by Miklós Vámos
I have met someone, a girl, and if it were up to me we would get married tomorrow. I’d be delighted if you could meet her. Could you not come over again? Let me send you a ticket!
His grandmother telephoned at once. “I will come, but let’s wait with this a little. Don’t rush things. First you should really get to know each other well.”
“That’s what she said, too.”
“Clever girl.”
These were busy times for Mária. She was making wall-hangings, an insurance company having ordered four large ones. She sat at her loom from the crack of dawn and stopped only to take the dogs out the regulation three times a day. If Henryk wanted to see her, it was during these walks that he could do so. They went on the wider pavement of the upper quayside, following the frisky little herd and apologizing to the more easily frightened pedestrians.
“Tell me, do you believe in reincarnation?” asked Mária.
Henryk was at a loss. He had never asked himself this question and so had no answer. When he was small he had attended church, and his grandmother would certainly have liked him to become a proper white Anglo-Saxon Protestant, but as no one around him took God seriously, he too thought religion was just empty ceremonial which he gave up as soon as he could, just as he did the scouts.
Reincarnation was the cornerstone of Mária’s view of the world. Death is also, simultaneously, birth or rebirth. After the decay of the body, the soul lingers on for about a century and a half, following various paths by way of purification; only after this can it begin its next life. Someone who was born a man in a previous life generally becomes a woman, and vice versa.
For Henryk the prospect that after his death his soul could have a second helping in another being was new, exciting and tempting; nevertheless, he found it difficult to believe.
“You don’t have to believe it,” said Mária. “When the time comes you will find it as natural as the fact that the sky is blue.”
Henryk was not convinced that this would happen, much as he might long for it. In the course of further conversations he discovered that Mária shared the views of a German philosopher called Rudolf Steiner, who was well known at the beginning of the twentieth century. “He was a spiritual visionary. There are people possessed of the ability to see on a higher plane, that is to say, they can see things that others can’t. They say you can be born with this ability, but it can also be achieved by self-education. In our time, the path of self-education is more common. Man today has lost his ability to see within. We possess what are called spiritual senses, but these cannot operate of themselves and have to be developed by the individual. I have many books on this; if you’re interested, I can lend them to you.”
The vast majority of the books were, however, in German. Henryk knew no foreign languages; he had English as his mother tongue and Hungarian as his father tongue.
Spiritual vision and self-education: so many unknown spheres. Just as hard to believe as reincarnation and at the same time just as attractive.
It turned out that Mária spoke English, German, and French very well, and even some Danish. A lover of opera, she could also manage some Italian.
It’s true, thought Henryk, I really don’t know her well.
“Why did you never go to college?” asked Mária.
“I came here instead. This is my university.”
“Aha. So you didn’t have the courage to take on a degree.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“But it’s true anyway, isn’t it?”
Henryk thought about it a while and then admitted it was. “How did you know?”
“It’s typical of Pisces.”
“Pie seas?”
“The astrological sign. You are Pisces, aren’t you?”
Henryk had no idea. Mária asked when he was born and when she heard the date, nodded: “Yes, that’s Pisces.”
Mária was well versed in the art of casting a horoscope, something she had learned from her grandmother. She cast one for everyone she came into contact with and who gave their permission.
“You ask for permission?”
“Of course. It’s a very intimate matter. Things can be revealed that the natives… the person concerned won’t perhaps be happy about. Or they won’t be happy that I’m the one to have revealed them. So… can I cast yours?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know the exact time of your birth? Hours and minutes. I need it for the ascendant.”
“I’ve no idea.”
He called his grandmother to ask, but Grammy did not know. “In those days we were not on smiling terms.”
“Smiling terms?”
“Yes. You know, we were not very pleased that she had married your father… In fact, not in the least pleased.”
“And why have you never mentioned this before?”
“Did you ask about it?”
“How can I ask about something that I have no idea about?”
There was silence at the other end of the line, then a quiet sniff or two.
Henryk changed the subject. “You haven’t asked about Mária…”
“How can I ask about somebody I know nothing about?”
They both put down the receiver offended.
Mária said that she could calculate the ascendant only on the basis of the exact place, day, hour, and minute of the birth, though she had heard of astrologers who were somehow able to calculate it from the subject’s most important life events. She wrote to such an astrologer in Szeged, giving her the dates of the death of Henryk’s mother, the disappearance of his father, his arrival in Hungary, and the date the two of them had first met. She was not satisfied with the answer (which had cost an astronomical ten thousand forints). “She says your ascendant is Aries. But I see nothing of Aries in you. Aries are fiery, liable to set their home ablaze, repeatedly dashing their heads against brick walls. Of course, you may be Aries nonetheless, but the planets in the twelve houses are so arranged that your ascendant is less typical of you than your Sun, that is, Pisces.”
“Well, now, is that good or bad?”
“I can’t put it like that. How interested are you in this?”
“Very.”
Mária nodded and launched into a detailed explanation. She did not tell fortunes from the stars, she only drew conclusions about the subject’s personality. That is, certain basic traits, with which the subjects can do what they wish and are able to. In her view one’s horoscope influences the nature of one’s fate no more than some 25 percent; the rest is down to genes, family background, upbringing, and self-development. Be that as it may, those born under the sign of Pisces have some difficulty in negotiating the boundary between themselves and the world. They are often lonely. Being the twelfth sign, the most complex, it yields the most sophisticated personalities. Pisces generally evince some sensitivity to art, perhaps even some artistic ability; there are, for example, many musicians among them. “They put on the pounds easily… though you show no sign of that yet. Have you heard of Enrico Caruso?”
“No.”
“He was a world-famous opera singer. Some say the greatest tenor of all time. He is a Pisces. I mean his Sun is. Then there is Elizabeth Taylor. Or Zorán. Have you heard of him?”
“No.”
“He’s a Hungarian rock singer. Then there is, let me see, Sharon Stone. You must know who she is.”
“How come you know so many people’s sign?”
“I’ve looked them up in Who’s Who. These days I can sometimes tell just from the face. Especially Scorpios, Virgos, and Geminis.”
Henryk took extensive notes from Dane Rudhyar’s The Astrology of Personality, which he found on Mária’s bookshelves. He still found it easier to read English than Hungarian. Astrology was again something that he reveled in, which made his spine tingle, though his doubts were never allayed. How can one claim that a person’s character could, even in part, depend on where and when he was born? Well… surely you can’t. At the same time it was beyon
d doubt that the Moon is implicated in the movement of the tides and the menstrual cycle, yet it is one of the smallest planet-like objects of all. Can one then say for certain that the heavenly bodies do not have any influence over us? Well… surely you can’t.
He tried hard to memorize the order of the signs of the zodiac, to master them like a poem: Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer… Here he always got stuck and had to sneak a look at his notes to continue: Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio… Again he needed help: Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, Pisces. He could not understand why he was unable to hammer into his brain these twelve words, let alone the dates of each. He envied Mária and her memory of cast iron: whatever that girl once set eyes on, or heard, or experienced, it was forever seared on her brain. Before the sculptor József, Mária had been in love with a Danish boy and had learned Danish for his sake-in effect in two months (the list of rarer verb forms was still pinned to the toilet door). Henryk failed to make any inroads even on the Magyar vocabulary he targeted.
“If you are so troubled by your poor memory, why don’t you develop it?” asked Mária. “You can improve every aspect of yourself, it’s just a question of willpower.”
On her instructions, Henryk started by memorizing lists of numbers, and then progressed to names. He began to feel he was making some headway.
Mária did not move in with him, nor did she let him share the workshop-cum-flat with her. “It would be a bad omen.”
“Amen?”
“Omen. Sign, premonition. I think it’s Greek. Or Latin.”
“But surely we know each other now!”
“Not well enough. I still don’t know what the most import ant thing in life is for you.”
“You.”
“Don’t be silly! I’m serious.”
“Only you could ask a question like that. And right away you make me feel like some stupid toddler.”
“A toddler would be able to answer on his or her level. Think about it.”
Eventually what I came up with was that you should be happy. Whereupon she says: who is the “you”? I replied: “Me.” Whereupon she: “A selfish view, but OK. So what is needed to make you happy?”
This again was a typical Mária question. I gave her the list: “Money, then good health, a secure family background, I guess that’s about it. Now what about you?”
She looked grave. Because we don’t agree on anything. The things I mentioned are, in her view, cliché ideals of petty bourgeois life. Health is like the air: it doesn’t make you happy as long as you can breathe it, in fact you barely notice it. She would not put a secure family background here either, because in the end you must count on yourself.
In her view it’s not these sorts of thing that you need for happiness, but abstract things, for example: firm and consistently followed moral principles, then knowledge, willpower, endurance. And good fortune. She was sorry that I hadn’t learned even that much yet. She could hardly marry me.
When she said this to my face, I ran home and wept. I knew she was right, in a way. But I also knew I wanted her as much as I ever wanted anything or anyone. I turned on my heels and went back. I bounded up to the fifth floor to knock on the workshop door. I knew what I wanted to say to her.
“If I have not learned enough, teach me; if I am not perfect, love me!” Henryk practiced the words as the black iron door opened.
Mária let him in.
“Now do you know me well enough to…?” Henryk asked at breakfast.
“Maybe. But you don’t know me well enough yet. You idealize me, although I have many bad qualities.”
“For instance?”
“Excessive self-assurance. The firm conviction that I must continually educate everyone. A degree of pedantry. Poor time management. But I am an Aquarius, not very practical, as you know.”
Henryk loved Mária’s faults, too, even if these sometimes annoyed him. He had occasion to discover that Mária’s bad qualities were just the same as her good ones. The self-assurance was handy when it came to dealing with officials and businesses. Her enthusiasm for teaching people was what made it possible for Henryk to learn from her. Pedantry and knowledge were fruits of the same tree. With the lack of practicality came the purity of her soul.
Following this train of thought he came to realize that probably everyone’s faults are the same as their virtues. He tried to look at himself in this light. He was relatively slow (i.e., thorough and determined). His self-confidence was low (i.e., modest and careful). He was not well educated (i.e., had a thirst for knowledge). His memory was rubbish (i.e., quick to forgive).
He felt his relationship to Mária was growing ever closer, despite the fact that she continued to keep him very much at arm’s length. Most worryingly, Mária insisted on spending two nights out of four, on average, in her workshop-flat, and on those nights Henryk had to sadly tramp home alone. At the mere mention of the word marriage her eyes flashed fire: “No. Not yet.”
Once, in bed, Henryk asked her: “If you became pregnant, would you marry me?”
“It would guarantee that I wouldn’t.”
“Oh, my… Now that I really don’t get!”
“But it’s simple. If we have a child and are married, in case of divorce we would fight over the child. If we are not married, it can’t happen. You could not do anything to me.”
“But why would I want to do anything to you?”
“In your case, that’s really hairy. You might one day decide to go back to America, you’d take the child with you…”
“Oh, Mária, what a weird view you have of things!”
“A realistic view. It may be hard to imagine now, but all my girlfriends are divorced and I have seen how it reduces people to the level of animals.”
“But look at the many pluses of marriage: the security, the sharing of everything we have; even in the case of divorce, under Hungarian law half of everything is yours!”
“I told you I am not materialistic.”
Henryk thought his head would burst, like an over-inflated football. What a setup! Every girl longs to get married, the only exception being the girl whom fate had brought him together with. He guessed it would be pointless to argue; he would just bounce off Mária’s iron will. There was nothing for it but to accept her as she was.
The ease with which Mária gave birth to my son almost suggested she had been practicing. Konrád Csillag came into the world on April 14, 1996, weighing two and a half kilos and measuring forty-eight centimeters in length. In the MÁV (Railwaymen’s) Hospital the consultant thought it would be advisable to place him in an incubator. But Mária refused her consent, saying it was unnecessary. She was right. Little Konrád flourished and ten days later we were allowed to take him home. By then Grammy had safely arrived and joyfully embraced her great-grandson, admitting that she had not thought she would live to see this day.
We notified Mária’s parents, too, but they did not come. They are as angry with Mária for not getting married as I am. Although I am no longer angry. I have accepted that nothing involving her is straightforward. Only her grandmother Erzsi came up from Hódmezövásárhely. Grammy was still with us. I thought they would get on well, but they avoided each other in some hostility. Erzsi was constantly checking my son’s horoscope (Aries, with Taurus in the ascendant); she perhaps devoted more time to this than to little Konrád.
By then they were living in Üröm, in a detached house that was three-quarters ready. Mária’s studio was to be in the loft, Henryk’s office in the basement, but these were still at the blueprint stage. The regulars of HEJED Co. were supposed to finish the work in the house, but the firm was so inundated with work that work on their home was continually put back. In the ground-floor lounge Henryk built a fireplace of undressed stone, a carbon copy of the one in Mária’s flat. He thought he would not be able to get hold of a genuine bellows, poker, and fire tongs in Hungary, but was amazed to spot a set at Budapest ’s Ecseri flea-market. Some enterprising Hungarian was (re)producing them by the
dozen.
The colder half of the year was nearly over, but Henryk was glad to light a fire in the evenings. It pleased him to show Mária how well the flue was working. He could watch for hours as the flames encroached upon the logs of crackling wood. A joyful end, to turn into light and warmth, he reflected.
The dogs took possession of the garden, digging out and chewing up the flora. Mária was not bothered too much. “We’ll sort out the garden when we have time.”
But they didn’t have time for quite a while, as the newcomer took up their every moment. For the moment, Henryk neglected HEJED Co., but Jeff and Doug took it in their stride. They preferred to throw a few one-liners at him: “When we have a child, neither of us will come in to work for a bit!”
Mária wanted Konrád baptized. Henryk did not understand. “But you are constantly on at the church!”
“Doesn’t mean he should be denied holy water.”
“What’s the point?”
“What’s the point of brushing your teeth?”
Again, Henryk gave up on this debate. But he insisted that either Jeff or Doug should be his godfather. Mária raised no objection. “But which of them?”
“Let them decide.”
“Both of us!” Jeff decided.
So my son had two godfathers in the persons of my dear friends and business partners. As for a godmother, we asked Mária’s childhood friend Olga to do the honors.
The business did not languish while I was employed as a father full-time; on the contrary! Doug had done some sniffing around and discovered that state grants were now available for refurbishing the old castles of Hungary, and we were successful in applying for some.
At present we are working on five sites, in Hungary and in Transylvania. I never imagined it was possible to make money out of something you enjoyed doing. As a result of our work, the past is re-created in stone and wood, so that it continues to endure.
The faraway U.S. becomes an increasingly faint memory. Sometimes I feel as if I had only dreamed those years, that is to say, in effect the whole of my childhood and youth. And now I can be certain that I am going to live here, as long as God, Fate, fortune, heaven, and all the stars allow it… or? Here was born my son; when the time comes, let him bury me here, in the land of my fathers.