Just Bloom

Bloom through the concrete.

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Bloom through the soil which has gone dry, cracked and hard as a stone in the summer that has not been particularly generous with the rains. ⠀

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Bloom through the God damn insecurities and fears that whisper darkly into your ears that you are never good enough, or worthy, or loved, or capable.⠀

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Bloom during the offseason when the tanned tourists pack their bags stuffed with cheap souvenirs and leave, when the freezing winds and cold are slowly taking over the “Kurort” city as the trees - naked and vulnerable - are accepting their vile hits. ⠀

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Bloom in the prime of your rebellious youth and when your hands are already covered with serpentine patterns of wrinkles and pigment spots.⠀

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Bloom, whether you are a fragile rose cultivated in a royal greenhouse, or a little wildflower that withstands the hailstorms without single protection, or a chubby cactus that shields itself with the threatening spikes from potential dangers of the oh-so-scary outside world. ⠀

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Bloom despite all this as brightly, boldly, and unapologetically as you can. ⠀

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Because this is why you have been planted in this less than merciful ground.⠀

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To bloom. 

Not Your Typical Pre-Valentine’s Day Post

Global marketing and advertising have been steadily feeding us the idea of The Perfect Love which implies finding a soulmate, the jelly to your peanut butter, the toaster to your gluten-free toast, the knight in the shining <Under> Armor with whom you then proceed to your Happily Ever After and disappear into the California sunset. Preferably.

Yet what they always keep behind the curtains is The Real Love. The hard, the messy, the raw, the bitterly beautiful.
Let’s face the uncomfortable truth here: we all are broken in our unique way, to a greater or lesser extent. Nobody survives this wicked, merciless grind called life unscarred.
As someone wise, whom I now cannot remember for the life of me, once said, “We are all of the books we read, all of the stories we heard, all of the movies we watched.”
For the purposes of this post, I’d take the liberty of adding, “and all of the people we once loved and who loved or didn’t love us back.”
By the time we smash into those we fall for in a Grand Kind of Way, we already have our hands full with all sorts of baggage and are covered in third-degree burns from everything we survived to date. And this is where it takes a crapload of compassion and tenderness, resilience and patience to love them with all those scars, unhealed wounds, roughness around the edges, the mess-ups and the fuck-ups. On the good days and the bad. Especially on the bad.
This is what real love is all about.
It has nothing to do with curvy little cupids all over the place on V-Day, Belgian chocolate (although I gotta admit, I love me some good ol’ Belgian chocolate!), 100500+ roses and all that obnoxious BS.
Love is gorgeously unfiltered and preciously raw, and imperfectly beautiful.
So, let’s celebrate it for what it truly is and love our “jellies” and “toasters” even fiercer, including on days when we feel like throwing utensils at them.

Jazz Season

Бесценны редкие минуты умиротворения и внутренней тишины, тёплой и вязкой словно насквозь пронизанный солнечными лучами акациевый мед. Минуты, когда не существует ничего, кроме Настоящего, каким бы оно ни было: душа прекращает заниматься привычными для нее метаниями и на целое мгновение забывает тосковать за ушедшим и тревожиться о будущем. Que sera sera. 
Сгущающийся ноябрьский туман безапелляционно берет город в плен, а последний сдаётся без всякого боя, словно того и ждал. Полное принятие и смирение, в котором отныне гораздо больше силы, нежели слабости.

Издалека доносятся звуки флейты, наполняющей аллеи вальсом Свиридова, отчего память незамедлительно возвращает в выцветшее словно слайдовая пленка детство, где бабушка под эту самую мелодию учит маленькую Катю вальсировать... Внезапно кто-то громко и чётко зовёт меня по имени. Удивленно оборачиваюсь и вижу девчушку, бросившуюся вдогонку за крохотной собачкой в синей курточке, продолжая окликать беглянку. Своевольная «Катя» без поводка дерзко и весело мчится вперёд. Ароматная жухлая листва по-киношному взмывает вверх. Jazz season. 🍁

Безветренно, тихо, тепло. И что важней всего - там, на глубине, куда не достать даже самым мощным батискафам.

Life Skills, What Are They?

When you really sit and think about it, this crazy thing called living boils down to mastering the following vital skills:

➼ Loving those who make your heart swell with immense tenderness as gently as you can without trying to “own” them or change them completely to fit into your little picture perfect because we all are beautifully imperfect, just as the life itself; 
➼ Fighting your own fight - whatever it may be - with as much dignity as you are capable of while trying to not let frustration, pain, envy, failure, dramatic curveballs thrown at you on an all-too-regular basis get the best of you along the way;
➼ Being accepting of all our differences - big or small - and seeing them as something that can unite us, help us grow and learn instead of creating a gigantic gap that is impossible to overcome;
➼ Helping whenever you can with whatever resources you have at hand and expect nothing in return - just like a fine saying goes: “Help and forget”;
➼ Giving yourself a break every now and again, but don’t stagnate for far too long. Believing in God’s plan predesigned for you is not at all a bad thing (deep down I do it too), but nothing is going to magically materialize unless you make it happen. 
➼ Steering clear of toxicity. Both in people you surround yourself with, things you do and consume - literally and figuratively speaking.

There is nothing fundamentally new or unique about it and, truth be told, I personally still struggle with a bigger chunk of these things, but hey, we all are a major work-in-progress and we have just lived yet another summer under the sun, so I consider it a win. ✨

It's okay to feel sad, it's okay to feel happy, it's okay to feel everything in between.

The not-so-unique idea behind this post has been sitting in my head for a long while, but finally the pieces came together in just the right way. Or so I hope. 

You know, in this day and age, especially on social media we are so used to parading the happiness. 

We are surrounded by motivational speakers, positive self-help books, you-can-do-it type of content, constantly pushing us to be "our best selves." 

However, for all the wrong reasons, more often than not this ends up making us feel obliged to be happy, because that's what you do, that's what successful and accomplished person ought to be doing. I mean, hey, look at you, you've got everything to be happy, exercise your right, grow as a person, work on yourself, stay positive! Yada, yada, yada. 

Instead of actually feeling happy, we do our best to SEEM happy. 

Success, accomplishment and "being your best self" are cultivated like rare kind of orchids in a greenhouse.

And let me tell you, that's such a bullshit. On days when happiness seems like a distant memory, the least you want to do is masking it by a fake smile and bravados. 

Cut yourself some slack, bro.

Being real is accepting your own shortcomings, flaws and realities, limitations and whatever else you have to deal with in your unique situation. 

This always reminds me of a brilliant dialogue between Holly Golightly and Paul Varjak from Capote's timeless Breakfast at Tiffany's about "getting the mean reds" and finding your very own way to escape them. Not pretending to do so, but rather overcoming it as it works best for you.

Thing is, no one wants to feel miserable, afraid or lost. Unless you are an avid masochist, which is fine, too, whatever floats your boat, darling.

But there's nothing worse than having to fake the emotion that just isn't there yet. "Fake it till you make it" is not exactly the healthiest method here.

Feeling unhappy, just like feeling happy is what being human is all about. 

I myself - especially as someone with a long-term disability striving to promote the most positive image of a successful woman in a wheelchair - always thought that this right here is your most distilled type of 

bravery, i.e. to put on a million-dollar smile, show up, nail it and, God forbid, anyone finds out about the sadness that you are carrying in your trendy little backpack. 

But over the years I came to learn - and learn the hard way - that it takes a lot more courage to actually admit that you are not okay. At least, to yourself. 

It's okay to feel sad, it's okay to feel happy, it's okay to feel everything in between. 

You are just a Human. Embrace it. 

#YourAlternativeMotivationalPost

Not that I have much trust in astrology anyway, however, every now and then I stumble upon a statement saying that Geminis take life half-heartedly. They easily shift from one passion to another, whether this is an occupation or, well, a person. They cannot be bothered by being forever-changing, unsettling, raw and careless. Biggest losers in attachment department, happy-go-luckies, with their heads in the clouds and wandering feet that feel the constant need to keep finding newer, different pathways.

I have to admit there is some truth in that. Just take a closer look at me. At one point of my bumpy youth, I was consumed and majorly invested in writing. I strongly believed that this is it, this is what I am supposed to sew into my life, this is what keeps my blood running and, thus, sustains me. However, that too has changed. Just like many other things. To my biggest astonishment and - quite frankly - disappointment... Later I fell in love with photography that remains till this day...

When it comes to my moods and my mind, these have their own quite spectacular roller coaster, too, which they enjoy on a daily basis. I cry with all that I am, I laugh just as intensely, and then I cry some more when no one watches.

Yet, when it comes to those who have entered my life and captivated my heart once and for all, the astrological assumption turns out to be false. They are stuck with me and I am stuck with them in the most old-fashioned manner in which you become devoted to someone. For good.

They might be world away, they might no longer even be a part of my life anymore, however, they never leave my soul, becoming an inseparable part of my identity.

I might not see them as much as I wish I did, I might not be able to ever talk to them again, I might not do all those things I long for and miss so much, but they never ever stop being woven into all that I do, into melodies that trigger both shivers and memories, into verses that I read, sunsets that I get to soothe my eyes with. Every moment when I am joyous and every moment when a feeling of lonesomeness and longing pricks my heart and stays in there like a thorn which I am unable and unwilling to take out. As cheesy as that.

... I remain annoyingly constant and old-fashioned when it comes to loving you.

The Key

Whenever you hit the darkest, filthiest, the most horrific of the rock bottoms imaginable,

thinking, "this is it, this time I am really done", 

just pause for a second and look at the tiniest daisy striking through the dirt, 

pulling through rock-hard unwatered ground. 

Regardless of the weather conditions, 

lack of rain or, on the contrary, its abundance 

that turns everything into a disgusting impotent mud unable to produce any plant or 

killing those remaining ones, nature still finds its way to replenish.

It never fails to try and try again. 

If you are searching for hope and signs of God's grace, love and forgiveness, 

nature is one of the things you should take a closer look it 

for it gives you the final answer. 

Always. 

Even when you - and I - deny it.

Come to think of it, we haven't gone too far from the animals. We, the humans, do mark our territory, just like the animals do. But even more so, we cannot restrain ourselves from marking those who we tend to refer to as "ours". We leave the scent of our deepest affection on them, and before you smirk, let me tell you, it has hardly anything to do with sexuality.

Those we love, those we have the biggest privilege to call "the closest" have that particular mark which is never visible to the naked eye. It is absolutely impalpable and in no way can be examined, tasted, smelled. It is carefully concealed, they themselves might never be fully aware of it, but it is as real as a lingering feeling one gets from being kissed on the eyelids - probably one of the most captivating expressions of tenderness yet.

It stays on them as long as the thread connecting us remains intact and - oddly enough - even after it breaks for all the wrong or right reasons. All of the dear souls who we were fortunate enough to touch and profoundly interlace with in our lives once still have our trace on them. And, I believe, it is one of the most beautiful things one can think of.