Marijona Matulkienė, a 73-year-old woman, finds it difficult to speak about her son.
--He was a good child, - she says, putting some red apples on the table.
--A handsome blue-eyed guy, - adds Alvydas' childhood girlfriend Sigita Kilkuvienė.
The mother brings in an album from another room. We look for pictures of Alvydas. There aren't many of them, only a few.
-He didn't like to be photographed, - says his mother. - I could hardly find one for the funeral.
-Stay in Rokiškis, why go to Vilnius, - the mother reproached her son on the morning of January 12th.
-No, mother. I want to do something for Lithuania's freedom.
He went by foot from Bajorai village, where he lived, to Rokiškis. “I doubt if I can get a bus" - he thought and hastily walked the 5 kilometers to the center of the district.
In Vilnius he met his cousin Nijolė Gudelevičienė, and they went to Mass at the Cathedral. Later they went to Parliament where they found a large crowd of people who had gathered from every corner of Lithuania.
Suddenly the roar of tank guns and the rattle of sub-machine guns were heard in the night. The crowd perked up their ears.
-Will they really shoot at people? - asked Alvydas and... fell down near his
cousin.
On the morning of January 13th, the radio brought bad news to Bajorai village: Alvydas Matulka had died from a heart attack during the attack on the TV tower.
-His heart didn't hold out. It was so sensitive, - Marijona Matulkienė talks as if with herself, or as if with us.
After Alvydas finished Panemunėlis secondary school, he studied at a Kaunas professional technical school. He began his worker's career in Rokiškis, producing agricultural machines. Later he worked for a motor-transport enterprise, driving a car.
When his father returned from exile in Primorė, he fell to the ground of the native land that he had missed so much. But his exhausted heart has not been beating for a long time.
People in Bajorai cannot say a bad word about Alvydas Matulka. He used to bring hay or fuel to anybody who asked him for help. He never refused to rick the hay or stow fire-wood in a wood-shed. Old people liked Alvydas and always waited for him, because he never asked them for alcohol in return for his help, and others did.
He was fond of reading books and newspapers. He went to Vilnius sensing danger for Lithuania.
-It isn't dangerous at all to die for freedom, - Alvydas used to say to his friends.
He, a 31-year-old man, was fated to have his hillock of sand poured in Kalneliškės cemetery. Alvydas Matulka's heart wanted to beat in a free homeland.
Lithuania, 1991.01.13 : documents, testimonies, comments. - Vilnius : State Publishing Center, 1992, p. 57.