Slice Of Life

October 2009

It’s the very end of fall. The sky is gray and heavy. Leafless trees and bare hills as if embarrassed by their own nakedness are hiding behind a thick fog. There is not a sound heard except for the monotonous uproar of the ocean. It's just another cold morning on Oregon Coast.

I sit down in a comfortable sink-in chair, fuzzy slippers on my feet, soft bathrobe, with nothing but a light nightgown underneath, on my shoulders. A heavy mug of a hot, burning my fingertips, coffee in my bare hands, an empty lobby of an one-night-stand hotel.

Had I ever intended to spend a weekend in this God forgotten place? No. I was planning on going to Portland to breath in spicy sent of fallen leaves and to refresh my memories of the brightly colored trees. As I got to my hotel downtown, I decided to explore the area a bit. Renting a car and driving to the coast for a day seemed like a great idea. Renting a car without navigation- not so much. Forgetting a map at a cheap diner by a freeway- bad. I got lost. So, what? Life happens; deal with it. As a result, I ended up here, in this gloomy place, miles away from cheerful reds and yellows.

I curl up in the squishy chair, my eyes still sleepy; my short hair messed up after a short night, not completely awakened yet. I look through a big, floor to ceiling, window. There is nothing but a steel-blue ocean, gloomy sky, and the fog out there. Nothing. There is not a sound on the inside; just silence, pushing on my ears. So peaceful.

I take a sip of coffee. Its bitter and smooth flavor warms me up from the inside. I close my eyes and think back.

Just a year ago, I was a prisoner, my own executor, and my own guard, all at once. I locked myself up in a prison, built with my own hands; I put a stern guard to remind me of how worthless and undeserving I was, at the door. I was looking at the world through obscure Plexiglas walls of my cell; the walls made of hate, anger, jealousy, and disappointment. I hated myself for not knowing what I wanted to do and who I wanted to be. I was angry with myself for being a coward, for giving up on my dreams for the sake of means of comfort I have got, and for staying in this stinky and slimy swamp of a routine, just like everybody else's life and doing nothing about it. I was disappointed with myself for, as I compared myself with other people, I saw me failing in every single category: I had no proper education; no prestigious job; no handsome and strong man next to me; no cute babies running around.
I took people and events not for what they actually were, but for whatever meaning I forced into them. Like a trapped animal, I was making one loop of hopelessness after another, tracing my own steps on the cold concrete floor of my cell. Time passed. Days turned into months, months into years.

I felt like a complete failure. I wanted to be loved and cherished but I got a message that I didn't deserve it; I wasn't good enough. I was told to change myself to be loved and I submitted. I gave up on myself and made others more important to me than I was to myself. It didn’t last long. Something deep inside me rebelled against it. Then, I was called a selfish bitch. It seemed that the world outside didn’t want me for who I was.

This was my state of mind when I went to Portland last fall.

I loved the city the moment I saw it from my plane. Before I landed, I made a decision to enjoy my time there no matter what.

Next morning, I was wandering around downtown, taking pictures, and looking at the storefronts. I gave some change to the most friendly beggar I have ever seen. He wished me to have a great day. I chatted with a sale person while buying post cards for my friends. I was asked for directions and thanked for my help. Sun was shining, people were smiling, and I felt as good about myself as ever. I got to a little park and there, sitting on a bench and looking up through red and yellow leaves above me, I asked myself what was this “selfish bitch” a few days ago all about. Was it about me not loving people I was supposed to love? Was it about me dreaming my own dreams? Was it about me not living my life according to someone else’s plan? If this was it, I was fine with that. Actually, I became very proud of myself. As I was saying: “Good job, Lyubasha”, I felt as if I was flushed, flushed of all the scum I had stored inside all those years. I felt a new me emerging out of the very depths of my being. The new me, who got a light heart, clear consciousness, and sharp mind. I felt like I could walk on clouds and take off from the ground I was standing on to soar above the city. I realized that I could be happy if I choose to. I finally got the idea that everyone has got their own happiness; let mine be zooming through piles of leaves or driving to the ocean to see a sunrise and clime rocks at 6 am on Saturday morning. That was fine. Whatever it was that made me happy was just fine.

Right there, downtown Portland, I saw the walls of my prison crush into pieces and turn into dust, my fears gone, my disappointment dismissed.

I consider that day a year ago, the day I started to live again. Like a blind who recovered her sight I cannot get enough of this world. I am obsessed with it, I learn from it, I get to know it and accept everything just the way it is and the world does the same in return. I accepted myself, too, just for who I was- a woman. A woman, who is in love.

I am in love. I give all of me to that feeling, which makes my heart dance in a wild broken rhythm, my soul sing in its deepest voice, and my body act jumpy and flirty for no good reason, as if it turned into a puppet, held by an invisible thread, controlled by a lost its mind performer. I am high with love. Could I really think just a year ago that I wasn't able to experience anything like this? Did I really think that this part of me, the part that was able to love, was dead? Did I really think that I wasn't going to fall in love ever again? Or even just to love at all? How bizarre. Back then, I was as much in pain as I am in love, now. Back then, I welcomed pain for it was the only way I knew that I still existed. And now, I feel like my body is not big enough to hold all this love I experience. Now, everything feels so intense, so vivid, so strong. Every occasional glance, every casual touch, every kiss, rashly given and every kiss softly stolen lasts longer than a whole night of lovemaking. The whole world seems to explode with millions of bright colors. Over and over again.

For years, I have been looking for someone to love, but I found none. Last year, I gave up on looking and simply opened up to all those people who came into my life: some happy with their pregnancies and weddings and some who are just like me- new born puppies blindly looking for a path to their own happiness and knowing nothing but that it does exist, and among them did I find the one I loved so deeply, so desperately, and so unpossesably.

Sometimes, I feel like I get exhausted with all this unexpected love and happiness, I get tired of this new me and this is probably why right now, after all those hectic days and sleepless nights, I appreciate this moment of silence and solitude, so fragile and so pure. This moment of being alone and listening to fascinating, scarcely heard, whispers of my mind and soul. The two parts of me who are finally in harmony with one another.

I hear an elevator going up and a door slamming.

As I take a sip of a barely warm coffee, I am thinking that renting a car, going to the coast, and getting lost wasn’t such a bad thing in the end.

I look at the clock on the wall. It’s time to leave this place and move on.