the first frosts iced the Gorski Kotar, Robert entered a Blue Period.
All summer, we knew that if we got up early, we could look out the third-floor window and see him sitting on the bench in the yard, staring into the ether, sweating out the halp-halp as Bobi sniffed the ground around him.
But during the first week of September, Robert developed a violent and tubercular cough. (Unfortunately for everyone, he didn’t cover his mouth when he coughed, and his great hackings sprayed upon the people in Stari Baća. Soon, many people had the same illness, and Robert sat virtually alone at the bar, smoking joylessly. Jim still went down at night with Stefanija and Pasha. They did not get sick, because they sat far away from Robert.) The doctor in Delnice prescribed strong antibiotics, and Robert could not drink while he took them. Drying out turned Robert inward. He spoke little. His face appeared deflated. He shrugged more than ever.
Robert still sat on the bench outside our window. But New Robert was even more oblivious to his surroundings. One morning, Jim noted a grasshopper sitting on Robert’s massive head of curls, a few inches above his eyebrow. Jim didn’t mention it to him, figuring Robert would feel it soon and looking forward to watching the frantic panic that would follow. But as the day progressed, the grasshopper stayed there, moving little, just like Robert.
Jim began hearing rumors that Robert was going to close Stari Baća. He decided that things had officially gone far enough and went looking for Robert on a sunny Monday afternoon after sending the kids for a walk in the meadow after lunch. Jim found him sprawled on the yard swing, covered by the wool blanket, face buried under a water-stained pillow.
“You okay, Robert?” Jim asked, poking him on the shoulder.
Robert slowly moved the pillow aside. “Oh, hey, Jeem,” he said, then sat up and doubled over in a spasm of gape-mouthed coughs.
“You okay?” Jim repeated.
Robert swung his legs around and faced his house, rubbing his face.
“I am old man,” Robert said.
“Aw shit, Robert, you are not,” Jim said.
“Yes! I am!” Robert beat at his chest, producing another round of hacking. “I look at my life, and what? Yesterday, I am boy. And then I am old man.”
“Robert, you’re not much past forty,” said Jim.
Robert shook his head, returned to a reclining position, and covered his face with the pillow. Jim left him there.
I felt myself rooting for Robert. It was either that or punch him. I saw him as a true nonconformist, wildly creative and likeably charismatic but colossally lazy. He’d let Stari Baća go to hell. Just walking into the women’s bathroom required rolling up your jeans because a leak in the plumbing caused an ever-present inch of water on the floor. The hostel rooms upstairs
were filled with big mounds of clothes that the summer girls were supposed to wash and iron for the silent Goranka, who couldn’t keep up between working at the tollbooth and maintaining the bar as Robert languished.
Mario mentioned to Robert every so often, jokingly but a little serious, that he knew a good rehab on the coast. As Robert’s first neighbors, they knew more than anyone that Robert’s family needed him to step up. Mrkopalj needed him, too; he had all the characteristics of a leader. His father had been an adviser to all, according to people in the village. Robert had a similar gravitas, but he was ruining himself.
Robert’s Blue Period both fascinated and saddened Jim. I’ve said before that the two men really got each other, and I think Robert’s midlife reassessment made Jim start reflecting on his own life and how it had changed while we’d been in Mrkopalj.
“How’s the homeschooling going?” I asked, one fall morning on our way to Tuk. He and the kids worked in the mornings while I went to Stari Baća to write.
“Good,” Jim said. “We study for a hard four hours. I switch back and forth between them, giving lessons. Pretty smooth so far.”
At night, Jim thumbed through the homeschooling books we’d brought from home, surfing for ideas before heading out to Stari Baća for his own routine: a nightcap with Stefanija and Pasha.
Within a day, Jim had taught Sam to tell time. Zadie had been toying with sounding out letters since Iowa, but she and Jim played intense phonics games.
“Zadie’s got a surprise,” Jim said. “When you come back for lunch she’ll have a little book for you.”
“That’s sweet,” I said.
“No, she’s not just going to give you the book,” Jim said. “She’s going to read it to you.”
I stopped walking.
“You taught Zadie to read?”
“I did,” Jim smiled.
“That’s amazing, Jim,” I said, hugging him. “She’s four.”
Jim and Sam had designed a video game from scratch, based on Internet tutorials. They had based it on a Shel Silverstein poem, despite the objections of Zadie, who thought the author’s jacket photo on Where the Sidewalk Ends was creepy.
“So what comes after this?” I asked him. “What will happen when we go home? It would be tough to go back to your old job, I bet.”
“I guess I’m not really thinking about it,” Jim said. “I’m just focusing on my family.”
Jakov Fak passed us on the street, his long ski skates making smooth rolling sounds as he glided by, waving.
“Nobody would believe me if I said the hardest part about this trip is not working,” Jim said. “Not having a purpose. You think all you want to do is get away for a break, and then when you’re not working, you feel useless.”
“You taught your four-year-old to read in a matter of a few weeks,” I said. “That’s so far from useless.”
“I know I’m doing a good job. I’m not looking for a pep talk,” he said. “But I’m an architect. It’s what I studied in college and it’s what I’m good at. I’m not cut out to be a permanent stay-at-home dad. I love the kids, but it’s hard.”
“It’s temporary,” I said. “When we get home, you’ll start doing the work you were meant to do. And then you’ll figure out how to get the balance right.”
“I’m over forty years old now. I’m an old man, just like Robert said,” Jim continued. “I don’t want to let things just happen to me anymore. I want to make my life what I want it to be. Whatever feels right when I get home, that’s what I’m doing.”
Back in the dorm, I lingered before going to Stari Baća to write. I wanted to be near Jim and the kids. To listen to them work. To hear Zadie read. It was a lovely sound, my husband and my kids turning over new things in their minds together.
Maybe Jim didn’t see it, but his best qualities were getting stronger and more defined in Mrkopalj. He was the guy who found joy in gathering and nurturing the people he loved. Whatever might happen once we returned to Iowa, if he followed the same jovial path he’d taken the minute we entered the village, he would be just fine.
I hoped Robert would find similar happiness, but I wasn’t so sure. One need only witness his degenerating coffee-making skills to see how far he’d fallen.
At the height of his Blue Period, Robert made the absolute worst cappuccinos. Lukewarm, without the slightest hint of froth, no sprinkle of powdered chocolate. Sometimes, Jim and I avoided Stari Baća in the mornings altogether. The summer girls had mostly gone back to school, so there was no one to bail us out of this one. A few times, we’d committed the faux pas of visiting other café-bars, but people always talked when we did that, and we didn’t want to make Robert feel worse. So mostly, we were loyal to the familiar murk of Stari Baća.
Though Robert talked to Jim during his Blue Period, he did not speak to me. He said he’d lost his English. He could barely string together a sentence. I couldn’t stop wondering what was going on with him. It struck me that in a village where I’d talked to just about everyone about their personal history, I’d never spoken so deeply with Robert. Of course I had no idea what was wrong with him. I barely knew the guy.
“Robert,” I said one morning as I sat sipping a strawberry juice, “tell me about your life. You know more about my history than I do at this point. Now I want to know about you.”
He’d been standing there, apron wrapped around his middle, staring into space. He sighed heavily and looked at me. “Why do you talk?”
“I’ve been getting to know people since we first got to Mrkopalj,” I said. “But I hardly know the guy who lives downstairs from me.”
“Aw,” he said, sucking his teeth. “I am no interesting.”
“You are, Robert,” I said. “You are a rock star.”
“I am no,” he said, dead-eyed.
“Let’s get together and talk tomorrow morning,” I said. “It’s a Saturday. I’ll see if Stefanija will be home from school so she can translate.”
“No Stefanija,” he said. “No morning.”
“I’ll see you at four-thirty, then,” I said brightly. “The bar is pretty quiet at that time.”
Robert sighed. “Yes,” he said. “Okay.”
I showed up at four-thirty to Stari Baća. Only a few old guys sat in the dining area. Robert sat with me at the bar for a few seconds before getting up and nervously pacing the floor after I asked the simple question of when he was born.
Goranka hovered in the kitchen, grousing at him in Croatian. Robert rubbed the back of his neck. “I have no words,” he said.
“Can we try again tomorrow?” I asked. “I’ll swing by at four-thirty or five.”
“Is okay,” he said, leaving.
So I’ve mentioned before that when somebody blows me off, it only makes me want to talk to them more. But on top of that, considering my own family history, my obsession with the newly sober Robert was also fueled by the desire to understand what makes an alcoholic parent tick. The more Robert eluded this conversation, the more I wanted to have it.
I showed up to Stari Baća the following day. Robert did not. I checked the second-floor rooms on my way back to the dorm. When I knocked, no one answered. I stepped inside and found Robert on the couch in long johns, sleeping.
Later that day, Robert called and suggested I come to Stari Baća at ten o’clock Monday morning. I did so. The door was locked. I peeked in the window. Empty.
He called later. “Your family come. My house. Tomorrow night.”
When we all arrived, Helena was there. And so, it seemed, was every other relative he’d ever known, as he’d filled the second floor with a real crowd. They cooked a huge pole and poured drinks, and I didn’t get the chance to ask Robert even one question.
We tried again the following night.
This time, there were fewer family members, but Robert had piled so much wood into the stove that it was unbearably hot and everyone was soon soaked as if sitting in a sweat lodge. I became disoriented from the heat. By sheer force
of will, I asked several questions, which Helena translated, but baby Magda was crying, probably cooking in her own skin. I was clearly taxing Helena’s patience. I knew this because she kept pouring drinks and yelling at me: “You’re so boring!”
Before long, Robert took a smoke break. Jim followed close behind. “What’s up, Robert?” I heard Jim laugh as they walked out to the breezeway. “You seem a little uncomfortable talking about yourself.”
“Helena, please tell Robert that I want to try one more time, tomorrow, with Stefanija, in Stari Baća,” I begged. “Please.”
“Why do you want to talk to my uncle?” she asked, peeved.
“Because he is Mrkopalj,” I answered.
She huffed out of the room, baby under her arm, and whatever she said to Robert worked. The Robert that showed up the next day was resigned and reflective. Stefanija translated for us, steady and patient. The privacy of the empty bar seemed to help.
Robert grew up a wild child, his mother’s youngest and favorite. When he turned eighteen, he was called to serve in the Yugoslav army. Robert always had trouble with authority, and his military service was made even worse by the aversion to Communism he shared with Ronald Reagan.
Besides, Robert didn’t want to fight. He wanted to rock.
So in 1986, he deserted.
To catch an Iron Maiden show in Zagreb. (Opening band: Waysted.)
Seeing that band was more important than any stupid army, he said. He was gone for two days before the police found him in a bus station, drunk and high on hashish. He’d lost his uniform and stood before the cops, woozy, in nothing but a T-shirt and pants.
Robert was sentenced to sixty days in jail, but his friends told his sergeant he’d gone crazy. Robert was moved to a psych ward and banned from carrying a gun, which was fine with him. Then his girlfriend in Sunger broke up with him in a letter and married someone else. He’d always been prone to depression, and this one was a doozy. Robert cried for months. Finally, the army discharged him.
“I have three sister and one brother who worked. They gave me some money,” he said. “For one year, I lay down and do nothing.”
Running Away to Home Page 29
