Rainbows

I'll never forget the rainbow.

It was the summer of 1993. It was the first time I worked with A.P.P.L.E. I was in awe of the beauty of Lithuania's countryside. I was amazed at the goodness of the people. I admired the strength of the women I met. I loved the food.

And yet there was a horror that existed. As I heard the stories of the Soviet occupation from people who had lived it, I ached. For a woman who grew up in a small town in eastern North Carolina this was something I had never experienced. I thought about childhood. While the women I met were living in Deportation Camps hearing sick babies cry , I was innocently sitting on the floor of my home playing with paper dolls. In Lithuania I was very close to something I had never imagined existed.

Each day as we walked to the school where we were teaching, we walked past some buildings which had been used for "Interrogation". It was explained that this was not the simple questioning which is done humanly in the US. This interrogation involved torture. Many people died in that building. During the 2 weeks I was in the city, the building haunted me. I could not think of anything else. There were times when I felt death all around me. I could not shake the feeling or my thoughts. Sometimes I walked slowly in respect for those who died, and at other times I crossed the street because the thoughts were too intense. As we daily walked in the constant rain, it even seemed more dreary.

Then it happened. One day at noon after an A.P.P.L.E. staff meeting, we walked out of the building. ALL of us stopped in silence. There was a rainbow which covered the entire sky from one side of the city square to the other. No one uttered a word but we knew the thoughts were the same. The rainbow was saying to those of us who had fallen in love with Lithuania and her people " There is hope. Lithuania will survive." And we knew that somehow we were a part of making that happen. Someone took a picture. We walked away, still in silence.

I never forgot the rainbow.

One summer a few years later, I decided that Vaiva must have a copy of the picture. I had the photo enlarged and mounted into a beautiful picture 2 feet wide. That summer in Panevežys during an A.P.P.L.E. conference, I presented this to Vaiva. I told the crowd about the rainbow and the meaning behind it. I explained that I had grown to believe that it was Vaiva's rainbow. Because of her dream, A.P.P.L.E. was touching the lives of the children of the next generation. They were the future of Lithuania. They were the "hope".

It was not until quite a while later that someone told me that Vaiva means Rainbow. What irony.

Yes- Vaiva and rainbows go together.

Myra Goodwin