Vivian Travels to Estonia Ch. 09

The next morning, Vivian woke up with Erki the dog, barking and Maia screaming. She looked at the clock and it showed 6:30 presumably, AM. Two things became immediately self-evident. Eino Tarvas was not in her bed. Either he didn't sleep with her throughout the night; or she had fallen asleep while he was still in her presence. Or perhaps he had remained with her but had left to tend to the normal daily dairy farming chores which she knew had to commence long before 6:30 AM. The other evident fact was that Maia had obviously not awakened during the wee hours of the morning. Her baby had slept completely through the night for the very first time. Now that was definitely something to celebrate for sure.

Vivian dutifully tended to her baby's needs. Vivian duly burped Maia after she had her fill of her mother's milk. Then with Maia in her arms, Vivian trudged to the Tarvas farmhouse for breakfast. Apparently, she had arrived at just about the right time. Eino had arrived for his breakfast and so had Helmutt, Eino's son. Maarja had started cooking for them, so that Vivian's timing was right for the entire family to have breakfast together. After breakfast, Vivian and Maarja sat down and planned menus to last a week. They soon worked a schedule for the household.

The next few days proved to be very hectic as construction material, milking machines and cows were delivered to the farm. In addition, more supplies were continuously being delivered which Vivian had ordered. Vivian also got around to obtaining a motor vehicle for herself, a four door Škoda Fabia sedan. Vivian viewed that the purchase of this vehicle signaled the final point of no return for her, and metaphorically completed her permanent departure from the US. This vehicle is not available for purchase in the United States, but as the Škoda car company was a total subsidiary of Volkswagen, she did not feel totally alienated.

Vivian and Eino worked remarkably well together in organizing and supervising the development of the expanded farming enterprise. It was not that they agreed in every aspect, but they each had a mutual respect for each other's skills and abilities. Thus, when there was a point of contention, they mutually took a breath, and calmly presented their case to each other. They had made a pact to each other, that once an agreement was mutually reached, there would be no articulation of second-guessing recriminations of the decision even should the choice turn out to be patently wrong in retrospect. Their working relationship succeeded because Eino Tarvas was not a male chauvinist. The experience of taking care of his ill wife brought home to him, the obvious fact how easier his life on the farm would have been had his wife not been ill, and able to contribute as she was prepared to do.

The camaraderie between Vivian and Eino in their working arrangement was very evident. They routinely exhibited uninhibited joy and satisfaction in taking on their tasks and chores. Their cheerful outlook had the hidden advantage in that it instilled high morale amongst the farm labor they employed. Those laborers were happy to be employed at the Tarvas farm, which in turn made them more productive as they took pride in their labor. Both Vivian and Eino were not afraid to praise them when justified.

Vivian and Eino divided their workloads to maximize their skills and interests. Eino was in charge of overseeing the dairy part while Vivian took care of the management of the crops. Eino was in charge of hiring the labor as he had intimate knowledge of the people available in the area augmented by knowledge acquired from his interaction with the neighboring farmers. Vivian took over the business financial operations. This proved to be for Eino the most useful skill that Vivian brought to the table. Vivian skillfully found the markets for the increased output of the agricultural production of the farm. The contractual agreements she negotiated was to the best advantage. In no time at all the combined farm was indeed well on its way to becoming the most prominent farm in all of Estonia.

The other initial major concern for Vivian was planning her wedding. Considering the brevity of the courtship, she could be forgiven to have desired an elaborate affair. A lavish wedding would possibly silence the presumably snide remarks which their wedding guests might be prone to utter in light of their brief acquaintanceship. However, the most important result she wished to achieve with respect to her wedding plans was to blot out the memory of her wedding to Sam Crawford. Since her wedding to Eino would occur on the same weekend in August, hopefully there would be less cause to recollect the image of having her first husband hauled off to jail literally minutes after the wedding ceremony.

Unfortunately, because of the territorial divide between them, it was not possible to plan a wedding where guests of the friends and relatives be equally represented. For practical purposes she could not have the wedding in Wisconsin. She asked Eino how many guests in Estonia he would like to see present, and so she could plan accordingly, with the assistance of Maarja as well. It turned out that Eino was well regarded and known by some very prominent Estonians, so that surprisingly the guest list was rather larger than Vivian would have expected. It actually consisted of around two hundred. Every possible relative by blood or by marriage were included. Also included were friends and acquaintances some of whom were very prominent in Estonian society. The acquaintances included those Eino had acquired in his business dealings.

Seeing the length of the guest list surprised Vivian, although she was secretly elated as an elaborate affair was something she truly desired in her heart. She asked, "Was your first marriage to Dagi equally as large or even larger considering she must have had more of her relatives and friends in attendance than I will have? At this point in time, it looks like I'll have only two guests, namely my co matrons of honor."

Eino replied, "Oh no! When I married Dagi there were only fifty quests in total. We were obviously both younger than you and I are now, as I had just started working the farm on my own. Since then, I've acquired membership in two agricultural organizations to advance the cause for improvement of farming in Estonia. As a result, my active participation in these farming groups, I've become more known and especially among some politicians. Hence this expanded list."

Vivian replied, "Oh I have no problem with having such an elaborate affair. However, I noticed most of the guests have Tallinn addresses, so it would seem like we ought to have the wedding in Tallinn as opposed to here at the farmhouse, as I had originally imagined. The additional advantage for having the wedding in Tallinn is that we'll be near the airport, so we can begin our honeymoon quicker."

For Vivian, her two actual and it turned out only friends and relatives, to attend the wedding were her two matrons of honor. Namely, her sister Erica Koeninger née Laaning and her best friend Angela Peterson née Black. Both of them had been Vivian's co matrons of honor, in the wedding a year earlier, and Vivian had been the maid of honor in each of their respective wedding ceremonies. All three of them had been pregnant a year ago and all of them had subsequently delivered baby girls. They were also still breast feeding as each of them attended meetings of La Leche League. Each of them had a goal to commit to one complete year of breast feeding before they would proceed to the stage of getting their babies totally weaned.

In this regard, Erica agreed to come four weeks prior to the wedding, and help Vivian construct her wedding dress. Erica also agreed to stay at the farm two weeks longer after the ceremony. The plan was to allow Vivian to enjoy a two weeks honeymoon vacation, without the necessity of toting her baby with her. Erica was certain, she would have enough milk available for her niece as well her own daughter, Anna. Angela could not appear until the Thursday before the Saturday wedding date. However, as she learned of the particulars of Erica's commitment, she indicated that she would be also available to assist in meeting baby Maia's nourishment requirements for a day or two, after the wedding ceremony. She was scheduled to return to the United States on the following Monday. Neither of their husbands were able to come to Estonia, and thus the remaining children of Angela and Erica would remain in the United States. Neither was the rest of her family able to or willing to come to the wedding despite Vivian's offer to pay for the air fare.

As the time came, Vivian with Maia in tow, traveled to Tallinn to pick up Erica and her baby daughter at the Tallinn Lennart Meri Airport. The flight left Chicago midafternoon and arrived in Tallinn midafternoon the next day. The flight took over fifteen hours with stopovers in Detroit and Amsterdam and plus the time difference of eight hours accounted for the almost full day passage for Erica from departure to arrival in local times. Erica was impressed by Vivian's Škoda Fabia, and expressed a wish she could have something as exotic for herself, instead of a mundane Cadillac SUV. Vivian merely chuckled at Erica's quip.

The conversations between the two of them, from the time Vivian had first advised of her engagement, out of necessity had been rather sporadic without too many details divulged. So, the two and a half hour road trip to the farm afforded ample time for them to discuss fully the upcoming nuptials and the implications of the radical change in Vivian's lifestyle. After initial greetings, and gathering some coffee to drink during the drive, Erica started the conversation with, "This may very well be a very silly question, but I have to ask, are you sure? Do you really think you will be happy with this marriage?"

Vivian replied, "As the saying goes, 'There are only two sure things in life: death and taxes.' Everything else is unpredictable no matter how certain one might be of the eventual outcome."

Erica scoffed, "True indeed as far as that saying goes. Still there are reasonable expectations based on experience and prior knowledge, where one can come to a rational decision. You said he proposed to you after only the third consecutive nightly date so that you hadn't known of his existence prior to three full days. And you accepted his proposal almost immediately. I get that you were infatuated with him. But how the hell can you have any certainty that you will have a successful marriage?"

Vivian felt she would have to adopt a lighthearted tone to defuse Erica's dour demeanor and nullify her serious reservations. So, she initially relied, "Not to put a fine point on it, but I didn't accept his proposal immediately. I believe it took at least two full hours of intense deliberations before I agreed to marry him."

Erica naturally scoffed, "Oh! Come on Vivian, be serious!"

Vivian replied, "Actually in his presentation, Eino quoted from Jane Austen's 'Pride and Prejudice' to reinforce the attractiveness of his sudden offer of marriage."

Erica was completely flabbergasted at this unique factoid. All she could mutter, "Huh! What the fuck?"

Vivian mischievously stated, "Since you've read the novel as well, you would know that there's a character named Charlotte Lucas, who opines in essence, that happiness in marriage is a crap shoot anyway as prior knowledge is of no advantage. Charlotte goes on to conclude that it's much better to know nothing of the intended spouse's flaws beforehand. The implication is that one never knows how one will adjust to the foibles of one's partner in marriage in any case."

"That's just BS and you know it. It may have been applicable in Jane Austen's time, but it has no application in today's marriages."

At this point, again trying to lighten the conversation between them, Vivian resorted to an affectation of speech she often utilized when conversing with her. She replied, "Au contraire my fair sister. Your two marriages rather prove that viewpoint."

Erica could only repeat, "Huh! How the fuck can you say that?"

Vivian replied, "You knew Matt for several years, and fucked him for several years I daresay. And you finally married him when you became pregnant. Yet your marriage to him was not successful and did not even last four years before you separated."

"That's not fair Vivian. You know damn well the circumstances. You're the only one I've ever told that my first pregnancy might not have been his, and my subsequent miscarriage removed any possible chance of discovery. It was my adultery and my subsequent pregnancy which was without a doubt the result of my adultery, which paved the way for the dissolution of that marriage."

"Don't be so hard on yourself sis. You know it takes two to tango. The only reason you committed adultery, aside from the wicked fun of it, was that you could sense that your marriage was going down the toilet anyway. You weren't getting pregnant, despite eschewing birth control protection throughout your marriage. You made a special point of having sex during virtually every estimated occurrence of your ovulation. Your troubles escalated since Matt refused to go with you to consult a medical fertility specialist. I have the impression, that because you were pregnant on your wedding day, that Matt couldn't believe that he might be sterile. Maybe had you been frank with him about the doubt of paternity of your first pregnancy, he might have been more amiable to explore all medical options to overcome the infertility problem in your marriage."

Erica sighed, as she replied wistfully, "Yes in hindsight I kind of wished that I had. Of course, hindsight is always 20/20 and if wishes were fishes, we'd all have plenty to eat."

Vivian smiled at this juncture, as she could sense, Erica was easing up her animosity regarding her proposed marriage to Eino Tarvas. She could see that she just might convince Erica, that she was not making a colossal blunder. So, she continued, "But look at you now with Rod. A man who you knew about as long as I've known Eino before you knew with absolutely certainty that you were going to marry him. This marriage sure seems as strong as ever and now you have three children two boys and a daughter. By the way is that it for you or am I going to have any more nephews and or nieces?"

Erica answered, "I think the plan is to have one more before I'll get my tubes tied. That will especially be so if we have another girl. That way each child for siblings would have at least one brother and one sister. I remember when you were about three that Paul was continuously pestering Mom for some time to get a brother for him as he was fed up being the only son."

Vivian replied, "I of course don't remember that, but I wonder how Dad would have resolved the problem of who gets the farm if we did have another brother. Anyway, back to what I was saying. You have a wonderful marriage now, despite the fact that you're in an interracial marriage with biracial children. And you know there still exists enough racism in America which makes an interracial marriage more difficult to maintain harmoniously especially when interrelating with slight acquaintances or even relatives of either race."

Erica had to admit, "You're right about that. Mom and Dad have been aloof towards me, and I sure don't get along with my sister-in-law. At least Paul is cordial with me, I guess he had always respected me as the older sister. Anyway, I had to obviously bring Anna along with me, so there's no hiding my interracial connections. How do you think your fiancé and his mother will receive me?"

"Oh, I've alerted them that you have a black husband. I'm sure they'll be circumspect. They may or may not be deep down in their hearts racist, but then Estonia is about as homogeneous a state as they come in Europe. So there really is no occasion to develop a racist posture. I certainly haven't spotted a black person yet, so I suspect there might not even be one lurking in the entire country."

Erica then returned to the main topic of their conversation, "Well OK enough about the rashness and the suddenness of your marriage to Eino. It's time to discuss the real elephant in the room concerning your proposed marriage. You're going to be a farmer's wife. I can't forget your consistent attitude when we were growing up on our family farm in Wisconsin. Since I believe when you were eight years old you made it crystal clear to everyone you came into contact with, that dairy farming was not your bag. As soon as you grew old enough you vowed to leave the farm for good, and you did!"

Vivian laconically retorted, "Well that was then, and this is now. Times have changed and I with it."

Erica added, "In contrast, it was I who wanted to grow up and become a farmer's wife. That's why I didn't pay as much attention in school as I couldn't find the knowledge useful. Of course, I regret that now, but that's a different story. I did become a farmer's wife and for a time I was happy. But things change as you say, and I'm now an owner of a successful restaurant and night club. And so, farming no longer holds any interest for me.

"But you studied law and became a lawyer. You were employed by one of the most important law firms in Chicago. You had an exciting life; you had fulfilled your life dreams. But now you are willing to throw all that away to return to a lifestyle you originally detested. I'll give you that I never heard you complain about the hard work involved in dairy farming. You never bitched to Dad about having to milk those four damn cows. I sure as hell did when I had to milk them when you were too sick with mononucleosis.

"No, you didn't mind the hard work, but what you said was that your chief complaint was that farm work was tedious and boring. It did not challenge your mind. So how long do you think it will take before you'll get bored and want to get out of what you're now getting into?"

Vivian answered, "Every job has its tedious and boring aspects, even in the job as a criminal defense attorney. Criminal trials might be fascinating as depicted in TV or in the movies, but the reality of criminal defense work in the main can be very tedious and tiresome. Mostly, you're dealing with losers as clients who lack the fortitude and discipline to earn an honest living. In most cases than naught, you plead your client guilty as the prosecution's case is unassailable. Your main job then is to produce a disingenuous presentation in court in an effort to procure the lightest sentence possible for your client."

Erica observed, "I take it then, that was the situation you found yourself in defending Sam?"

"Exactly! The evidence against Sam uncovered by the forensic accountant turned out to be pretty damning. The challenge for me was to get the least amount of jail time possible. In my view anything less than twenty years would be success. The best case scenario would have been ten years and with early parole Sam could have been home in time to see Maia enter grade school."

Erica gasped, "Oh my God Vivian! Were you that much in love with him, that you would have stayed married to him had he not been murdered?"

Vivian replied, "Well you know that the traditional marriage vows start with 'for better or worse', and this definitely fell into the category of 'worse'. I guess my commitment to marriage was probably stronger than my love for Sam. I actually have bittersweet memories of him. The one thing that mystifies me, about him, is how greedy he was. He stole $120 million over a period of twelve years, thereby averaging $10 million per year. And he kept on stealing right up to the time he was caught. I was to learn that during that last month, last August, he had squirreled away a half million during that month which monies turned up in the Monaco bank.