My life with Vaiva

Gita Kupčinskas has sent the following lovely remembrance of growing up with Vaiva. Gita's funeral tribute is here, a photo of her at the funeral is here.

I met Vaiva Vėbraitė when she was three years old and I was six. I remember the day well because someone took beautiful photos of Vaiva, my sister Diana, our mothers, and me in the Vėbra family garden during our visit. Periodically, I come across those photos. Vaiva really, really didn‘t want to have her picture taken that day. Diana and I loved posing. Thus began a life-long friendship, though I am not so sure that I should term it friendship. It was really more of a kinship. We were a bit like sisters who just didn‘t live in the same house.

Because Vaiva was being raised by five adults (her mother, father, maternal grandmother, maternal grandfather, and Teta Lijolė—her aunt), she had many advantages. Vaiva had adult conversations about a variety of topics from a very early age. She learned to read early and read avidly, both in Lithuanian and in English. She was exposed to the worlds of music, art, literature, and history long before many of her peers. I think her imagination was greatly enhanced by the attention of these five loving people. But life among these fascinating adults had its disadvantages as well. Vaiva didn‘t really know how to play. She didn‘t relate easily to other children. That‘s where I came in.

Being three years her senior, I probably matched Vaiva‘s intellect, at least for a while. Vaiva didn‘t particularly like games with standard toys, but she really responded to my suggestions to act out the Nancy Drew mystery series. The many rooms and passage ways of the Victorian style house and garden on Lawrence Street—the Vėbra home—made a terrific background for these adventures. The backyard garden was not really what I would call cultivated. It seemed to grow at will. But it was filled with surprising and delightful pleasures such as wayward raspberry bushes.

The house itself had two main floors with many rooms. Some of them were supposed to be off limits to us children because they housed the paintings which Teta Lijole was working on, but once the adults got involved with their coffee and tea, we were pretty much on our own to explore at will. When I look back on it, I don‘t think there was much order or discipline in the Vėbra home, but there sure was a lot of imagination and a great deal of love.

Once,Vaiva and her father brought home an injured baby squirrel, which they had found in the park. I remember going over for a visit and spending the better part of the day holding the cute little animal in my lap. I couldn‘t wait to go to Vaiva‘s again so that I could hold and pet the squirrel. However, the next time I was there, the squirrel had recovered from its injuries and had grown substantially. When I tried to hold it, I got scratched—not exactly the greeting I had been expecting. The untamed little creature literally spent most of the time racing around the walls of the room along the ceiling, jumping from one piece of furniture to the next. That‘s what it was like visiting Vaiva; you never knew what to expect next.

As children Vaiva and I shared a great number of things. Because my mother was a good seamstress, Vaiva often got to wear the clothes I had outgrown. In fact, she received her First Communion wearing the dress my mother had made for me when I received the sacrament. In Lithuanian school we had the same teachers. We were part of the same Lithuanian dancing groups and youth organizations. During the summers we were at the same camps. When we went off to college, Vaiva and I never particularly kept up with each other. We didn‘t phone; we didn‘t write letters. But whenever we got together, things were always the same. We could talk to each other honestly, and we could share the secret corners of our lives. That never changed.

When Vaiva became close to Jim, she went through a great deal of soul searching. She had grown up quintessentially Lithuanian. How was this—albeit intelligent and handsome—mid-western American going to fit into the life Vaiva had envisioned for herself? She knew one thing deep in her heart, however. No one would ever love her the way Jim did, so she chose to make him the partner of her life. From that point on, I would say that Vaiva blossomed. Those of us who had known her as the shy, unusual, sometimes awkward little girl, saw the emergence of a confident, graceful, beautiful woman. It was delightful to watch, and quite the talk among the ladies of St. Casimir‘s parish after Sunday Mass.

Even when Vaiva and I were adults, our lives continued to intertwine. When the twins were born, Aidas and I were moved that Vaiva and Jim chose us to be the the godparents of Lokys. It brought our families closer together—relatives by choice as the Lithuanians say. For many years, the members of Sodauto (the folk ensemble which I led in the Boston area) together with the members of Vėtra (the dancing group which Vaiva led in the Hartford area) got together at the Vėbra-Gust homestead to celebrate Joninės—St. John‘s night, the Lithuanian summer solstice. What magical nights those were with bonfires, wreaths of flowers, singing, dancing, blossoming ferns, and of course raganos and laumės, witches and wood nymphs.

Then there were the A.P.P.L.E. years. From the very beginning Vaiva called me to be part of the planning sessions. Those early years were filled with difficult yet immensely gratifying experiences. When I took on administrative roles at the school where I work, it became harder for me to be part of every seminar since I work during the summer. But in 2001 I did take my turn at being president because the work was too important to let die. Later, when Vaiva battled back cancer and agreed to be president of A.P.P.L.E. for a second time, she asked me to be program coordinator at Klaipėda during the summer of 2005. I didn‘t refuse. It was Vaiva asking. How could I refuse?

As you do with younger siblings while you are growing up, I think I sometimes took Vaiva for granted. She was just always there as part of my life. We didn‘t keep in constant contact, yet we knew that we could call on each other whenever we needed each other. Even when Vaiva became an important figure on the Lithuanian national and international scene, I think she liked to spend time with me because there were no roles to play; we could be ordinary together. Thinking now that Vaiva is no longer with us doesn‘t really make sense to me. I have to believe that Vaiva is with us in a new way. We will continue to feel her presence in our midst over and over again. Vaiva always was and always will be part of my life.