Trafika Europe 3 - Latvian Sojourn

The woods were so quiet, benevolent and fragrant. On a high tree top a bird was sharpening its beak against the tree bark. A deer raced past and a snake slithered by. White cobwebs criss-crossed between pine and fir trunks. Nadezhda dipped her hands in the dew covered wild berry mounds and cooled her face. How would it be if she were never to go back? If she were to go into the marsh and stay? Among the mounds of cranberries and the marsh tea. She would lie down in the white, damp moss, fall asleep and force herself never to get up. And wait, perhaps wait for a long time, wait for him to arrive and take her – death, deliverance … But, just look, at the morels along the roadside – tiny, crunchy and slender-capped! And the orange-capped scaber stalks like thumbs protruding from among the ferns, the fists of wrinkled porcini poking out from patches of moss and sand, and look there, the flock of peppery milk caps in the black leaves. See the cranberries barely blushing on the mounds of bushes and the clusters of cowberries ripening underfoot. Nadezhda fills her lungs with the morning air, thus finding strength, she bends and starts to pick …

…picks and bends, bends and picks …

Nadezhda Mihailovna performs her synchronized, routine moves.

101