It is Kevadpüha. It is the first day of spring, a day of great festivity and warmth for the Estonian people. Had Mother not had her mother-in-law at home, she would be spending the entire night with her sister, Eha, and her nephew, Jaan, out on the streets of Tartu, celebrating the Walpurgis Night to the fireworks above the town hall building. Of course things are different this year for many reasons. Her nephew is growing to become a teenager and wants to spend less time with the uncool adults who helped raise him. And Mother has been so busy being a second mother to her mother-in-law that she has little time to meet her sister. She hasn’t met her in months and has no idea what is going on in her life, which is why she decided to call her some days ago and invite herself over, to the house she used to visit regularly, in an attempt to celebrate the first day of spring like they used to.
It is Kevadpüha. Mother didn’t come the evening before because there was no way she could have spent a whole night without sleeping after taking care of her mother-in-law all day. Mother comes at seven in the morning, the hour during which Eha readies herself for work. It is in theory the start of spring, but the weather is still incredibly cold. The morning’s temperature is right about zero, and it is hard to bear because of Mother’s lack of fat on her bones and the lack of sunlight above to warm her in its glow. Eha has a beautiful backyard with ample space for a garden and an apple tree, but all that one can see in this hour is the dead, dry, blacked-out branches, the frosted wooden planks of the fence, and the snow. Mother finds the key Eha hides under a doormat—some things never change—and uses it with the fence that will lead to the back of Eha’s home.
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