I first laid eyes on Karl Pruuli 44 years ago. The occasion was my father’s 50th birthday - an event celebrated in the basement hall of the Estonian Lutheran church in Montréal, where my father, also named Karl, was the pastor.
Looking back now, and knowing Karl Pruuli a little better, I suppose that he believed that if he got the minister on board, other Estonians would follow and not only would he sell more building sites for cottages, but the slightly wild and wooly reputation his farm was acquiring as a party place would be moderated.
And incidentally, he did manage to sell more plots, beginning with another one to my father since the gift plot was a little too small to build on.
Whatever the intention, that is what did happen. Pruuli’s farm became a place for Estonians to gather - a place where they could leave aside the cares of jobs and life in the city, a place where they could go for an inexpensive holiday and relive to a certain extent the kind of farm life that so many of their generation had experienced as children in Estonia.
On weekends, this area was always lively. People would come up for a swim, to play cards, to go to saun, to gather raspberries or mushrooms in season, or to fish - which was one of the pasttimes both my father and Karl Pruuli enjoyed, farmboy style, no fancy rods and lures - just a handy tree branch and a few worms.
But above all, Pruuli’s farm was a great place for parties. One of my fondest teenage memories is coming into his hall with a little band six of us had put together to play for any Estonian group brave enough to have us, usually at what we call “juubelid” - significant anniversaries and birthdays - where the dancing, singing and imbibing would last into the wee hours. But nothing was one-dimensional here - and more than one kind of spirits would be invoked from time to time. Once or twice a year, there would be an outdoor church service, and a gathering to celebrate the mid summer on St. John the Baptist Day which also allowed us to commemorate Estonia’s all too brief independence. So its only fitting that we celebrate Karl Pruuli’s life on this day.
Those of us who were lucky enough to spend major portions of the summer here, year after year, will never forget the happy atmosphere that Karl Pruuli and his family created for the benefit of the Estonian community and, more recently, for others as well.
Like my father, I ended up buying a part of Karl Pruuli’s pasture land to build a small cottage on and became a sort of neighbour of the Pruulis.
Over the years life here has become much quieter. Many Estonians have moved on to Toronto, or other places. Many, including my parents, have died. And I am pleased to remember that Karl Pruuli did not forget his friends and attended the funerals of my parents in the city.
For me and my family it was always a great pleasure to come up here to drop into the Pruuli’s kitchen, where Karl Pruuli would be seated at the end of his table, like the country squire that he truly was. And there would always be a drink or two and his wonderful wife Hilda would bring out some tasty homemade Estonian style food - smoked eel, home cured ham, sült... And we would then sit and chat for hours, recalling the old times and debating the future.
There was never a dull moment during these conversations, for Karl Pruuli had an opinion about everything and if we started to agree too much about anything, he would slyly play the devil’s advocate in order to get a rise out of somebody, often my brother Jaan, who would always rise to the bait.
Karl Pruuli had lived through so many incredible experiences, he was outpoken and direct, and frequently irreverent, with a sly sense of humour. But even my father, who had no tolerance for scoffers, would enjoy their conversations, recognizing in Karl Pruuli a kind of kindred spirit and the common bond of their farmyard boyhood in Estonia.
Always I would marvel that here was this man, in his eighties, still climbing ladders to paint his famous red roofs or wielding a chain saw to cut more firewood than he would ever use. Idleness was not a word he knew. Karl Pruuli was a kind and generous man and a man of his word.
His death leaves a hole in the fabric of our community. All of us who knew him will mis him. May he rest in peace.
(Karl Pruuli’s memorial service at the Pruuli farm, Dalesville, Que., June 23, 2002)
