Wieslaw Mysliwski - Stone Upon Stone

As if that wasn’t enough, I couldn’t loosen the scarf, because I’d tied the ends firmly so it wouldn’t come undone on the way, and the priest was almost there. Plus I needed to kneel. How could I kneel when one leg was completely stiff and the other could barely bend either? All my efforts came to nothing, because the priest hurried by like a storm. And though Mrs. Sekuła helped me, and the other woman too, we didn’t manage to get the scarf off in time, and I only got a few drops of holy water on my hands, none of it fell on the eggs and they didn’t get blessed. So they didn’t taste the way they should. They tasted like you’d just gotten them from the hen and boiled them and you were eating them. Though at least I didn’t have to regret not having gone. There’d been worse times and I’d always gone, my legs weren’t that much of an excuse.

When I worked in the district administration, the fact was I was a government worker, and the times weren’t right for blessing eggs. Still, when Holy Saturday came around I’d leave work during the day, I’d say I have to go get my eggs blessed. I didn’t hide it. And even when I got transferred to the quotas department it was the same, I’d say I need to go get my eggs blessed. Though the quotas department wouldn’t employ just anyone, they were always holding meetings to get us to collect more and more. You often had to be hard as nails with folks. They hadn’t even harvested their crop yet, it was still standing in the fields, and here we were sending all kinds of deadlines, provide your quota, provide your quota, anyone who doesn’t is in deep trouble. But it all came from the higher-ups. Someone up there was setting the deadlines. It must have been someone that thought he was more important than the land. But only God is more important than the land, for anyone that believes in him. If you don’t believe in God, then the land is the most important of all. And you can’t hurry it either with deadlines or with whips. If you got mad at it for not obeying you it would just say, kiss my ass. But what could we do?

There were times my hand went numb from writing, because we’d write and write, directives, reminders, fines. My eyes would be red as a rabbit’s. I’d get up in the morning and I could barely see. Mother would ask me, why on earth are your eyes so red. Why? From writing. Father would say, sure it’s from writing. If that was the case no one would go to school, because there all they do is write. There wouldn’t be any priests or professors. It’s from drinking. Yesterday he barely made it over the threshold, then right away he crashed down on his bed like a hog. You were asleep, you didn’t see it. You just keep drinking. At work they even told me I should go see the doctor, maybe he could give me eyeglasses. Some people at work had glasses. Sąsiadek did, and this one guy in the insurance department, I think someone in highways did, the local policeman used to sometimes put them on as well when he got a written order to go somewhere and he couldn’t read where. And three of the women clerks wore glasses, but I didn’t like the looks of any of them. I tried Sąsiadek’s on one time, I actually looked pretty good, but it was like staring through fog.

Some people thought I’d taken the easy way out, but what was easy about it? After you’d dealt with them, people would come and curse me and the government to high heaven. At times my office would be bursting at the seams with all the papers I had to send out. And there was as much again stacked in the hallway or even outside. They’d bring in the letters they’d been sent and put them on my desk and say, you go and mow, and harvest, and thresh, you go collect it all. A good few of the women would point to their ass and tell me where I could stick my papers. All I could do was throw my hands up and keep repeating, it’s not me, it’s not my decision. Then whose is it? You’re all the damn same, the lot of you!

Of course, sometimes I’d help people out. One guy, I’d move his deadline back a bit, another I’d reduce his quota by a couple hundred pounds, with someone else I’d at least advise them how to write an appeal and where to send it. Then people would want to thank me somehow. How does one farmer say thank you to another? He invites him for vodka. Vodka isn’t a bribe. It isn’t that one person gives and the other one takes, no — both of them drink. So I got to drinking quite a bit. Actually, in a job like that you can’t not drink. Plus people think anything can be arranged with vodka, more than through God. And you never can tell. Sometimes it helps to have a drink, and sometimes even praying doesn’t help. But if you want to live among people, you have to drink. Because then they accept you as one of them. And that means something.

In addition, the pub was virtually just over the road from the district offices, all you had to do was cross the road. And everyone knows gratitude isn’t something you measure out, you do this much for me and I’ll do this much for you, so it rarely ended with just a single bottle. Because gratitude isn’t in the pocket, it’s in the soul. And I don’t care how much of a schemer a man is, after a bottle his soul has to come out. And at that point it’s the soul that’s standing the drinks, the soul that’s paying, and moving from one soul to another is just like entering someone’s house.

Also, someone or other always sat down with you, because even if he didn’t have an actual reason to be grateful to you, he wanted to be grateful just in case. Then someone else would come along, then someone else again, often it was whoever found themselves in the pub at the time. Because who doesn’t want to be a soul instead of just a body? When it came time to shut the pub, Jasiński, the manager, would lock up on the outside, and inside we’d carry on drinking. At most the prices would go up some, he had to earn a bit extra too on top of his salary. He’d go lie down on the chairs behind the counter and we’d drink on. I’m telling you, we drank like it was our souls celebrating because they were in heaven, and not us in a pub. Wake me up on your way out. Come off it, Jasiński, who’s leaving, where would we go. We’re not gonna come all the way down to earth again. We poured drinks left, right, and center, wake up Jasiński, we need another bottle. Because I was Eagle again. Come on now! You’ve abandoned us God, good job Eagle’s here. Come on now! Soon as Eagle’s here, every tear we shed is one dead enemy body! Come on now! Eagle’s in the village with his men, they’re drinking at young Marysia Król’s, there’s going to be a parade through the village, bring your flour and lard! Though it often ended sadly, one or another guy killed, a guy gets killed so many times and he has to keep on living. You were Eagle and now you’re a piece of crap, not a government official. Wake up, Jasiński, another bottle!

The next day you’d be sitting half dead at your desk, your head would be splitting and your belly would be aching, and on top of everything you’d have to listen to folks complaining about how hard life was. No one cared that maybe you had it even harder, but you weren’t going to take some form and go complain, who to? To God? Why is this happening to me, God?

Oftentimes I’d barely make it home when I had to be off to work, there’d only be time to have a quick mouthful of sour milk or cabbage juice. And though home was close by, once the devil began leading you astray he’d push you any which way, sometimes you even ended up back where you started. He’d mix your head up so bad you’d almost get lost in your own village. The only thing for it was to go from one house to the next. Luckily, in those days the houses were close together, like beads in a rosary, it was like they were only separated by the winter insulation on the outside, so you could count off the houses as you went, Hail Mary, full of grace, Our Father. Today almost all the houses are new, it’s like someone snapped the rosary and the beads got scattered to the four winds, and you’ll never be able to pray that way again.