Vinyl Day in Vilnius

"If it's a story I'm telling, then I have control over the ending. Then there will be an ending to the story and real life will come after it. 

It isn't a story I'm telling. 

It's also a story I'm telling, in my head, as I go along. 

Tell, rather than write, because I have nothing to write with and writing is in any case forbidden. But if it's a story, even in my head, I must be telling it to someone. You don't tell a story only to yourself. There's always someone else." - The Handmaid's Tale

The last day in Vilnius was very peaceful. I had breakfast with Asta. She told me about growing up with fresh vegetables and how much she loves the change of weather, because the change of weather means a change of soup.

Soup is a part of every meal here.

Her partner, Donatas, is what they used to call a "gearhead" back in the day. Loves cars. Loves oil and roaring. Loves pieces and parts. Bolts and belts and solenoids and torque converters. He was very clean, though, with a haircut like an Icelandic pony.

I had "done" the town, so the goal this day was to plot out the rest of the trip, to just take a few hours with my charts and my sextant and a book interpreting the navigation of the stars. I drank instant coffee and ate dates.

The box they came in read "Juicy Dates."  Which will be my stage name when the audience tires of Amber Regrets.

Getting up to Riga wasn't going to be a problem, but getting back to Poland where my flight home is will be tricky. Because of an "exclave" on the West Coast of Lithuania, it's difficult to take a shortcut back to Warsaw.

This exclave is called Kaliningrad and is a sizable chunk of Russia that doesn't connect to Russia in any way. It will definitely be in the news when all hell breaks loose over here again some day. It's a port full of tanks and battleships right in the middle of Europe. It gives them great access to Scandinavia and everywhere else.

I guess it's kind of like Alaska.

In any case, you can't enter it without a Russian visa, and those are expensive and not, to me, worth it just to cut across Ivan's back yard on the way to soccer practice, so... I booked a flight from Riga to Warsaw, a cheap shared room for that evening in Warsaw, and then a little shuttle back to the airport, so I can hear Ruggles a'purring again.

All of that was still cheaper than the visa. And faster, of course.

I finished reading The Bluest Eye (scary! sad! great!) and also finished the last story in The Pegnitz Junction (fantastic!), and started something called Ferdyduke. After about twenty pages, I threw Ferdyduke in the Ferdydump and started The Handmaid's Tale.

Which is excellent.

Ferdyduke is a classic of Polish literature that has been highly recommended several times, and I've started it several times, so I packed it figuring this would be the only possible place to read it. But, it is not my bag, baby.

It did teach me, however, that the Polish words for "fingers" and "toes" are the same. Worth carrying it around the world for that, I'll say.

I think the Liths were waiting for me to leave so they could mindmeld or whatever they do for lovemaking, They're too fragile and clean-seeming to picture fucking. I just imagine she hums like a tiny car for him and he makes a sound like new soup for her, and their muscles contract.

That... actually sounds kind of hot. Which means I have been on the road a long time.

Took the long walk into the city and went back to the tea house I liked on the previous day.

You are here again! Do you want the same thing?
"Yes, please. The Lord Henry."
Yes, I know. Are you here a long time?
"Just today. Tomorrow I'm going north to see The Hill of Crosses."
Why?
"It looks...interesting."
It is, perhaps, the top-10 creepiest place on Earth.
"Haha. Ok, I'll go get creeped out."

(Loud church bells ring outside for a long time)

After the Hill, you will go home to the UK?
"Haha. No, I live in Seattle in the U.S. Do I sound...English?"
No, but you ordered tea. Americans drink coffee.
"Why were the bells so loud just now?"
To tell the hour.
"But they rang at least twenty times."
To tell it is an hour. It is your own responsibility to know which one.

I shopped around for some amber, which is here too in great quantities, but it's very expensive, even for a little chip carved to look like a heart. Nobody is getting any.

I popped into an antique shop that looked promising, but it was also very expensive. It had ID cards for Nazi officers and Soviet medals. The most interesting, to me, was the Mother Heroine medal they give women who have ten or more babies.

Good work, Natasha, we were running out of soldiers and prostitutes. The state thanks you.

I left without buying pricey Prussian coins or Himmler's shoulder blade.

Outside, children straddled wooden bicycles and their parents, one tenth of the way to a Mother Heroine medal, helped them balance. Little girls held out candies and asked for them. When they were told no, they selected different candies. And again until a candy was approved by the state.

I popped into a deli for dinner and met the meanest woman. Holdover from The Bad Old Days, I think. She sold me some pretty bad cepelini (those blimp-shaped potato things) and some just-ok beets.

Walking to a park to eat, I heard a violin playing the familiar sad sounds of Where is My Mind. So unexpected and beautiful. I started shaking with emotion. I followed the sound until I found the musicians and sat on the steps near them just as the singer was "swimmin' in the Caribbean."

I ate the beets with my fingers and wept. I am trembling now remembering it. Why was it so powerful? That happened yesterday with Cherry Bomb too. The street musicians are what I will remember about this place, I think. And the beautiful red Church of St. Anne.

I took some terrible video of them. It's just awful, really. I just wanted to be near them. I'm so much more used to being affected internally, from passages in books, from thoughts during films. They changed to the Game of Thrones theme, and I needed a coffee. My fingers were purplepink from the beets. My mouth, if I could have seen it, was probably the same color.

A guy walked by in a t-shirt that read FUCK HAPPENS, which cracked me up. A sign at a cafe read "Come to the Dark Side, We Have a Coffee."  The "a" in there killed me too.

I was open and happy, a kiln-fired porcelain creamer painted with folk flowers.

Bought some coffee and when I came back out, the musicians were playing Where is My Mind again. I thought it would have less impact, but it was just as beautiful. In fear of immunity, I left.

On the (long, long) walk back, I wanted a drink, but the famous whiskey bar (King and Mouse) was closed on account of coming down with a case of the Sundays. Same with the famous brandy bar. A sober night for Captain Kiln Creamer.

Which was fine. I would be taking the bus in the morning to Siauliai to see the Hill of Crosses.*

Farewell, Vilnius, you were a town of kind people, beautiful live music, and tasteful monuments.

*Spoiler Warning - I made it there with no trouble as these pictures show.  These are the pictures you get for this entry. Does it make sense? Not to me.