Maja’s Traces

Since I had the day off, I had actually planned to go out and take some photographs, but because of the weather I decided instead to settle on the wide windowsill by the garden window with a book. While the rain drummed onto the lawn and the wind rustled in the leaves of our old birch, a message appeared on my phone. With the very first words, “Do you remember…”, I knew who it was from.

His little sister had joined my class a few weeks before the long summer holidays, and soon after that I had become friends with her brother, who was a year above me. The son of an artist, who had moved from the big city out into the countryside because the city had “killed” his mother’s creativity. They had bought an old farmhouse surrounded by fields, far from the small village. Although the house itself was large, my friend moved into a small wooden caravan in the middle of the huge garden and turned it into his own little home.

In his message he asked whether I still remembered that very caravan. He had discovered a new passion, camping, only the mosquitoes were getting on his nerves. I smiled, and for a while we exchanged memories of that time. Then the phone fell silent, and I knew we would not write again for some months, perhaps even years. It had been like this for twenty years now. Remarkable how such a thing can endure. We do not reproach each other, we do not quarrel. We write when we have the time, as if we had seen each other only yesterday. We laugh about our shared past, bring one another up to date, and then return to our separate lives. One of those timeless friendships, in which a bond has been tied for good, no matter what happens on the outside.

His mother was a painter. She worked in oil and acrylic and created beautiful paintings. Her favourite artist was Niki de Saint Phalle, and her favourite song was “Für mich soll’s rote Rosen regnen” by Hildegard Knef. She loved the art of “imperfect beauty” and detested perfect beauty, which she nonetheless had to produce for her commissions.

One day she received an offer for an exhibition of her work and was given a specific number of pieces she was to show. She was still working on the last painting right up until a few days before the opening. I no longer remember the painting clearly, because during that productive phase she hardly left her studio, which was also the living room, and only came out to eat. I also do not remember why she had to rush out of the studio that day and, very unlike her, left the door standing open.

They had a huge St Bernard called Maja. Maja was terribly clumsy but utterly endearing. As a greeting she would, with astonishing accuracy, plant her more than sixty kilos right on my feet and shift all her weight onto my legs. Now the studio door was open, and the still‑wet painting for the exhibition stood unguarded and a little unsteady on the easel.

When we came into the house to fetch Maja for a walk, we saw that she had left various traces across the painting with her nose, and that the painting in turn had left little marks on her own. The painter was beside herself when she returned, but when she caught sight of the dog, she swallowed down her frustration, and together we carried Maja out into the garden to wash her.

Only that evening did we see what this incident meant to her and what it set in motion. The paintings were to be collected early the next morning, so she really had no choice. Either she removed the painting from the exhibition, or she made the mishap part of her idea. She disliked both options, so her partner took the decision from her hands. The painting went into the show.

A few weeks later the opening took place. Many visitors praised her for the “disfigured” painting, and although she smiled, anyone who knew her could see in her eyes that she was not truly pleased. She received many offers for the piece, yet when her gallery works came back and we unloaded and opened them, we saw that she had not sold it.

At first we thought she had kept it because she could not stand behind the painting. But when we asked her, she laughed with tears in her eyes and said that she had realised you cannot control everything, only the way you choose to respond. She thanked us for our help with the exhibition and for quietly sharing in her frustration. Then she hung the painting with Maja’s traces in the kitchen, where the whole family would gather again and again.

That is one of the many memories we carry within us. Back then it was simply one day in a stretch of shared time. Today, I think I understand her words. And I believe she was right. Even though I know they sold the house and moved away long ago, in my memory the painting still hangs in the kitchen, a small monument to that insight and at the same time a loving reminder of Maja.