Author: Marita Tkeshelashvili

 

“I was standing alone in the yellowed leaves, beneath the branches of fallen trees, and I felt I existed inside something vast and mysterious. How clearly I remember that day; from here I can remember everything…”

I first read these words years ago – in an old book found in a village, in my father’s library. It was autumn outside, yellow leaves rustled underfoot, and the afternoon stretched on so slowly, as if it were reflecting on its own existence.

Since then, Rezo Cheishvili and his stories have always been with me.

Especially in autumn and spring, I feel the urge to reread them – in those two seasons when everything changes, as if being born and fading at the same time. When I miss Kutaisi, or when I am there, the moods of these seasons remind me directly of Music in the Wind.

Many things in Kutaisi remain the same: the White, Red, and Chain bridges; the magnolias; Archieli Hill; the winds; and Music in the Wind. The sound of the Rioni’s waves, the white stones shining in the sun, the green flowerbeds lit by daylight, the domes of St. George and Motsameta – they are unchanged. The humour of Kutaisi, its character — those things that neither fade nor vanish with time. The streets, houses, alleys, and bridges of my native city bring to mind the characters from these stories – the people of post-World War II Kutaisi.

There are lively, quick characters – children who tasted life’s bitterness too early during the years of war and hardship; the colourful faces of the city; boys who went to war and never returned; men with unfinished houses and families left behind – “the people of music scattered in the wind.” The music that once scattered in the wind still lingers – on the bridges, at the windows of old houses, in the scent of magnolias.

The wind comes and goes, but this music remains – like the city’s soul, like a hangover only Kutaisi can hear.

Perhaps I should also mention that I knew Rezo Cheishvili personally – my mother introduced me to him, and I even visited his house once. I remember one day my mother called and said, “Something has gone wrong with Rezo’s computer; if you can, come and help.”

I went straight to his house on Kupradze Street. Even now, I can clearly picture that room – the light pouring through the window and his thoughtful face. I edited something small on his computer, but for a few seconds, it felt as if I were touching something more meaningful.

Later, we met a few times at the Kutaisi Public Library – greetings, warm smiles – and finally, at the Lado Meskhishvili Theatre, we said goodbye to the great writer and creator of that classic.

It breaks my heart that I hadn’t read all his stories sooner – to have offered him a few warm, sincere words while he was alive. Perhaps those were the words I delayed saying to my beloved writer.

The autumn when I first read his stories quickly gave way to winter. The afternoons, once saturated with sweet grape juice, slowly turned into windy days. When I walked to the Botanical Garden or up to Bagrati after work, it felt as though the notes of a light piano followed me – and indeed, I was convinced: music belongs in the wind.

It must drift from the white curtains and be carried by the breeze toward Archieli Hill.

“They were playing the gramophone in Sajaia’s house – they were playing it completely out of place and without direction. The wind was blowing through the white curtains and would not let the music out…”

The stories of war, hardship, and people’s rise and fall, the diverse gallery of characters, the absurd music in the wind, the sadness of unfinished houses, and scenes seen through discoloured windows – all combine to paint a large picture of post-war Kutaisi in Rezo Cheishvili’s work. When I first read it, I was amazed that Georgian reality, war, and suffering could be described with such lightness, bright melancholy, and warm humour. “The Picture Book,” “May,” “Winter and Mrs. Manana,” “The Soldier,” “July Days,” “Chonia Ukleba,” “Ushangia,” “Stupid Shota,” “Bodokidze,” “Iribuli,” “The Story of Iron Water” – each tells stories of humanity, pain, and dignity.

“The Story of Iron Water” – the tale of a boy who was sent every week to the village to bring iron water for his sick grandfather:

“I fill this bottle with water, but don’t go down to the old spring; you have to go around the ruins of the castle – it’s a bit of a bad road, but there’s real, cool iron water there. I go up, fill it, take it, and when the train starts, I aim my bottle at the rails, drop it down, and bam! It’ll burst, it’ll shatter… Didn’t you hear the sound it made?” – the boy’s eyes sparkled with delight.

The writer wrote:

“Either why tell it to Grandfather Nove, or why break the bottle, or why walk such a long road, or why bother and burden me, a new acquaintance, with this…”

The story of the lost and returned hat feels even more human – a clear reminder that even the most reckless, seemingly uncontrollable hooligan can show sympathy, regret, and friendship; that humanity sometimes appears where you least expect it.

Nabi Kinchev stole Little Rezo’s ticket to the theatre, and in this chaos, someone also snatched a newly and dearly bought hat from his head.

Nabi finally returned the hat and gave me the ticket he had taken:

“Tie the strings under your chin, someone will tear the hat off again,” Nabi warned me.

He went out again, pacing. He handed over the tickets – or rather, he sold them secretly…

“Here is your ticket,” Nabi told me. I looked at it. It wasn’t mine. It seemed to be for a much better, more expensive seat.

“What are you going to do?” I asked.

“I’ll find another!” he said, looking hopelessly around the empty waiting room.

Maybe he really found another ticket – for Nabi, that would not have been a problem, although I did not see him at the theatre that day.

And perhaps the lightest yet saddest tale is the story of the first time he received the dreaded five-point grade.

For the first time in his life, he was the only one in the whole class given a five for his essay that day. The teacher was surprised, and so was the boy.

At that moment, the class troublemaker Barbakadze erupted:

“- You gave him a five and I got a four?! Here is my writing, and here is his! If I deserve a four and he deserves a five – Ok, I will complain where it’s needed!”

The whole class was crying and wailing – “Correct my points, sir, otherwise I will complain!”

I felt he was speaking the truth, but a truth I would never voice. And that is what hurt my heart.

I should also say something about the Melikhishvilis – about the Melikhishvilis and the Bidziashvilis – but that would take too long.

Now I will tell just one episode: how the boy Kote tried to sell his used schoolbooks to me for five tumans.

“- I will give you this,” Kote told me, “for five tumans; it will last you three years, you will definitely won’t regret it. Why do you want money in your pocket (in reality, I did not have it – neither in my pocket, nor at home), it will be spent, but the book will remain a book; it will be with you forever.”

“I have no money,” I said with shame.

And for some reason, I felt ashamed on his behalf.

Such is Rezo Cheishvili’s Kutaisi – a city where childhood sincerity turns into an unspoken dignity, where even a small incident – the point you get at school, the return of a lost hat, or the sale of an old book – becomes a story of clear sadness.

In the story of the red goat – under the Tskaltsitela bridge, when a red goat fell on its back in front of the “Zari” gambler – years later, at a Kutaisi Football League match, a respectable professor recalled that old event to fix the date: “When a red goat fell on our heads, I would have a trembling knee since that day.”

I wasn’t surprised that the former hooligan leader from Kutaisi became a professor after so many years. The Kutaisi character is like that – able to move from one extreme to another, talented at adapting, and flexible in life. And other stories pierce the tenderest part of your soul – a little boy’s “almost sacred” goat, raised with care, had to be sold to a soldier in exchange for a few kilos of beans and millet… “The soldier was walking, holding the goat upside down. He was probably the only person on earth at that moment who would not leave the goat, would not lift it, would not let it drink water, would not let it set foot on the ground; he would tear its throat, skin it.” The goat, its throat bent, bleated and looked at the boy with astonished eyes, as if asking, “What have you done to me?” Someone laughed somewhere; somewhere else, the goat’s heartbreaking bleats could be heard. How could the boy forgive people for this? Revenge would have been their fate, habit, and rule.

I always remember a story in my life – about a boy who could not become a robber.

“The Little Boy’s Picture Book” is the image that comes to mind when a person might become small and confused, or when things go wrong. This story reminds us how goodness can triumph and how to preserve humanity when everything seems to demand the opposite.

“A boy in shorts is walking down the street. He is holding an open illustrated book in his hand. He walks alone. He doesn’t even look at the passersby; he is absorbed in his book. He slowly walks toward me. I am standing across Sakiri Street, near the glass factory. The open illustrated book catches my eye from afar. It’s decided; I must snatch it away! Here they are tearing each other apart and taking everything away.”

My heart sank as I imagined how that boy in shorts might be caught up in a cry and a fight.

– “Come here!” I would say.
– “I won’t come…” he would answer defiantly and step back.
– “Come, don’t be afraid, it doesn’t matter, I’ll catch you, you can’t outrun me!”

He stops. He stands. He doesn’t dare to run away. I approach.

– “What is this?”
– “A book.”
– “Lend me that book!”
– “I won’t.”
– “Lend me!”
– “No!”

If not, then you will see what I will do, and so on. Roar.

The poor bandits who had come out onto the road before the robbery must have been so nervous.

The boy straightened up, felt my steady gaze, recognized me, and stopped.

– “Come here!”
He came. He had a bright, round face, close-cropped chestnut hair, and light blue eyes. He smiled. He looked at me.

– “What is this?”
– “A book.”
– “Lend me that book!”
He gave it to me.

A small wooden sword hung at his side, which I hadn’t noticed at first. I took it down, too. He looked at me with a smile again. He was pleased that someone admired his picture book and his little wooden sword. It is truly a beautiful, eye-catching, brightly coloured book. It is not only a book but an album filled with drawings and words I do not understand. God, what wonderful pictures he had drawn inside!

I held this good book in my hands, the sword under my arm. I looked at the pictures. They caught my eye, warmed me, frightened me, and drew me toward a hidden, unseen world.

– “Is this your sword?”
– “It’s mine.”
– “It’s a good sword!”

I sheathed the weapon and hung it back on its hilt.

– “Is this book yours, too?”
– “It’s mine.”
– “It’s a very good book!” I praised it and returned it.

The boy walked on, stopped after a few steps, turned, smiled, and continued on his way, a little thoughtful. He could not understand why I was standing so tense and worried in the middle of the road. I still clearly see the bright child who appeared that day. Sometimes, when evil touches an invisible part of my being, I see that bright face again and again, and something in my soul brightens for a second, shining like a picture book opened in the sun.

And there are other stories, simple in form but with heartbreaking endings.

“This absurd music accompanied a soldier who died in a city where soldiers do not die. Perhaps the man was also unlucky in life. Perhaps his death was as absurd as the existence of music in the wind.”

“If Gegelidze had lived another year or two, it might have helped. Now there is so much food; if they had been force-feeding me, they would have force-fed Gegelidze too. How much sun there is now, and what playful weather. Where is my school friend Gegelidze now?”

“I asked and they said he died. Which stone are you sleeping under, Ushangia, or at least get some rest?!”

Against the backdrop of war, poverty, and hunger, people’s desire for humour, curiosity, and mockery does not diminish. That impulse to tease, humiliate, and ridicule is part of the city’s nature. Spectacle becomes a form of self-preservation; everything around turns into a performance. Those obsessed with this urge overcome all obstacles.

One day in May, somewhere, a kangaroo appeared in the city. People walking in the garden gathered; the gates were closed. No one had seen a kangaroo; children streamed in from different streets, full of curiosity, in groups and crowds. They ran around the square, to the edge of the garden, out from the market, past the women’s gymnasium, past the White Bridge. New people joined along the way. You could follow the crowd, see people running out of the market, and others joining them.

Meanwhile, a well-dressed man suspiciously asked a peasant with a scythe:

– “Is this a kangaroo?”

Someone might say:

– “The kangaroo won’t cross the bridge.”

The kangaroo stood helpless on its haunches, then the well-dressed man announced:

– “It’s a type of giant Australian wallaby .”

Maybe. The offended kangaroo ran across the Red Bridge; its tired followers no longer followed. It went to Sataplia; a man asked:

– “What did you want, kangaroo, in our city in that May?!”

I always remember the story “Kangaroo” by my fellow writer when I lean on the railing of the White Bridge – the centre of the world for the people of Kutaisi. I put on the hat of Picasso’s boy and ask:

– “What did you want, kangaroo, in our city that May?!”

In April-May, when I climb to Bagrati or think back on the faraway city, I see a film-like scene: a woman in a red dress and a man in a white shirt in the courtyard, with a pale milky cloud rising from Mount Nakerala above them.

“Below the Rionhesi dam, near the sewage plant, a large car backed up to the river, stopped in a puddle with its rear wheels; someone opened one of the side panels, someone else got out and disappeared. It seemed that cobblestones were being thrown from the car. A man in a white shirt and a woman in a red dress appeared in the yard of the old courthouse. They stood in the sun, not moving, crying, laughing, or talking – they were probably laughing.”

A blue, transparent cloud drifted over the long pipe of the Motsameta cement factory.

A thin, freshly blown milky cloud rising from Mount Nakerala separated the Tskaltsitela valley, rose above the dove-coloured Church of the Virgin Mary, floated to the right, and covered the sun somewhere toward Bakisubani and Kakhianouri. The light faded and, for a moment, the Rioni turned blue.

Every time I come to Kharazov’s garden, I remember Badri Yamanidze – the boy from the story about the barge who went to war and could not return, who could not cross his post.

“– Forward to the outposts! – Badri shouted.”

“The old ceremonial barge was pitifully abandoned in the mud and slush. Badri Yamanidze, in turned-up trousers, stood by the electric pole and, smiling yet sad, smoked a crumpled cigarette. The second or third day, they took him to the war and never brought him back. Badri Yamanidze walked as far as he could. Whether he reached his outpost, crossed it, or stopped there, no one ever heard of it.”

I cannot omit the story of Efuti; I simply cannot. The author searched endlessly for Efuti ( the book of astrological tables), seeking a book of wisdom and fate, the emerald-studded Etrat.

In the end, what a person seeks and yearns for, he will inevitably find. This is how Rezo Cheishvili gave us Music in the Wind – a book of wisdom and sorrow, a picture book opened in the sun, a volume of blessed moments that follows me and reminds me of my windy city and its people.

“And every time the darkness rises in the invisible and the highest part of my essence, I will see that revealed face again and again, and something in my soul will light up for a moment; it will glow like a picture book opened in the sun.”