Paint the Wind, page 16
“Do you need some help?”
“Of course. How did the painting go with Elise?”
“Fine.” I didn’t want to reveal my disappointment or show her the now blank canvas. I took out my frustrations on the onions and potatoes. After supper, I made excuses about being tired after a full day outside and went up to bed.
YiaYia and Pappou exchanged knowing glances. I had expected Pappou to grumble something about painting not being work, but he was uncharacteristically silent. I lit the oil lamp on my dresser and turned to undress, then stopped short when I noticed a package on my bed. At first, my heart raced with a foolish thought that Andreas had found me and sent me a letter, but the parcel was too bulky. Had my mother sent a gift, books, or clothing?
I tried to still my excitement, but it had been a while since my mother had written. There was no address on the package, neither directing it to me nor indicating who had sent it. With disappointment, I recognized the wrapping paper and string. It was the same paper I used for my drawings, from Nota’s shop. Perhaps YiaYia had bought me a pair of boots. She had fussed about how wet the meadows were at this time of year. My hopes dashed of finding anything remotely pleasing, I unwrapped the package, saving the string and carefully flattening the paper to use for my drawings.
But as I turned over the last fold, I looked in amazement at a collection of art supplies—a thick pad of paper, charcoal, graphite pencils, ink, and a pen with several different size nibs. I searched for a card or some indication of who had sent it. When I didn’t find one, I assumed it was another gift from Elise.
The fatigue I’d felt earlier left me. I set everything out on the table next to my bed and fingered each implement. A knock on my door interrupted my reverie. It was YiaYia.
“You found the package?”
“Yes. When did it arrive? Did Nota say who purchased it?”
“She didn’t need to.”
“So it was Elise?”
A look of pain passed over her face. “No, Maya, it wasn’t Elise.”
I was confused. Had YiaYia herself purchased the materials?
“It was from you, YiaYia? Thank you!”
She shook her head sadly, and I remembered the look that had passed between my grandparents before I came upstairs.
“Pappou bought me these materials?” I was incredulous.
“Pappou is not so blind to who you are and what you desire, Maya. He saw the drawings and how you save every scrap of paper. He blustered about you thinking we were too poor to afford paper and went marching down to Nota’s. He would have bought out her entire stock for you, Maya, not out of pride but out of love. He’s not forgotten what you did for him. This is how he expresses his thanks.”
“I am so sorry for assuming it was Elise. I’ll go and thank him right now.”
YiaYia put out her hand to stop me. “I have a better idea. Draw him a picture and leave it quietly for him. He’s a man who doesn’t make or want a big fuss about anything. He didn’t even want me to tell you the package was from him. That’s why he left it on the bed instead of presenting it to you himself, but I suspected you might think it was from Elise. I only told you otherwise because I didn’t want you to hurt him.”
I grasped YiaYia’s hands. “I don’t want to hurt him either.”
I kissed her cheeks, and she left me with a blessing, marking a cross on my forehead with one of her thumbs.
Over the next few days, I departed from my usual choice of subjects, the natural world or still lifes of household objects. Instead, I began to sketch my grandfather when he wasn’t aware I was watching him. In one drawing, I captured his portrait—the lined face marking years spent at sea and his eyes revealing a world-weary intelligence. In others, I drew full-length images of him leaning on the pasture fence, watching the new goats cavort on the grass.
I finished the drawings in pen and ink with a wash for shadows and background, then hung them to dry in my room. When they were ready, I slipped them onto his plate at the dinner table.
That night when he sat down, he picked them up, one in each hand, his eyes moving from one to another. Then he glanced across the table at me.
“A good likeness.”
“Efcharisto, Pappou.”
After completing the drawings of Pappou, I realized that my next painting with Elise should not be another landscape. When we met at our usual spot, I brought the painted-over canvas and one of the sketches I’d made of Pappou. Using the drawing as a starting point, I transferred an outline of his image to the canvas with a thin brush dipped in a thinned-out burnt sienna. Then, with color, I created an entirely different version of Pappou than the pen and ink drawings. The rustiness of my skills that had been apparent in the brushstrokes of my first painting was scrubbed away. My arms felt looser, and my hand no longer cramped as it held the brush. I felt a fluidity to both the shape and the coloring of my grandfather’s image. I painted him, not as a literal version of my memory of him but as my sense of him. I was beginning to grasp what Elise had meant about not only seeing my subject but also feeling it deep in my core.
I was surprised by the tenderness that surfaced in the portrait. His face still contained the gruffness and cynicism that eighty years on this earth had shaped, but it held much more than just that. I had learned that my grandfather was more complex than the image he portrayed of an astute businessman and powerful head of a prosperous family. His quiet generosity and devoted love of his wife also made up who he was.
Elise examined the portrait with concentration and then looked at me.
“Although I haven’t met him, I know who this man is, purely on the basis of your painting. Brava, my friend.”
My days took on a rhythm after completing the portrait of Pappou. Although Elise and I met only once a week, on the other days I rose before dawn, and after my coffee, painted for a few hours until YiaYia needed me. She gave me an old cotton coat to wear while I painted when it became clear that an apron was barely sufficient to protect my dress. My strokes, which had been so tentative and unsure that first day I had painted with Elise, became energetic and muscular. I felt as if I were dancing as I approached and receded from the canvas. The physicality of my process often meant that not all the paint ended up on the canvas. I sometimes finished with not only a colorful coat but also a green cheek or a turquoise eyebrow.
The seeds planted by the challenging questioning of both Elise and Leo had taken root. I was no longer haunted by the words that had provoked me to take up YiaYia’s pencil. Why aren’t you painting? Aren’t you a painter?
My painting became both a release of my emotions and a balm smoothing the jagged edges that my exile had inflicted on my soul. But it also opened me up to the longing for Andreas that I had suppressed—a searing need for the intensity, for the challenges, and, yes, for the touch. I poured my yearning onto the canvas, but it was a poor substitute for the double-sided sword of our love. I was still cut off from what had fed my spirit, and I still hungered for it.
Had I been in Vienna, would I have plucked a few of my best paintings and dared to present them to Andreas for critique? A part of me admitted to my reluctance to open myself to his appraisal. Our relationship was deeply entangled with our roles as artist and muse. How would he react if I stepped into his milieu? But I realized with a wry acknowledgment that if I were in Vienna, I would not have produced any art at all. There would have been nothing to reveal to Andreas.
Chapter Twenty-One
My cousin Leo had been trying to coax me to join him for an evening with young people. I had resisted until one evening when YiaYia spoke bluntly to me.
“Maya, when your father brought you here, it was not to punish you but to protect you. You’re not a prisoner here. I’m an old woman, but I still remember what it felt like to dance. Go with your cousin. Let go of the shadows you’ve brought into this house. Even if it’s just for an hour.”
After Leo arrived, we walked down the hill in companionable silence. He seemed to recognize that gloating about my acquiescence would probably provoke me, and wisely kept his mouth shut. I considered him like a brother, with all the aggravation that entails, but I never doubted that he cared about me. We could hear the music before we reached the square.
“What’s the occasion?”
“Have you been away so long that you’ve forgotten the feast of Klidonas? It’s Saint John’s Eve.”
As we drew closer, I could see the bonfires and hear the shouts and cheers as young men and boys leapt over glowing coals. Piles of freshly harvested oregano filled baskets on the steps of the church. The air was thick with smoke from the fires and the pungent aroma of oregano. I was a child of ten the last time I’d been on Skiathos during Klidonas. I remembered hovering on the periphery as the older girls in the village had carried out the ritual that would reveal their future husbands. I had chafed at being too young to participate, and my mother had dismissed the practice as primitive, pulling me out of the house where the young women had gathered.
“Do the girls in the village still perform the divination ceremony?”
Leo raised his eyebrows. “Are you hoping to dream of your lover tonight?”
“I detect some mockery, dear cousin. I’m simply curious.”
“If you want to join in, I’m sure Irini would take you along. You surprise me, Maya. Perhaps you are rediscovering your Greek roots.”
I shrugged. I didn’t know what I wanted. We set out to find Irini.
We found Irini in the midst of a group of young women bubbling with excitement. All of them were dressed in elaborately embroidered jackets with fringed scarves wrapped around their heads. I wished I had carried a sketchbook with me so I could capture both the vivid plumage on display and the effervescence radiating from the group. Leo gestured to Irini, and she left the circle to join us. Her face was flushed, and she danced across the cobblestones. Her necklace of bronze discs and beads tinkled as she approached, matching her joyful mood.
“Maya, you came! Leo was determined to help you escape, but I didn’t believe he would succeed.”
She grabbed my hand. “You should come with me to the ceremony. Do you remember it?”
I looked at Leo. Was this his plan from the beginning, to pull me into the life of the island?
Leo kissed us both on the cheek. “I’m off to jump over some coals and find a large bottle of ouzo. Come to Manolis’s when you’re finished.”
Irini brought me to the others and introduced me. Despite my Greek features, which had been so unusual in Vienna, I was acutely conscious of how different I was from these young women. But Irini’s enthusiasm pulled me in, and I linked arms with her as we started to walk.
“We’re gathering at Olympia’s house. Did Leo tell you I was chosen to draw the water from the well? It’s such an honor and a responsibility.”
Irini babbled the entire way, and I smiled to myself as I imagined the effort it would take for her to carry the water later without speaking. The water used in the ceremony was called omilito neró, silent water, because the woman carrying it must do so without saying a word.
“Will you come with me to the well?” Irini was sixteen, and I remembered myself at that age. Innocent and protected, but longing for experience of the world, a world that was both exciting and terrifying. What would Irini dream tonight? What lover would reveal himself to her?
When everyone had arrived at Olympia’s house, her yiayia welcomed the girls and reminded them of the sacred nature of the ritual. The water Irini carried would be poured into a clay pot, and each young woman would drop a belonging into the vessel. The pot would be bound in red fabric and prayers offered before being brought outside for the night—an offering to call forth dreams of the man each was meant to marry.
Some of the younger girls, Irini’s age, giggled and whispered. I could understand how the romance of the tradition would appeal to them. For the women closer to my age, I could see the longing in their faces, in the way they held their bodies. Whether the man of their dreams lived down the road or only in their imaginations, they were pulled toward the vessel of water with both hope and desire.
Irini was bouncing on her feet, anxious to begin. When the grandmother gave her blessing, Irini and I made our way swiftly toward the well. For all her chattering earlier, Irini was now quiet, carrying the pitcher she would use to transport the water. At the well, she filled the pitcher to the brim and then turned back to the house. Her silence and her slow steps were a sharp contrast to her exuberance earlier. She had fully embraced her role, and I could see that the ritual was truly sacred to her.
I wondered what my Viennese friends would think of this feast, what they would think of me for taking part in it. Even though I considered myself an outsider, only an observer, I could understand why the women did it. The door was flung open as we arrived, and Irini held the pitcher high as she approached the clay pot on a table in the middle of the room. With a flourish, she poured the water. One by one, the women drew near and removed an earring or a bracelet or a medal, murmuring a few words and dropping the objects into the pot. Irini was the last to approach, but before she let go of the necklace that had made music, she turned to me and whispered, “What will you offer Maya? Do you not have a dream to be fulfilled?”
I was about to shake my head in denial. I didn’t need ancient magic. But Irini’s question stopped me. The longing I had sensed in the other women was as palpable as the hidden desires the artists in Vienna were attempting to reveal in their raw and passionate paintings. I felt something stir in me and reached around my neck to unclasp the chain that held the ring Andreas had given me. I had been wearing it ever since I had left Vienna with my father. It was warm to the touch, retaining the heat of my body. I dropped the ring, chain included, into the vessel and stepped back. My heart was pounding and I felt lightheaded, relinquishing control as I let go of the ring. Olympia led the prayers around the pot as two of the young women covered the top with a red silk shawl.
I bowed my head as I listened to the chanting. Although I understood the words, I did not join in the prayers. When the prayers were finished, the women gathered at the door, led by Olympia carrying the bowl.
“What now?” I whispered to Irini.
“We’ll follow Olympia to the garden, and she’ll place the vessel outside under the stars. Our prayers and wishes will rise to the heavens during the night and return to us in our dreams.”
She squeezed my hand as we left the house. Once the pot swathed in red had been left on a stone in the garden, the women dispersed. Most, like Irini and I, were headed toward the beach, where bonfires had been lit and where the chances of discovering the object of one’s dreams were far greater than in a secluded garden. At the beach, we found Leo.
“Ready to leap into a new life, Maya?” He pointed to the line of people that had formed, all of whom were waiting to jump over the coals.
“Oh come, Maya!” Irini was pulling me toward the glowing embers. “You’ve done only part of the feast day rituals.”
She tucked her skirt up around her belt and moved toward the bonfire. I did the same and took off my shoes to make it easier to run. Shouts and cheers accompanied every attempt to leap. Some of the young men ahead of us were quite drunk, and I suspected many of them would be nursing burned feet the next morning. When it was our turn, Irini went first, running furiously toward the fire and lifting her skirts as she sailed over the coals. She was laughing as she landed on the other side. I took measure of the distance and focused on the far side of the bonfire. At first I was hesitant, but then I remembered the girl I had once been on this island and took off as fast as I could. After a few seconds of disbelief, I managed to get to the far side of the bonfire. It had felt astonishing to be up and over the coals with the heat reaching its tentacles for my feet.
After we retrieved our shoes, Leo guided us to a table outside a taverna in the square. While we waited for our vanilla sodas, I removed a few hairpins and knotted my chignon at the nape of my neck.
“Let your hair down, Maya. It will only come undone again when we are dancing.”
I was about to protest about the dancing but stopped myself. I had already embraced every other tradition of Saint John’s Eve. Why stop now? I shook out my hair.
“Take me dancing.” I grabbed Irini’s and Leo’s hands and pulled them away from the table. Leo led us toward the group of dancers and my dress floated around me in ripples as we raised our hands and moved into the circle of the Kamara, the traditional dance of Skiathos. The music of the square had a rhythm and an energy to it that seemed to enter the bloodstream of each dancer, consume their thoughts, and take over their bodies. We all became one organism, moving in unison, and danced until we were exhausted, exhilarated, euphoric. I collapsed against Leo’s chest, laughing.
“Thank you,” I said, and kissed him on the cheek.
Leo linked arms with each of us. “Let’s get you two home to your dreams.”
YiaYia was waiting up for me, reading in the parlor. She closed her book when she saw me standing in the doorway and appraised my appearance.
“You’re no longer wearing the chain around your neck.”
My observant grandmother missed nothing. I felt the blood rising to my cheeks.
“Did you place it in the Klidonas bowl?”
I nodded, hoping not to be the recipient of a lecture on the inappropriate choice I had made in matters of love. But instead, YiaYia approached me and kissed my cheeks.
“I remember the night of Klidonas when I dreamt of your grandfather. I’m not a superstitious woman, Maya.” She waved her hand toward the bookcases lining the walls. “I read too much, or so the town harpies tell me. But Klidonas is more than superstition. The ancient mysteries are powerful, and our dreams reveal more to us than the romantic wishes of girls full of longing for love. I’ve read Freud. Don’t look surprised.”
“I’m not surprised, YiaYia, only awed.”
