7 February, 2025: Returning Home

set in Törmänen, Finland

They are leaving. The car is packed up, and there are plenty of dried fish snacks and elkskin clothes in the back seat. Some will be given to neighbours, others to Mother’s friends.

The snow is still high and covering the dirt track. Mother fears they’ll have an accident. Father has always been a bad driver, but now his hands really tremble against the wheel.

He has to be emotional. That will affect his driving.

The winter will soon end, but the sun still rises around ten. Despite it being completely dark out and the temperature being around minus twenty, all of the family members have come out to say goodbye: Father’s two brothers and their spouses, Father’s cousins, and the various children. The elders are in their jackets made with reindeer hides, or beaska, while the younger children wear coats and jackets found commonly in Helsinki or other parts of Europe. Father’s oldest brother is named Jonne. He wears the hat of the Four Winds. It is blue with a cylindrical form, and each of the four clothed stars hang downwards, indicating a cardinal direction.

Father and his relatives say goodbye to each other. Mother is closer to the car so she can’t make out what is being said among them, but Father seems cordial enough as he goes to each and every male elder relative and their partner or child to wish them well.

The plan was that after Mother’s mother-in-law’s funeral, they would spend a week or two maximum and then return home. Instead, it has been nearly two months in the village. And Father has told his brothers that now that he has retired, he will try to come more often.

Father finishes with his pleasantries. He looks at Mother and says it’s time to go. The car has been on so that the engine can start up and the interior can properly heat. Still when Mother takes her seat, it freezes her bum.

It has been some time since they have started up the car, and she only hopes that it will drive effortlessly. It will be a long thirteen-hour drive. Since it is about seven in the morning, they should reach Helsinki around eight or nine at night. At least it’s a fairly obstacle-free drive back to Helsinki. It will be a straight road with snow clumping around the sides of the highway and icicles hanging on the tree branches. They won’t see much as it is still dark. Not to mention there aren’t many towns or populated areas to pass. It’ll get easier once the sun comes out, and then they’ll exit Lapland, and there will be a lot of lights and signage from the neighbouring towns. The scenery will become much more urbanised once they reach the south.

All Mother can hope is that they don’t get caught in a blizzard, and that Father will be able to manage the drive. At least Mother will be there, to keep her eyes vigilant and focused, to warn Father of anything that could disturb them on their journey home.

As Father waves to his relatives, giving them permission to return back inside their homes, Mother asks, “What did they say to you?”

Father says, “Nothing.”

Mother scoffs. “Nothing? Has there ever been a time when your older brother has told you nothing?”

Father puts an annoyed smile on his face and gets the car in gear. “Whatever needs to be said has already been said. And I understand why they say it. The past is past. It’s time to return home now.”

“That is also true,” Mother says. She puts both of her hands in her lap. She was so busy being a caretaker to her mother-in-law for the last year that she has forgotten what it is like to do other things. She could get active in the church again if she feels like it, she could probably spend some more time with her good friends, too. She met many neighbours during her walks with her mother-in-law, neighbours who softened when they saw her being a caretaker to an elder. She is going to have a lot more friendly relationships in her neighbourhood.

All in all, Mother has learned a lot from being there for another human being far older than her, just as she enjoyed learning how to sheer fur and cook novel meats during their time in Father’s village. She is going back to Helsinki with new knowledge, and she has the sense that Father, no matter how little he acknowledges it, has changed a lot in the last two months, too.

Father revs the engine. He reverses the car onto the dirt tracks. Mother looks back and waves goodbye, though the relatives are already gone. Something about seeing an absence of people around the wooden cabins relieves Mother, and she takes a breath.

They are leaving. Their time in the village has come to end. By the end of the night, they will be back home.

And once they are there, an entirely new chapter of their life will begin.