Chapter 18 The Blessing
Maria was used to waking up early; her first impulse was to go down to the kitchen to get some breakfast. To her surprise, Austria and Poland were already there, quarreling about where and when to get the food blessed.
"But, like, the whole service will be in, like, German!"Feliks protested.
"You're in a German-speaking country!" Austria blew his stray hair curl out of his eyes. "They'll all be in, like, German!"
"Don't you have any really conservative Catholic churches, where it'll at least be in like Latin?" Feliks whined.
"Nein! The Pope hasn't authorized that!" Austria turned away and saw Maria standing in the doorway. "Maria," he said, resuming a dignified, calm tone, "would probably get more out of a German-language service than a Latin one." She nodded and he smiled.
"Fine." Feliks huffed. "At least my German is better than, like, poor Liet's." He checked his cell phone. "He should be down here soon."
"Want to see what we are bringing to be blessed?" Onkel Roderich ushered Maria into the kitchen . He showed her his basket with jars of pickled herring, hard-boiled eggs, bread and dried sausage. "But look at Pan Fancy-Pants's basket!"1
Poland proudly revealed a picnic hamper that could have held enough food for Maria's sixth-year class. "A little bit of what we're going to eat tomorrow!" He crowed. He pointed out fresh and smoked kielbasa, eggs, ham, little loaves of raisin and rye bread, a container of salt, a butter lamb, slices of poppy seed roll, cookies, containers of potatoes, beets, cabbage, and the deadly horseradish.
"Everything looks so good," Maria sighed. Poland waved a finger at her. "You can't have any until the crack of dawn on Sunday," he warned. "Until then, it's whatever can be eaten without cooking."
"I'm not that strict," Austria muttered, but Poland laughed at him. "I give my women a break!" he exclaimed. "No cooking after Good Friday!"
Lithuania came downstairs, straightening his tie, and the four agreed upon a church and time.
Maria had never been in a church outside of a field trip. As they entered the Baroque church, she gasped. It was pink, pastel blue, gold and white; ornate carvings framed stained-glass windows. An organs' pipes reached to the heavenly ceiling. Statues of saints in various poses of adoration and torment stood in corners. She followed Onkel Roderich to the first pew, panic growing in her chest. I don't know what to do, she realized, and everyone's going to see it.
As if he read her mind, Poland leaned over and whispered, "Kneel when we kneel, stand when we stand, sit when we sit. The one thing you can't do is take communion. So just sit there and smile while we do that, tak?" She nodded and looked at the leaflet he shoved at her. Gott Sei Dank it was in German, even if the Austrian German seemed almost like a foreign language to her. She was able to puzzle out when the blessing of the food baskets took place and was relieved to see it happened before the Eucharist.
Maria didn't even try to sing the hymns; she had learned from bitter experience how terribly she mangled a tune. She did as Poland said, trying to decipher the Austrian dialect as best she could; it was odd to realize that if they had gone to a Polish-language service, she would have understood it better. When the priest called parishioners up with their baskets, she looked at Austria and Poland. Austria looked hesitant, but Poland held out his hand to her. "Come on, chickie," he whispered, "help me lug this thing up there." She smiled, feeling as if she weren't a total outsider.
She stood in line with Poland, watching the priest and altar boys hover over the baskets. When it was their turn, the middle-aged man smiled and raised an eyebrow. He did the blessing in Polish, which made Poland squeal with delight. "Mój Bój," he whispered, "He must be one of my mortals. He totally recognized it was a real Polish basket!"
After the service, Poland insisted that they should greet the priest after the service. The others hemmed and hawed, but he had his way. Maria stood next to him as he grabbed the priest's hand and chatted in Polish. Afterwards he told the others, "He grew up in Krakow and took orders because of the stories his parents told him about Pope John Paul II! Isn't that fabulous? I got his name and I'm totally calling my sister about him right now!" He whipped out his cell phone and chatted away, while Maria walked with Austria and Lithuania behind him.
"Wesołych Świąt, Elenka," Feliks said and he ended his call.2 "So," he turned to Maria. "What did you think of the service?"
"It was nice," she admitted. "I liked the blessing of the food and the building was beautiful."
"But what about the service itself?" Austria asked. "What about the music?"
"Onkel Roderich, I'm tone deaf," Maria whispered. "The most beautiful music is wasted on me." Austria sighed. "And I'm not used to the Viennese dialect the priest used," she added.
"You know," Lithuania said, "You should go to a Catholic service in one of the southern or western German states. You'd be able to follow along better."
"Nie, Liet, what she really needs is to hear it in Latin, God's own language!" Poland retorted. The others laughed. "What's so funny?" He demanded. "It's like the universal language! We used to speak it all the time at court, Liet, you remember that!" He turned to Maria. "Does your school offer Latin?"
"The Gymnasium does," she admitted. "But they also offer French, English and Chinese. Vati wants me to continue with English or start Chinese."
"Hmm," Poland snorted. "No one can ever accuse your father of not looking towards the future." He turned to study Maria. "But what do you want, chickie?"
Maria looked back. In a short time, the notoriously shy Poland had apparently taken an interest in her. Over his shoulder, she saw Lithuania smiling at her. They were just strangers who had become friends; they couldn't do any damage to her or get her in trouble. "I want to become either a marine biologist or a zoologist who studies wolves," she whispered.
Poland clapped his hands, while Lithuania shook his smiling head, and Austria frowned. "You can't do that," Onkel Roderich scolded. "You're going to represent Mecklenburg-Vorpommern!"
"Why can't she do both?" Toris asked. "Let her go to university and then represent her state."
"I think that's fabulous!" Poland exclaimed. Maria smiled at him. "Do you think I can do both?"
Feliks turned to her, suddenly serious. "Listen to me, chickie. I met your Onkel Ludwig back in the 1820s. He was, like, so sweet, smart and idealistic then. If he had been raised by my friend Saxony, he would have gone to university and learned a totally different way of governing than what your father taught him. He's regretted that ever since. If you tell him you want to go to university and study fish or dolphins or wolves or whatever, he'd let you do it. And that kind of stuff can help you be a better state than just learning how to, like, do the paperwork." To Maria's surprise, he grabbed her arm and peered earnestly at her. "Go to university, chickie. Learn to learn, learn to think."
Lithuania shrugged and Austria sighed and shook his head. "I had no part in this,"Onkel Roderich said. Maria looked at Poland and nodded. "Learn to think?"
He smiled brightly. "Chickie, you have job security! You'll learn on the job. Study the things you'll love, that'll make you a wiser, better being." He laughed and shook his head. "I don't know why the hell I care about what happens to Prussia's child, but I like you, kid. Good people make good neighbors, tak?"
"Tak." Maria smiled and the two walked back to Austria's house, Lithuania and Austria leading the way.
Maria found her mother and told her about the church service and the blessing of the food. To her relief, Muti smiled and gave her a hug. "I'm glad you found it worthwhile, Liebling," she said. "I never felt I could impose my religion on you. I'm also glad that you agreed to go with your Onkels Vash and Ludwig to a Protestant service. I think it's good that you learn about religions before choosing one." She sighed. "Too many of us believe what we do because it's what we grew up with, not because we educated ourselves and made an informed decision."
"Muti," Maria said, "why did you start to tear up yesterday? I didn't mean to hurt your feelings."
"Ach, Liebling, I knew that. But when I started to think about love's power, I thought about me and your father. It was personal, that's all."
"But you have nothing to be ashamed of, do you?"
To her surprise, Maria's mother blushed. "I was selfish. I forgot how much your Onkel Vash cared for me when I started seeing your father. And I lied to Onkel Ludwig to protect your father when he was planning his bid to become the state of Brandenburg and Eastern Germany. But I've worked so hard to regain their trust and ask their forgiveness. And they've given it to me."
"What about Vati and the things he did to Poland?" Maria asked.
Muti frowned. "That is between those two. I was there the night Poland asked your father to forgive him for some cruel things he did to him in the past, and to your father's credit, he did. But I was also there when Poland's sister, the city of Gdansk, confronted your father. She had just told me about what he had done to her in the nineteenth century, and that had been very upsetting. I almost left your father because of it."
Maria stared at her mother; she had never heard this before. "What did he do to her, Muti?"
Muti shook her head. "It was long ago and it's not my place to tell you. If anyone should tell you that, it should be Vati." She looked up at Maria and there was a sad sweetness in her eyes. "When I teared up about love and redemption yesterday, it was because of your father. For so long, every nation had called him a brute and a bully. Poland was one of them. I took a chance with him and as I got to know him, I realized yes, he had done bad things. But he did them because others had wounded him first, terribly, and he never wanted anyone to hurt him again." Her eyes filled with tears. "I'm sorry, Maria, it still moves me. He needed to atone for his cruelty, to be forgiven, and to be loved. And I did all that for him. It was hard, but it was—it is—so worth it." When she looked up, Maria saw the love and pride shining in her mother's emerald eyes. "He loves you so much, Maria, and he wants to be the best father he can to you."
"He is good to me, Muti!" Maria exclaimed.
"Ja, he is. But sometimes the past is not always easy to let go. It's easier said than done." Muti stood up and hugged her. As Maria inhaled her mother's scent of almonds, milk and wildflowers, she felt the same comfort and love she remembered from her earliest years. "It's good that you are making friends with your neighbor Poland," Muti whispered. "But be cautious. Don't expect Vati to be as happy about it as Onkel Ludwig or I may be. There is too much bad history between them."
"Why does it have to be so hard between certain nations, Muti?" Maria whispered into her neck.
"I'm not the best nation to ask, Süße." Muti said gently. "I've never had a deep-seated hatred or rivalry towards anyone. Maybe Onkel Ludwig or Onkel Roderich can help you in that regard." She combed Maria's hair with her small fingers and smiled at her. "Tomorrow is Christ's resurrection from the dead and the redemption of humanity and all nations. But everyone is expecting Easter baskets as well. Will you help me and Onkel Vash assemble and hide them?" Maria nodded. "Gutes Mädchen! Ach, I remember your first Easter and how you just focused on taking that first plastic egg apart! Your Vati was almost in tears because he wanted you to keep hunting and find the stuffed rabbit he had bought you!"
If you're wondering about the incidents Lili refers to when she talks to Maria, they are in "Liechtenstein x Prussia: Maiden and Unicorn." Also I want to wish everyone Merry Christmas, Joyeux Noel, Frohe Weihnachten, Got Jul, hauskaa joulua, and Buon Natale!
1 Pan: "Mister" in Polish
2 Polish: Happy Easter