keep on truckin’ mama

WHEN I GOT HOME Kevin Costner told me I had to clean out my apartment, no ifs, ands, or buts. This was after I had dropped Silvia and her aunt off at the apartment downtown. My apartment was a mess. There were glasses and dishes everywhere. While I was moving a box of them toward the garage they fell on the ground and shattered. Some of these were heirloom glasses. Some of them even contained the souls of dead ancestors. When I looked into one of the frosted glasses I could see my great grandfather the physician with his Victorian Era mustache. This glass was salvageable and had only been slightly damaged. I picked up the shards and put them inside the glass. I was certain I could glue the shards back into place.

At night, I tried to get back to her, but the car just wouldn’t start. I left it in the garage and took my bike instead. Viljandi had changed a lot. It was hillier. It all looked like La Jolla, California. Yet it was unmistakeably Viljandi. The Centrum shopping center was there, it was just now on a hill and been significantly remodeled. All of the streets were in their right places, Tallinn Street was over here, and Posti Street was over there, but all of the buildings had changed. It was summer warm and there was a sticky humidity in the air. I rode my bike toward Centrum and then decided to take that route through the parking lot past Jysk that would eventually bring me back to Silvia’s. There were some Finnish tourists on the bike path.

I told the Finns to get out of the way.

I had on a pair of jeans and my old Hot Tuna t-shirt. Instinctively, I began to whistle their old song, “Keep on truckin’ mama, truck my blues away.” Off 1972’s Burgers. What had ever happened to that shirt? And would I ever see Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady play it again? And what was Silvia doing now? She was at her house in the woods down Posti Street. Probably making tea. I could almost see her blonde hair bundled up in a red handkerchief. I could almost see her blue eyes through the woods. I could almost hear the teapot whistle.

betrayal

I HAD KNOWN HER for years, but I didn’t ever think it would come to this. I would suppose that she was an attractive woman. She was older than me, by a decade at least, and had shoulder-length brown hair. I’m sure she was quite the catch back in ’86 or ’88. But it was 2024. I don’t even remember how I even wound up at the house. Her husband was away. Her children were all grown. She was in the bath when I arrived. I told her I could wait but she invited me in, and that’s when I saw those long legs poking out of the water. It was steamy in there. The walls were dripping wet. It sounds sexy, I know, but it wasn’t. It had all the allure and sensuality of old motel wallpaper. But I was weak. At least, that’s what they call a man like me when he does a thing like that. So weak. I was the softest there was. That’s what they said.

When her husband Kalle arrived back home, we were already drinking tea in the kitchen. He had been on a business trip to the UK. I marveled at his English-language proficiency. He didn’t seem to think anything was amiss. He told us about his various business meetings as he removed his tie and set his briefcase on the table. I wasn’t sure how I felt. Not every feeling has a name. After Kalle left, she went upstairs and drew the bathwater, disrobed and climbed in. She asked me to join. There is something comforting about being told what to do, especially after shouldering so many responsibilities, but I couldn’t shake that ugly gray betrayal feeling.

Poor Kalle. What a dope! Was I really responsible for this? “Come and get in the bath,” she said.

tokumaru

I MOVED INTO an apartment that happened to be located inside a Tokumaru Japanese restaurant in Helsinki. The interior design was white and spotless. I didn’t mind sharing my living quarters with the clientele nor the smell of gyoza being served in ceramic bowls. Then one day, Jonas came to find me so he could threaten me about talking to his girlfriend Margot. He stood outside the Helsinki Tokumaru with his face against the glass. I wasn’t sure how he had even found me. I had moved out of my last apartment for the same reason. There he was. His white, angry face was pressed against the window, and his teeth were clenched. I could see the steam of fury in his dark-rimmed glasses. His hair was combed neatly. Margot stood nearby, staring into space. Her eyes were black with mascara and shame-terror. “How dare you, how dare you write to my girlfriend!” he stormed. The Finnish owner offered Jonas some black coffee and tried to soothe his jilted nerves. I was unaware that Tokumaru served coffee.

Supposedly, the Tokumaru coffee was very good.

While Jonas was distracted, I fled out the back door. I wanted to take the ship back to Tallinn to get away, but there had been a major storm. The waters of the Baltic Sea had flooded the city, and there, at the foot of Korkeavuorenkatu, I looked up, only to see an enormous Tallink cruise ship come crashing down the street, crushing every building in its way. I looked the other way, and saw another Eckerö Line ship floating on its side. There was nowhere to run and the waters rushed into the Helsinki Tokumaru, washing away everyone with them. Jonas, Margot, the Finnish-Japanese owner. They were all drowned in the sea. I grabbed onto a floating navigation buoy that had washed in from the archipelago and survived. Later, the storm calmed and the sun came out and the waves died down. I could even hear birds singing.

rapla-bound train

THAT CREAKING, rocking, squeaking, Elron (Hubbard?) Train, lurching south, all the way through Saku, Rapla, Türi. At Tallinn-Väike, the girl got on. But who was she? Me, overtired, my hands still stained with dirt from when the wind blew my hat into a city gutter in the morning, and from pulling it from all of that avenue street mud, and eating something starchy and disgusting from the Baltic Station, and blowing my nose in the meantime, and just nothing that could ever be cleaned up and made presentable. A werewolf. Even if bathed, my soul is dirty.

Her, blonde, clean, tidy, and well-organized, with pink full lips, typing away on a laptop with some homespun manicure. But look how she types, and how absorbed she is in her deep work. Why, she just seems like the most pragmatic, industrious chick there is! I briefly ask her if she can hear me, because I think she might have headphones on, or ear pods or whatever they are called nowadays, and she says that she can, but that’s all that she says. Her look at me is as blank as school wallpaper. There’s nothing coquettish here. This girl is from Rapla. She is a shock worker. Her hair is so light. She should be out marketing muesli with creamy yellow curls like those. She has a head like soup noodles. A golden yumminess like warm sun rays.

A day later in the deep tech lounge of the conference, I am dodging robots and weaving in between the Swedbank People in their orange shirts. People from the past drift through my mind. I think of Linnéa and accept her death from my life. I’ve turned passive. I’ve stopped trying. I’ve stopped caring. Nothing. And all of these startup investment people are boring as fuck. But who was the girl on the train who disembarked at Rapla? Does she always ride the last train? If I keep riding the trains south to Rapla, will our paths cross again? Will she once again sit across from me, oblivious, tapping away? Is it even romantic to think such thoughts, or somehow against the rules? That’s how his lifetime obsession started, riding the Rapla-bound train. Waiting for the tubli girl with the laptop and no-nonsense demeanor. The lonesome bachelor, scribbling mad in his notebook. That was how the whole affair started.

but desperation can crystallize

“BUT DESPERATION CAN CRYSTALLIZE. It’s like amber or obsidian, like those obsidian arrowheads from the Yucatan. It hardens and somehow becomes more bearable, natural.”

“And Eisenhower hated Fitzgerald. And the hatred was mutual. Cold cold bright days again. Work week, work, work. But, yes, I’ll do it. For the money.”

“And waving to [name omitted] at night. It’s like clutching to debris from the sinking Titanic. You just cling to it and cling to it. It provides you with a feeling of safety. Sort of.”

“I just sort of glued myself to her after that. She was tired though and left wearing a little black Bolt helmet. She went home to sleep. Mine ja maga uinakut, I told her. Go and take a nap. And I hugged her and it was nice.”

“Then I willed myself out into the countryside. I was thinking of her, all silver and blue, a girl who swims through life like a tropical fish. At least it is an honest feeling, a true feeling. At least I know that honesty and truth still exist, just as she exists. And if I could tell her anything, I would say, I would choose you and only you, and even if you are really so short, for me you are just right, paras.”

“And in that dream I was waiting for a train to Philadelphia beside [name omitted] who kept telling me that I was annoying her. Then I was in a wooden ruin, which turned into a sinking ship. I was talking about 21 Jump Street with Johnny Depp and Richard Grieco and Peter Deluise. Then I took the subway into the office in New York, arriving at noon. My editor scolded me for being late. [Name omitted] was there, but was preparing to leave work, but she asked me to collect her things. There was a kind of gauze or white sheet, and I folded everything up for her.”

“I ran to the theatre, diving for cover. Horrors of Mariupol, murder. I looked out into the distance and could see the billowing red Oppenheimer clouds. Orange with abundant death. I ran to the theatre, taking shelter. Some buildings had been hit. There were glass windows, and blue leaking water. There were anti-aircraft gunners but it was no use. People, blues, ballooning, drifting. Groceries blown all over the streets. Run to the theatre, get in the theatre!”

“[Name omitted] was then elected president of Finland, succeeding Sauli Niinistö. She went to Tallinn to accompany an art exhibition or installation, but was protected by her bodyguards. I wanted to see her, but was nervous. We would meet at Kumu. I agreed we could talk about her new flower book. Along the way, several people stopped me to ask for directions around Tallinn. But Tallinn had changed. It was like Stockholm. It was set out on islands, with bridges everywhere …”

Excerpts from my journal, written April 2023 – February 2024

the airport and kermit’s birthday

WE WERE SOMEWHERE in the Far East. At least it felt that way because I knew that the flight home was going to be a long one. Getting to the airport was an ordeal. You had to go down to the port and take a ship across the harbor. It was easier to land planes on that side, between the mountains. These were large ferries that made the voyage every 20 minutes. Much of the transport time involved checking and loading passengers. We were late though because on our way to the port, our little dinghy got stuck in the swamps. It was me, two of my daughters, and Kermit Haas, the world famous Estonian cubist painter. When we got to the port, my eldest made it aboard the ship and proceeded to the plane, but the youngest and I stayed behind, in part because I got to talking to Gunna and one of her girlfriends there. They were dressed as if they were about to go out to some nightclub. We agreed to meet again.

If there would ever be an again.

But we missed the next ferry to the airport, and decided not to proceed on our journey. Instead, Kermit drove us around the harbor to his house, where there had been planned for him a surprise birthday party. Somehow this part of the area looked quite like the opposite shore of Viljandi Lake, and there was even snow on the ground. Some farmers were out tending to rusty old machines in their snowy farmers’ fields. The house was full of people. I was surprised to see Linnéa was there. She was a friend of Kermit’s as I understood it. She was dressed in a white blouse and her blonde hair hung about her shoulders. She was filming the entire event with her phone, broadcasting it live via multiple Instagram accounts. As usual, she ignored me. I kept looking in her direction, hoping she might make eye contact, but there was just blackness in those eyes. It was not only that she was ignoring me. It was as if I didn’t exist.

Toward the end of the party, an African fellow who worked at Wolt showed up. He was dressed in his delivery clothes. He went over to Linnéa and put his arm around her, and I realized they were together. The Wolt delivery man and Linnéa left the party together, but at the last moment, she looked in my direction. This time I could see it in her eyes that she recognized me, albeit faintly. The two of them left. The rest of the guests were hoisting Kermit Haas in the air.

There were balloons floating up everywhere.