This made Taavi laugh a bit, but only Taavi. The other men in the sauna were very still.
“I know what you mean,” Taavi said. “When I first saw he was collecting those books, I thought, ‘What the hell are you doing? Are you turning into a Nazi or something?’ But a lot of World War II battles were fought near Ahja. My brother is working on the farm and digging and he’s always finding belt buckles and helmets and bullets. And some of these things are worth a lot of money.”
“Did they mostly belong to German soldiers?”
“Not all. It’s like – the Soviets invaded, then they retreated and left their things, because when you are retreating, you don’t have time to pack up every last helmet or bayonet, you know. Then the Germans came and then they had to retreat and leave their things. So the fields are full of war memorabilia.”
“But your brother said he knows Kalev Rebane, too,” I said after the steam had passed.
“Who’s Kalev Rebane?” Peeter said and turned to me.
“He’s that skinhead who was stirring up trouble with the Bronze Soldier,” Marko said.
“Oh, yeah, him,” Peeter said. “Wait – Taavi, your brother knows him? That’s scary.”
“No, no, he probably said he knows of him,” Taavi said. “Not that he knows him. I think many Estonians know of him, especially after what happened. That was crazy. What did you think about that? Riots and cyber attacks, and all over some old war monument.”
“It’s like you said. It was crazy.”
Taavi stared at the hot stones in the sauna a bit. Then he said, “Okay, I’ve had enough,” and made for the door. We followed him out into the night and jumped into the pond. I was the last one to jump in because I didn’t really want to go in it, but I was still soaked with sweat and my skin was hot and everybody else expected me to do it. I launched myself and came in up to my neck and felt for the bottom with my feet but could sense nothing, no reeds, no mud, no sand. I paddled across the cool dark waters to its muddy banks, eying the Warning! Sharks! sign as I did it, and though I knew no shark could live in a manmade pond in Ahja Parish, I felt my pulse quicken, as if I was surfing with Taavi in Australia and a Great White had just bitten into my board. When I climbed out, I shivered a bit and wiped the dirty water from my skin and looked around at Taavi, Peeter, and Marko. The dogs were barking out there and some unseen lambs bleated. It was dark and the only light came from the house windows.
Inside, when we returned, the girls were chatting and still radiant from all of the heat.
“Kallis Justin!” asked Sirts with her bohemian clown face. “How was the smoke sauna?”
“Good,” I said, “if you don’t mind sitting in a dark, hot room with a bunch of naked guys.”
“Haha! Exactly, exactly! It’s really weird, isn’t it, kallis?” she said. And this was coming from Rüblik Sirts, the woman who bared her breasts at the Sydney Opera House.
On the way home, as our car twisted through the dark runs of pines, and our little angelic daughters slept like dormant volcanoes, the warm glow of the sauna and the good company stayed with us.
“I love Sirts and Taavi!” Epp said. “Aren’t they the best people?”
“Yeah, I like them.”
“And they have such good energy. You know, Sirts said we can come and visit them in Ibiza. She said that they have an old friend who has a house and we can stay there.”
“Old friend, huh.”
“She says he’s really cool and that Ibiza is full of cool old hippies.”
“Maybe it is worth a visit.”
“We could get rid of our Tartu place and go there.”
“Get rid of it? Wait, what? But we just moved in a few months ago.”
“Mmm.”
There was a very long and unsatisfying pause.
“You know, Taavi’s brother keeps finding war relics on the farm,” I said.
“What does that have to do with us moving to Ibiza?”
“Oh, now you have us moving there? What the heck am I going to do there then?”
“Whatever you want to do. Come on! Who needs another cold, dark Estonian winter?”
“But do you really want to go live with some old hippie guy who thinks he’s Jesus?”
“But Sirts says he’s really cool. You saw the pictures. You saw how ideal it is there.”
“Please, all of those guys think they are Jesus. It’s like the moment the beard grows in.”
“Could you stop being so cynical! These are good people. These are our friends.”
“Yeah, but… She’s a masseuse, he paints fake tattoos.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re really negative, you know that?”
“I’m not negative. I’m just trying to be realistic.”
“That’s what you call it.”
I knew she envied their lifestyle and, though I didn’t admit it, I admired it, too. But I was still just cranking out news articles in those days. My own little bohemian monster had yet to break free.
Years later, when Sirts was hitchhiking through America, she contacted Epp, hoping to somehow visit our home out on Long Island before making her way to New York’s JFK for a flight to Ibiza. That we were living two and a half hours east of the airport didn’t seem to factor into the equation and why should it have? This was Kid Sirts! It was morning and her flight left in the afternoon. When I asked Epp to ask Sirts where she was, that maybe we could come and help her, the answer came back: Maryland. “Maryland? That’s four hours away! Her flight leaves this afternoon and she’s still in Maryland hitchhiking? Just forget it. She’s never going to make that flight.”
But she did make it. It was hard to believe it when I heard it, but Rüblik Sirts was right on time.
Tea with the Icebreaker
Fred Jüssi was king of the Estonian beatniks. At least that was my first impression of him.
Even if his bebop was bird calls, there was always a touch of the hepcat about the naturalist. Maybe it was that beret he was so fond of wearing. Epp told me that Fred had been born to Estonian parents in Aruba in 1935, which I never believed until I saw a magazine with a grainy black and white image of an infant Fred in the Caribbean sands.
That was when Fred’s life began, back before the war when Estonia was free, long before he ever picked up a camera, ages before he wrote the book Jäälõhkuja, and eons before Mr. Jüssi crossed paths with me.
It was a fortuitous crossing, one that probably changed my life. Not that I decided to pick up a camera and become a naturalist myself, but whenever I saw the images of Fred Jüssi out at work in the woods, I felt a sort of solidarity in our lonesomeness and our dissatisfaction with rote, routine, professional life.
Jüssi just couldn’t help doing what he did. And as journal after journal filled up with handwritten notes scribbled in planes, trains, buses, against city walls, I knew I couldn’t help it either.
First I should tell you a bit more about Jäälõhkuja, that fetching and crazy-looking Estonian word. It was the title of his book.
In the early days of the publishing house I did a lot of the errand work, but I wasn’t exactly proud of it. Dropping off books, receiving books. Meh. I still did my online journalism job, so the money was coming in, but with all the book business buzzing about me in Tartu, with