Two Women, One Birthday: A Baltic Homecoming in 58 Candles

What my grandmother gave me that I’m still unpacking

My grandmother and me on our shared birthday — circa 1968

My grandmother on my mom’s side and I share a birthday – April 14 – exactly 60 years apart. We celebrated 26 birthdays, always together, until she passed at the ripe age of 86, right in the middle of my twenty-something years when I was ingrained in figuring out my adult space and John and I plotting moving to our farm and starting Inn Serendipity in Wisconsin.

And here we are today . . . with me celebrating a truly full circle birthday, back on the Baltic soil she left when the Soviets invaded and occupied Latvia and Estonia in 1944. My mom’s side is Latvian and my dad’s Estonian, with those two later meeting in a displaced persons/DP camp in Germany after they fled their homelands and before they immigrated to the US.

My heart and soul and all these ancestral connections feel so amplified on this shared birthday this year, my first year back on her soil. Perhaps because of this shared birthday, my grandmother – “Omi” as I called her – and I were always tightly aligned.

Lilija Zapars was born on April 14, 1907, when Latvia was still under Russian czarist rule. She came of age during Latvia’s first independence in 1918, following the end of World War I and the collapse of the Russian and German Empires. She married my dear grandfather, Emil Lauznis, in 1926.

My grandmother’s confirmation in 1926. She took this dress and made it into her wedding dress a few month later.

Omi defied norms early on, becoming a career woman as a physical therapist in Riga, Latvia, and was the one woman in my family who admitted she didn’t love to cook and didn’t care what others thought. She was the charcuterie queen before it was cool. When I was a kid and my grandparents were babysitting me, we’d have the best nibble plates from the delis in Chicago, from sausage to halva and steamed artichokes, very exotic for 1975.

Career woman on the streets of Riga, Latvia (1934)

And she was stubborn, a quality I so often see in myself. Opinionated and sometimes missing the bigger picture., like me. My grandparents had an argument right at the harbor in Riga when one of the last German military boats were leaving as the Soviets were rolling in, back in September, 1944, the day after my mother’s sixteenth birthday. My grandpa negotiated space on the boat for them in exchange for labor but my grandma didn’t want to go, didn’t want to leave her home and the rest of the family. She had faith things were protected, that all would work out.

It wasn’t until my grandfather made it clear he was leaving with my mother, whether or not she came, that she — undoubtedly begrudgingly — came — and a new chapter for my family history began in the United States which she embraced. And today, on this birthday, comes back full Baltic circle in Estonia, learning every day.

Three generations: my mom, my grandparents and my great-grandmother (Riga, Latvia, around 1940)

Omi was also incredibly resilient, a quality I hope to keep nurturing within myself. Physically, she was always strong and sturdy. The kind of person who would indeed be an excellent physical and massage therapist. The woman could move bones back into place. As a teen I was identified as possibly having scoliosis (for those that remember the Judy Blume book, Deenie, you remember the era) and I swear my grandmother just picked up my spine and moved it back into corrective place.

She was the kind of person that when she gave you a hug you felt supported and loved on multiple fronts. Her resilience enabled her and my grandpa to navigate a new country, language and life.

I remember once visiting Omi in her apartment shortly before she passed (which no one expected — it was a quick and unexpected passing in her sleep — I hope I have that genetic code). I was filled with young adult angst, trying to become my own person and find my place in the world. I don’t remember what specifically was upsetting me, but I started crying during her all-encompassing hugs she gave whenever I walked in the door, at which point she simply hugged even tighter and said: I may not understand everything going on, but know I love you very much.

And here I am, on my 58^th birthday, bringing life full circle, back on the Baltic soil right on the sea she left with John and I living 23 km (about 14 miles) from the Latvian border. The full circle of life aspect has so many parallels still needing some time for me to process. I’ll bet you my last Euro I end up with the same arthritis she had in her senior years. Russia is still and probably will always be an on-going threat and cloud in this new life chapter we chose.

I find myself thinking about my female ancestors like Omi all the time. My mom, aunt, great-grandparents I never met. I increasingly find strength in knowing there’s a lineage here, a feeling of connection and empowerment of the spirit.

When I mentioned Omi and I were close in spirit, case in point: Even after she passed, she kept calling me.

During her last years when I was a young adult with my own first apartment in Chicago, I’d call her (on my rocking landline) every day. She often had a hard time sleeping and would sometimes call me in the middle of the night, a bit confused I think on the actual timing and that she was waking me up, but I never said anything. She needed me and I was there.

A few days after she passed and continuing for a few nights, in the middle of the night the phone would still ring. I was conscious enough to be like “that shouldn’t be happening um she’s dead,” but I picked up the phone. Indeed she was on the other line, on the other side. I don’t remember conversations other than she sounded great, strong, totally fine.

Back to our shared stubborn gene: it’s like she was up in the heavenly afterlife and basically said, “excuse me I need a phone to call my granddaughter and let her know I’m fine.” And she did. And I love her for that.

While we pared down a lot when we moved to Estonia, there were a handful of things that belonged to her I took with, including these earrings. I found them in my mom’s stuff after she passed but she never wore them so they have probably been sitting in this box for decades. Omi probably grabbed these as they left Latvia, a reminder of home.

So today I’m starting a new personal tradition: to yes wear these in her honor and when I need to channel that stubborn resilience and to always wear them on April 14 and celebrate our shared birthdays. They are a little sparkley for my usual everyday but why not. Life is to celebrate.

Omi’s earrings and a new April 14 birthday tradition.

If your inter-generational lineage of women are still alive and on this planet, take my story as a nudge to reach out. Early and often. Time goes quick.

Happy #58 birthday — April 14 — can you see the earrings?

Check out more photos (and ordering options) from John D. Ivanko on Alamy