All who come to Arkady’s home in Kolodozero, or to his church for the service – they are all running away, somewhere or from something. From the urban noise or weariness, from the absurdity of life, from themselves, from their former selves, from their sins or wrongs. Arkady himself is a fugitive, more than once he has said that he was here, “because I am weak, the strong are able to leave.”
To leave is something the strong can do, but they will come again when their strength is on the wane. And go the route of the temple, general store, house of culture, Ust-Reka stop . If at the bus stop Yuri is drowsing, he will not refuse ‘one hundred grams of vodka for the welcome’. Then the urban fugitive will turn to Zaozerye, and will visit yet another former city dweller whose kid Zakharko, three years already as a country kid, wanders around in the rain. Then our fugitive will launch the boat in the lake, sit on the oars and even forget about them. And it will circle the lake waters, from island to island, until he comes to his senses and heads for the temple.
In Arkady’s barn there are two other fugitives repairing an old motorcycle. Why kid Pasha and Max are better off in Kolodozero than with their own families is embarrassing to ask. Pasha once let slip that he knew how to make soup from nettles, “we did not have any food at home.” Arkady makes a stern face, but not for long, soon he accompanies the kids with a playful slap to search for cloudberries. The motorcycle crackles and shakes, but runs, leaving behind a cloud of bluish gasoline smoke.
The Kolodozero cycle tightens, and another life already seems impossible, without the morning fog, in which a boat appears from nowhere and it is hard to tell if it floats on the water or on the fog. Everything looks eternal, the countless dogs and cats, goats and chickens, a girl with a basket on the road and young people with blue lips from the blueberries. Back in town, the fugitive will not soon come to life: through the walls of the apartment for a long time he hears a mosquito buzz and the ringing of bells, and trough the wallpaper patterns emerges the painfully familiar outline of the Nativity of the Virgin Church.
Russia, Karelia 2009-2014
June 27, 2015
