The line between being creative and being crazy is a fine line at its finest. I’ve never been crazy–better check with my husband–but I can feel that in both cases, a power that drives your thoughts is hard to control, fight, or resist. It can be a whispering voice or the divine warm inspiration streaming in through the crown of your head or flowing from your heart that forces your hands to write, draw, paint, play, mix, and shape. Or lose your mind, identity, and belonging to the “normal” group.
The first time this power took hold of me was almost twenty years ago. As a souvenir from my three-week stay at a summer camp, I brought home my first poems. Was I so scared, lonely, or bored that I decided to put the words together in lines and rhymes? Don’t know. But the reaction of my family of lawyers and scientists was a telltale sign that I was cursed to be creative.
Sometimes it feels like I’m standing in a waterfall, and its noise mutes the whole world, leaving me the only job–to catch the right drops that will make the message in my hands clear. After episodes like this, I often look at what I’ve written and can’t understand where they came from or how I managed to encapsulate such a complex idea. Is it even human to feel something so overwhelming and overpowering?
Sometimes creative work is a therapeutic tool to process an experience or feeling that’s been bothering me. When Russia invaded Ukraine, no words could express the pain I felt, but a poem gave me the respite I needed to stop crying.
Sometimes, and these are the most magically intimidating moments, it feels like I’m channelling someone or something else outside my mind or body. At times like this, I’m a pure receiver of the signal, absolutely in tune with the world and out of touch with myself because “myself” doesn’t exist. The only existing thing that matters is the pain, the suffering of the world coming through me.
Being a receiver is a difficult task on its own because you have to mute all the other channels and become a breakwater that stops the waves from around you: social media, people you love and live with, friends who dump their whole life on you knowing that you do listen. Being a mom and trying to tap into creativity is the “nightmare” level of this game. When my kid is around, I’m 100% tuned into him, his needs, wants, and desires. I grow an extra pair of eyes on the back of my head, and my ears register every wrong sound or silence that lasts too long. It’s impossible to hear my own thoughts, not to mention my heart or soul. When I became a mom, I lost this connection–the power button on my radio.
I’m learning to turn it on and listen to what I hear and what comes through. Walks by the creek and bike rides help a lot. Listening to the sleeping house at night works like magic, but I usually fall asleep before writing down the words I catch in the silent and calm sea of my mind.
Will I cross the fine line if I listen for too long or too carefully, losing my balance? Well, if that ever happens, I hope it brings my family a fortune.
In the wake of International Women’s Day (and another wave of PMS-induced fights with my hubby, god bless his soul), I’m publishing some thoughts about what it means to be born a woman.
Every woman knows what gaslighting means. Not because it’s often gender-based, with females being the victims, but because our bodies gaslight our minds, i.e. we gaslight ourselves. Don’t get confused. Just bear with me.
Gaslighting means manipulating someone using psychological methods into questioning their own sanity or powers of reasoning. Well, our bodies use psycho-hormonal methods that make us question our own sanity every month. If you’re a person who has ever experienced PMS and periods, or a partner who can anticipate the storm, you know what I mean. And while all the videos online about craving specific snacks and how crazy we can get are funny and all, the reality can be scary.
Every month, a deep dark well of despair opens up, tearing apart my heart and soul. It sucks all my energy, casting an ominous cloud over everything in my life but the doubts, insecurities, and pains. With no mercy, the voice from this well questions how come I’ve thought that I am fine and enough and my life is good. “Your life is miserable,” it whispers. “You’re gonna get fired and divorced because everybody will find out how crazy and worthless you are.” I’m grateful for all the routine tasks that distract me from this voice, but it stays in the background for several days in a row.
Someone–probably a male–can say, “just learn the symptoms and get ready for them; what’s the problem?” The problem is that you can’t make a checklist of symptoms because they can change every month; they depend on many other things; and they hit different as you grow older. I experienced the dreadful thoughts of being crazy and depressed and losing my mind for the first time when I was 27. It took my body more than ten years to start messing with me, and it’s hard to get used to. Every month, I hope that I won’t turn into another person, that I’ll stay myself, but no. I cry uncontrollably, choking on tears. And then, the period arrives, and I breathe out, realizing that it’s not me. It’s my body. And how scary is the idea that you and your body can act against each other? Isn’t it the definition of autoimmune diseases?
I knew I was born with a girl’s body, but only at 11 did I understand what it meant. It was a mindblowing conversation with my friend, and I’m still dealing with its impact. We were walking to school, when she said, “It’s not fair that boys don’t have periods.” I was confused–I didn’t know a whole lot about male bodies–so I said that maybe they do, and we just don’t know about it. Her reply made me question the balance of fairness in this world: “Have you ever seen an ad for any boy-specific thing like those that promote tampons and pads?” The words tampons and pads made us giggle, but below the fun was a tremendous shift in my child’s brain. She was too right.
Since then, I have learned a lot of facts that point to a very unbalanced picture. That for decades drugs were mostly tested on men due to a false belief that female hormones could skew the results. That the whole society is built around the circadian rhythm, relying on a 24-hour clock built-in in every man, and the infradian rhythm–the 28-day clock built in every woman–is given no attention. That even though over 70% of women have needed to take sick days due to period pain, only five countries (out of 195) have menstrual leave policies. And most recently, that men think they can decide what women can and cannot do with their bodies.
However hard it is to feel empowered and powerful (and these are the most common words I’ve seen on social media on the 8th of March) in this–to its core–men’s world, being a woman is a blessing. To quote a powerful girl, Hermione, I have to say that I can’t imagine living with the emotional range of a teaspoon. The rest is figureoutable.
Working on this article, I got tangled in pronouns. I and we, my and our, sprinkled with occasional you felt right when typing and spilling thoughts on the screen, but when I reached the “re-read and edit” part, I saw inconsistency–the worst enemy of expressing thoughts. But it’s never about what; it’s always the why, right? So I started thinking about the reasons I was jumping from my personal experiences to generalizations about us as a group. Wait a minute, what group am I even talking about? We as people, we as women, we as writers? And I think it’s worth setting this right for you, my dear reader, from the beginning.
Below you’ll find this messy article, where I use we as people who pay attention, notice, observe, and feel. The sensitive part of humanity that dreads the idea of living a life where you can wake up one day and hear or say, “I don’t love you anymore,” and shatter the decades built on an assumption of love, taken for granted as a fact that happened kids ago. The group of people who want to take control of their life as it is happening, transition after transition.
From newborns to presidents, we’re all doing the same thing–living. I used to think that life was a static fact as my roles in it–a sister, a first-grader, a teacher, a friend. The realization that it’s a constant flow of transitions, like from a best friend to a grown-apart piece of the past, has been overwhelming. I think that our lizard brain is programmed to make life less paralyzing, so it registers only “significant” transitions as facts that are done, like celebrating your 20th birthday when your twentieth year of life has just ended. These huge transitions are packed in the first three years of life and then happen less and less often, and we often find ourselves going with the flow, noticing an important achievement here and there until the gaze focuses on the next generations–that’s where people start demanding grandkids.
You lie and blink, turn your head, crawl, sit, stand, walk, jump, and run. You learn to talk, then–after a lifetime for you and a blink of an eye for your parents–you learn to talk back. You move from school to college, then from a place where you pay to learn to a place where you get paid to forget what you’ve learnt and start from scratch. You think boys are weird, and then you marry one. You try to figure your life out, and then you grow one inside of you. The problem with transitions is that you think you know what to expect, but life, God, or the universe, whatever you believe in, doesn’t care about your expectations.
When I was 12, I had a favourite video game called Zanzarah: The Hidden Portal, where my player character escaped to a world full of magical creatures. I was fascinated by the first location–a beautiful village with tiny houses, streams and springs, enchanting music playing in the background. Then I clicked on the map and saw only one area highlighted–this lovely village made up about 1/6th of the map. The rest was hidden in the dark, and I wanted to know what those parts of this magical world were hiding. To get to one of these areas, I had to go through a full checklist of items to collect and tasks to do. I couldn’t get to the land of fire before I had enough water fairies to protect me. And that’s the magic of games– as a character, you’re always ready for the next transition. Or, if you fail, you know the reasons and what to try or fix to win next time.
In life, we often rush through transitions and find ourselves in a new area of the map, where we don’t have the words to describe where we are and what we’re feeling, let alone enough skills to face it fearlessly. The culture equips us very well with vocabulary, patterns and scenarios when it comes to the world of infatuations, affairs, and love. Still, we fail in this area badly. But what about grief and pain, courage and excitement, soothing mediocrities and averages of everyday life?
Getting ready to become a mother was one of the deepest transitions in my life. All I had known and heard was how happy I would and should feel. Women who stumbled into depression and didn’t radiate joy were frowned upon simply because their loved ones didn’t know what to do with them. What if I turn into one of those shadows?
So, I had my baby, bracing myself for the glowing happiness, and the day we got released from the hospital, I found myself in a pitch-black area of the map: not enough skills and resources, no words to describe what was happening. In a video game, I’d die. I was drugged with hormones that were supposed to keep me going, but like main characters with superpowers who don’t know how to control their gifts, I had no idea what to do with this ocean of love, responsibility, and pain.
And here’s the overwhelming beauty of real life: when in dark places, you can move around, groping, absorbing and filtering, breathing and crying and drowning in echoing silence. Seeking love inside and outside, hoping it’s there for you to take somewhere in the dark. This hope is what pushes us from one transition to another, the lizard brain in search of the calm bay of predictable life that’s always out of reach. Labelling it as a transition instead of a milestone destination is liberating because it grants the right to be sure that it’ll pass, it’ll be over one day, and it’s changing me for the best.
Transitions take time, and that’s what we can’t afford to miss anymore. We don’t want to be assigned a life, and we don’t want to end up thinking, “Where did all the time go?” when we’re 70. So remember to put a lot of effort into registering even the smallest changes in how you think and feel to see where it leads you and how you can tune in, adapt, and trust the process while running it. Does it take time and energy? Yes. Is it worth it? Hell yes.
I’m on a plane, on my way back home after the first business trip ever. But that’s not the only first thing that happened to me this week, and this blog is about the experiences I went through and the funny discoveries I made.
The parents’ right not to share.
I forgot my toothbrush, so the first thing I did after checking in and leaving my lonely suitcase in the hotel room was go to the closest store. Walking under the bright light, flattering berries and greens, I realized that I wasn’t in the tickling rush I always feel in supermarkets.
I had nothing else to do, no one to read to or play with, so I decided to browse for a bit and see if there was anything I craved. I ended up getting three random items: raspberries, chocolate with orange zest, and Pringles. What I was buying at that moment was not just food or treats; it was the feeling of not having to share. I bought the right to eat them on my own, slowly, without hiding behind a bag of oats. Of course, I could do that at home too. And that’s what my husband does for me: he buys me chocolates, he knows the kinds I like, and he keeps the supply. But there was more to that. Show me a parent who buys a pack of berries to eat all by themselves. Yep, this species has not yet been discovered.
Do you think that four days was enough for me to finish everything I bought? Nope. I forced myself to eat the last handful of raspberries before checking out, and I brought the chocolate and Pringles home as souvenirs of freedom.
How hard will I miss my family?
On March 29th, I woke up in an empty room for the first time since I got married and became a mother, which means that I have never slept alone for the last 1800 nights. My husband and I started a family, moved to a different country, and changed careers, but I’ve never slept alone during this period of my life. That morning, the silence of my thoughts peacefully waiting until I was ready to approach them was palpable.
So, this week I got a chance to test out living on my own and face the scary truth: will I miss my husband and son or not? On a scale from 1 to 10, will I even give it a solid 8?
I was scared to enjoy the time on my own. I was afraid that I’d enjoy the life where there’s just me, my job, and my hobbies too much to stay considered a not-too-bad mom. And here’s what happened: my heart didn’t break when the plane was taking off at the Edmonton Airport or when I was going to bed alone. But I wasn’t celebrating in delight either. I felt a bit lost because I’m used to being anxious about packing everything my little one might need, about the way he feels and behaves, and now there was just me and… me.
The wave of the urgent need to hug and kiss Timofei behind the ear rushed on me twice. First, during our video call when I had to explain that I wouldn’t be putting him to bed that night, and second when I saw another kid of about the same age playing at the airport.
The outcome is that if I didn’t have these two, Denis and Tim, I’d have to spend much time figuring out what to fill my life with. With the whole work-from-home situation and the boundaries between professional and personal life being so vague, my family serves as a perfect switch between work and life modes. Every day, I have a hard stop at 5 pm because I need to go and pick Timmy up from the daycare. And a different routine starts: we get home, he asks to watch an episode of his favourite cartoon, we have dinner and talk about friends and events, read books, argue, go to a playground, and laugh. Without them, I’d need the discipline and motivation I don’t have to keep myself busy with anything but work.
The chameleon nature of Moms.
April 1st, I’m on a plane. I’m looking at a mom who spent three hours holding her child on her lap while he was sleeping. When the kid woke up and was taken for a quick plane tour by the father, that woman looked drained. This look of profound exhaustion that went far beyond just being physically tired was too familiar to me.
Somehow, mothers manage to turn Superwoman’s Mode on and off, depending on the situation. They are like chameleons changing the colour of their skin based on the environment, but they do that with their mood and energy level. I remember the same substantial shift from a girl to a mom in myself.
My first long flight was to Spain. We were on our way to spend three weeks honeymooning in mesmerizing Spanish cities. The flight was pretty long, and after about three hours, I got bored and tired and didn’t know what to do to keep myself busy. The second long flight was crossing the Atlantic from Istanbul to Toronto. It was a 10-hour flight that my husband spent watching films and sipping his drink, having been seated separately from us, and I was coming up with all possible ways to keep our 1-year-old from throwing a tantrum and waking up the whole plane. I had packed new toys, stickers, pegs, books, snacks, stickers – anything to keep him busy. Out of 10 hours, the only time gap I spent alone was when my husband took Tim, but he was a momma-boy, so it didn’t last long enough. I’m sure I looked the same way this woman on the plane did, and we both did the same thing once our babies were back. We were smiling and hugging them as if we had just woken up. There is an inevitable sacrifice in being a mom. And having a good dad next to you lets you share this sacrifice with another human, a soulmate if you will. And if this isn’t love, I don’t know what is.
Sometimes, I enjoy believing that I find signs showing that everything is as it should be. When I was typing this post on my way back home, Northern Lights were dancing outside my window. The soothing flow of green and yellow with a hint of purple reassured me that slowing down and paying attention was a skill worth working on.
That’s what I was thinking about on my first grown-ass woman business trip. Thanks for reading.
A grown-ass woman enjoying fancy branded onboarding kit 😉
War leaves you numb. It devalues and erases the meaning of words because no matter what you say or write, it will never come close enough to the reality filled with palpable fear, pain, and grief. Words, however, are the only medium available to me, a Russian with a Ukrainian surname, living in Canada. And here is what I have to say.
Two weeks ago, I came across a video of three rescue workers gently pulling a breathless body of a two-year-old from the rubble. For 52 seconds, I was hoping that the miracle would happen. My son is about the same age, and he welcomed this world in the same way: silent, without taking the breath that the whole room was waiting for. Those seconds before the doctor patted my baby on the back to make him cough lasted an eternity in my mind, but finally, I heard him whimpering, calling for me. The difference is that my boy keeps breathing, and the kid from the video will never have a chance to feel the spring air rushing down his lungs again.
“A book is a loaded gun in the house next door. Burn it. Take the shot from the weapon.” Fahrenheit 451
Forty-two days ago, in another life, the government of the country where I was born and raised started a “special mission” that the whole world calls War and Genocide. For the past five weeks, I’ve been trying to answer a simple question, “who am I?” and while most labels are still there, like a mother, a writer, an immigrant, I can’t say that I’m Russian without my internal voice trembling. Kicks in the guilt and greasy feeling of being connected to one old psychopath who decided that ruining the lives of ordinary people and showing who’s the boss by attacking a neighbouring nation is the only choice.
It’s heart-wrenching to see photos and videos of destroyed hospitals and schools, houses and theatres. The crack in my soul goes even deeper when I realize that it’s done by people who had the same history and literature classes as I did. That young boys who’ve been listening to family stories about their great-grandparents suffering through wars and not returning to their kids are now taking part in this madness. Fearless. Violent. Blind.
When I was 6, my grandma took me to Kyiv. She was born in Ukraine, and her relatives lived there. I have two core memories from that trip: how she was teaching me basic Ukrainian words and the phrase “Я тебе кохаю” (I love you); and how we were walking along Khreshchatyk, and I was soaking in the story of my mother’s first love, closely tied to Kyiv.
In 2014, when my grandmother called those relatives to wish them a Happy New Year, they asked not to call again because we were taking away their land, and we were to blame for starting the war. Did I understand what it meant? Not really. But I saw my grandma’s pain. And I feel it now.
In 2017, I got married and took my husband’s Ukrainian surname — I changed my “-ova” to “-ko.”
In 2022, I’m watching how the lives of millions of people are irrevocably changed. First, I thought it was heartbreaking to hear my father-in-law saying, “The only good thing is that you managed to escape this nightmare.” But after one heartbreak after another with each news report, I see that it’s impossible to escape.
It’s impossible to wrap my head around the idea that people who support and approve of this war make up the majority. Millions of people don’t realize that they’re forced to live a low-quality, poor, miserable life to fulfill the ambitions of the elite, having to save money to buy a new jacket for their kids. It’s painful to see how state-regulated religion and blind faith that Russians are guided and protected by God are used as a tool to make people believe that they’re on a great mission. I spoke to a woman who has 15 other women working on her team. Almost all of them have reached the retirement age, but they have to keep working to provide for their families. They’ve lived enough, as they say, yet they support what’s going on 150 kilometres away from them. The only one who’s against and keeps her mouth shut out of fear is that woman I spoke to. One of her colleagues was full of deep patriotic feelings until she found out that her son, who was doing mandatory military service, was sent to fight in Ukraine and might never return home. What left me speechless is that she still believes that he’s doing his part in saving the world.
As a mother, I’m scared to close my eyes and imagine what it’s like to wake up to the sound of explosions and explain to my son that we’re not going to the daycare today and we need to hide. I don’t have enough tears to express what I feel when I come across a photo of a 6-year-old boy looking at his mother’s grave with a handmade wooden cross.
As a woman, I can’t imagine how much time it will take all the raped Ukrainian girls and women to heal the wound and go back to their lives, if ever.
As a Russian whose great-grandparents shed blood for peace, joyful childhood, and a promising future for their kids no matter where they end up living, I use my words to say that this crime against humanity must be punished.
Nothing can be worth so much anger, hatred, fear, and pain. If you’re also a human who’s terrified that this is possible in the 21st century, do your part. Share the news from reliable sources, support Ukrainians and Russians who want to stop this madness by signing petitions and sending donations, and don’t let your mind get used to the idea that there’s a war somewhere far away.
Every time someone asks me, “How is Tim doing?” I immediately come up with a dozen stories about him but never feel comfortable enough to share any of them. Why? Because I don’t want to see people getting bored, especially those who don’t have kids or don’t tend to talk about them during work hours.
A couple of weeks ago, I realized that 80% of my colleagues know that I have a toddler only because every now and then I drop a message in our chat saying, “Tim’s sick today; I’ll be responding slower than usual.” That was the moment when it crossed my mind that although two of my colleagues also have kids under the age of three, I never hear about them until I ask more than one regular question or they get sick and have to take part in zoom meetings. Everybody knows that catching colds is normal, but I’m sure that if I didn’t have a toddler myself, my brain would learn that having kids equals a never-ending vicious circle of illnesses, ruined routines, and pushed deadlines.
Edmonton, March 2022
Growing up, I heard adults around me saying that children always have runny noses, sore throats, and coughs. That once the world of daycares accepts a child, it grants them with a special mark of colds and fevers. And again, scientifically, it’s correct: we need those triggers to teach our immune system how to fight the disease. But from the emotional perspective, kids are often considered an inconvenience. For a mom who has gone through an oxytocin rollercoaster to establish an unbreakable bond with a tiny snoring alien-looking human being, it sounds wrong to have the words “child” and “inconvenience” in one sentence, but… it’s a fact, right? The problem here is that only parents know the true portion of troubles in having little ones, and it’s unique for each family. Here’s a breakdown based on what I see and experience: 10% inconvenience and 99% love, laughs, hugs, kisses, and fun. You can thank me for this quick introduction to Mom’s Math later. But do people outside your family need to know about your parenting challenges and which skills your baby learned last week?
In today’s brave new world of hybrid and remote work modes, it’s a challenge to catch the balance between your professional and personal lives. Working at the office, I had a chance to start a small talk several times a day, and that’s precisely how I learned fascinating things about people I work with, the little stories that make up who they are outside titles and responsibilities. Being a mother is a massive part of my personality, and I feel that it’s essential to share it with colleagues if the final goal is to build strong relationships, not just wrap up a project. The question is how to do that when all small-talk opportunities are minimized.
Exploring Canmore, Fall, 2021
With friends, it’s a bit different. You meet them at a certain stage of life when you share interests, time, and problems. Then, when each of you moves to the next stage, be that a career move, a literal move to a new place, or starting a family, you have to put more effort into maintaining the connection. And I honestly don’t understand why it makes sense to ask your friend about their new workplace and job role even if you know nothing about the company or the industry, but they can say something like, “I don’t know what to ask about your kid, I don’t have one.” You end up sharing what’s most important to you only with people living in the same context, and that’s not always the best scenario.
Now I’m working hard at looking deeper into this feeling of discomfort that tickles my stomach every time I start telling a funny story about Tim:
How he and his daycare friends decided that licking each other’s faces in the middle of the global pandemic is fun.
How he fell into a puddle and was shocked that he got wet.
How diplomatic he looks when negotiating the bedtime routine.
One method I’ve been trying out is being more open and asking friends a simple question, “Do you wanna hear something fun about Tim?” Then, if they’re interested and support the conversation by laughing or sharing their own childhood memories, I might dive into whatever I find challenging or demanding in my role as a parent. And no, such conversations don’t last for hours, but they can improve your mental health and find new friends. Wanna share something with me? I’m all ears. And eyes.
They say it’s essential to take time to give yourself a pat on the back for every goal achieved, every big task completed, and every dream you make come true. Keeping in mind a list of things you’ve done well and what you’re grateful for supports mental health and helps avoid burnouts. But when you grow, outperform, or achieve, you become a part of a narrower circle of people who have done the same. This fact slaps you on the face, devalues and resets your system of ‘good-job’s and ‘well-done’s, and makes old efforts seem worthless. I’m typing these thoughts out to zoom in and examine my own milestones. If anything like that has ever happened to you, please share, I’d appreciate it.
At high school, out of 30 students, only two had outstanding English results, my best friend and me. Back then, we were teens, the feeling of superiority was new to us, and I have to admit it felt fantastic. Maybe that was one of the main reasons I decided to keep learning English and entered the “English Language and Literature” program at university. Turned out all the girls who had the same ‘superior’ position at their schools had also chosen that program, and I wasn’t different or special because of my knowledge and skills anymore. It took me some time and a lot of effort to prove that I could do more, study better, outperform, achieve.
Fast-forward to six years later. After several months of preparing all the paperwork and anxiously checking my account every day for five months straight, I received a dream-came-true email: our application was approved, and the last step was sending passports for Canadian visas. From that moment, we were absolutely sure that we were immigrating and starting a new life from scratch. Needless to say, our friends and family got excited and surprised after we shared the news. All the possible adjectives and emotions were in the air: you’re crazy; that’s incredible; how did you do that; no way; I would never dare. But then, after we moved to Canada and started meeting Russian-speaking people, there was nothing special about us anymore. They had all done the same thing, got the same paperwork, and in many cases had to go through a much more complicated process to come to Canada. Mission complete – start another one.
The last event that had that explosive and then numbing effect was me landing a dream job I thought I’d never get. It’s still a mystery why my boss decided to take a chance on me, but although I felt special and chosen – yes, like in Disney movies – in the beginning, this feeling is long gone. I just made another step on this ladder of narrowing features and talents: from the girl who knew English at school to the student who had to prove that she deserves to be appreciated; from an alien-immigrant among my friends to a norm in a country of immigrants; from an unexperienced enthusiast to one of many content writers and marketers.
Going from one circle of somehow special people to another is a closed loop. Apparently, I got addicted to being unique, praised, and appreciated. Is it because my grandma would always compare me to other kids and say that I was smarter, better, prettier? Is it just a part of my personality? Is it what “rat race” means for me? I don’t know the answers, and to be honest, I’m tired of trying to find out what made me feel like this and whether I should change it or not. Looking back at a 20-year-old me, I can see differences, and I keep flowing, evolving from one state into another. Maybe in ten years, I will stop searching for a narrower group of people where I can belong because I’m special. But now I’m figuring out which circle I want to enter next: another round of from-scratch zero-experience jobs? Diving deeper into what I’ve learned over the past year? Narrowing down what I love doing and focusing on it? Let’s see.
I’ve always had two passions: writing and sharing knowledge. The first symptom of writing inflammation was creating captions: as a big fan of “The Charmed,” I had a special notebook where I would put stickers and added a line or two, or even a short dialogue. When I was about ten, I tried writing stories, but they seemed to be clumsy simulations and never engaging realities. Plunging into a brave new world, even if a fantasy one, was what I loved about reading, and I was trying hard to recreate that feeling. But again, everything seemed to simulate and copy what I had in my mind, like in those pixel-graphic video games of the early 2000s: names, setting, plot, dialogues had nothing in common with what I wanted them to be.
But I loved writing, the process of it. One of my favourite childhood books, with a green cover and golden title, got me so hooked that I took a crispy-new notebook and started copying it word by word. I got so excited about finally finding a way to touch the world of stories, but Mom told me, “Rewriting a book doesn’t make sense,” and I gave up the idea.
Since I enjoyed writing, I ended up starting a lengthy story. Once, someone spilled tea over my precious notebook, and I was bawling my eyes out, but Mom’s words changed everything again: “Wow! It now looks like an ancient manuscript. This notebook has some history, hey?” That’s the only thing I remember about that notebook: no characters or plot twists, just yellow-brownish wavy pages.
If at this point you’re thinking that this blog is about Mom affecting my emotions, choices, and experience, you’re right, but everything starts with a mom, no?
So, I made several attempts at stories. When I was nine, I cut my teeth on poems. I went to a summer camp and brought back several short poems about space, nature, probably love, and all my family was so impressed that I fell in love with reciting or reading them aloud. Now, 15 years later, I don’t remember any of those poems, but I feel the touch and smell of a big blue notebook that I had found among my grandmother’s treasures and trusted with my poems. On my 12th birthday, I got one of the most memorable presents – a publication in a local newspaper.
I’ve always felt that there were too many words inside of me; I had the urge to write myself out. When I was about 17, I decided to go for a long hike to Altai, and had to spend three days on a train, so I took a notebook – yeah, I still remember the touch of pages and how it looked. It happened after a break in writing, so my first pages were like rusty water coming out of a long-forgotten tap. Several poems after, I felt like a crispy cold spring of mountain water and managed to end up with something meaningful and beautiful.
The other passion, sharing knowledge, also showed its first signs at school. I used to be that kid who always had organized notes, and before exams, classmates and later groupmates at university used to ask me questions, and I explained everything in a way that they understood and remembered. Of course, I also used this trick to refresh the material or even learn it myself, but I did it through sharing and explanation. That’s why it’s of no surprise that I started teaching English when I was in my 2nd year at university. I picked up the methodology pretty quickly because it was reasonable; I loved the structure, the flow of ideas, and interaction with people was also something I enjoyed. One of my first students was a gorgeous doctor in her late thirties, an amazing woman who was struggling with English. I was supposed to substitute her previous teacher, who left for maternity leave; that’s why the expectation bar was high. Four years fast-forward, and I have experience teaching business English to groups of corporate students, general English to IT guys, managers, and teenagers, and preparing people for IELTS.
When we moved to Canada, I had two diplomas, one long work experience in my resume, and one year of maternity leave (which was driving me crazy, to be honest.) Did I have any idea about what I’d do in Canada to earn money? No. Did I think it would be connected to English? Well, of course, it’s an English-speaking country, no choice. The only area I had expertise in was natural to thousands of people around me. I realized that in the country of native speakers, the teaching competition would be too high, so I decided to sprinkle some certificates over my CV and took a long course from the University of Arizona in TESL. Have I used it ever since? No. I became a member of the local organization of English teachers and started gathering all the paperwork necessary to prove that I had the experience and could teach English in Canada, but in the end, it was not possible without local education. Was I frustrated and overwhelmed? Well, sure. The only career ladder step I had in my head just vanished, and I was working as a screener at a senior facility (pandemic-lockdowns era if you’re reading this in 2050) at that moment, so I didn’t know what to do.
Wait a minute. I had another passion – writing. Can I turn that one into a career? What a coincidence – my favourite blogger launched a course on writing for Instagram, and of course, I jumped on this opportunity (hello, Mom, thank you for paying for this course as a birthday present). By the way, I finished that course as a top-3 student, so I basically got my money back as a prize. Anyway, I started writing for my personal blog in Russian, and the moment when people who I didn’t know started communicating in the comments was so thrilling and exciting that my heart skipped a bit.
An important note here: I hated writing in English. I mean, in IELTS, Writing was my lowest score because I just couldn’t get what they wanted from me. But, at the same time, I remember that for one of my university assignments, I wrote a poem in English about the 13th zodiac sign (yes, we had creative assignments).
I was sure that finding a job connected with writing in English was impossible. But I applied for the position of Creative Content Writer, having no experience. And they took a chance on me.
If someone had told me a year ago that I’d professionally write in English, I’d have burst out laughing. But here I am, sitting in my home office, writing content for our clients, fighting the idea in my head that if you’re not a native speaker, you’ll never be good enough. So far, I’m winning.
It’s human nature to compare. As an immigrant, I compare every day. After spending almost a year here, I noticed that there are five awe-inspiring things that you wouldn’t pay attention to if Canada is your home country. Let me know if I’m right!
1. Sky and Personal Space
My home city is twice as small as Edmonton, but 200.000 more people live there. To make a picture clearer: about 25% of Edmontonians live in apartments. In my home city, this proportion is close to 90%.
When we just moved here the air, the distances, and the space seemed astonishing. Now I’m more used to this insane feeling of freedom. Yet, every time I look at the sky hugging everything around me, I’m on the verge of crying. This freedom affects people: they respect your private space — a priceless thing for me. In my home town, I felt insecure because of all the stares and glares. I thought there was something wrong with my hair or my outfit was inappropriate, or the lack of makeup. Here I am comfortable no matter what I’m wearing or doing.
2. Sun and Green
Moving from the south of Russia I didn’t expect Edmonton to have so much sun. I was more afraid of wintertime and even bought a wool vest (which I never wore). The amount of sun you get here is unbelievable. A day when it’s -30 and the sun is shining is a blessing since the winters I’m used to were all gloomy, wet, and dirty.
We did our research before choosing Edmonton. When I saw “Edmonton has more than 800 parks” I couldn’t believe my eyes. Now I know that sometimes a couple of trees and a bench can already be called a park. At the same time, those huge parks scattered all over the city make me forget that I live in a capital city. I’ve never seen so much wildlife in my entire life: squirrels, hares, owls, ducks, and geese. A different life right next to you — a fantastic feeling.
3. Support for Parents
Last weekend I was looking for a new place to visit with my little one. I saw cool theme playgrounds: life under the sea, dinosaurs, bear lodge, space, etc. Every time I see a playground here I ask myself “Is it free?”. Of course, I know that we pay taxes to have that infrastructure. But in Russia I paid taxes as well and had nothing of the kind.
No one gives you the stink eye if your baby is crawling around the store or playing with dishwashing sponges. As a parent, I am more confident here.
4. Customer Service
It was a striking experience. We were checking in for our flight from Toronto to Edmonton. It turned out that we had booked extra baggage space which we didn’t need. It was around 50 bucks. When the lady at the desk told me that I could only reply “well, it’s our bad, no worries”. She spent the next 10 minutes trying to hack the system and return our money. I was shocked: she went the extra mile without being asked.
Our first steps to starting a new life were to rent an apartment and to buy a vehicle. We were sure that public transport would be enough for the first days (that was a big mistake by the way). So we went to several dealerships using LRT, buses, and on foot. When we were at the last dealership the agent found out we had no car and were traveling around the city on foot with a stroller. Instead of saying “That must be hard” she offered us a drive home. I mean, it was the first time she saw us, we didn’t buy anything with her and it was the end of her workday. But she was eager to help. This is the customer service I never got in Russia.
5. People
So we moved at the end of September, and Christmas was already in the air. I was sure it would be an ordinary day for us since we had no friends or relatives here. What happened is more like a fairy tale: a colleague at my first job invited us to celebrate Christmas with her family. Needless to say, it was so heartwarming I was crying before we left home.
Everyone said “Welcome to Canada!” after hearing that we moved a couple of months ago. They asked polite questions respecting our boundaries and offered help. It is a pleasure to share our story, for sure.
We got so much support that I haven’t been homesick at all.
If you are a Canadian, do you appreciate or notice these things? If you are an immigrant, do you agree?
This is what I say when I talk to people with hearing issues and those in a hurry. Actually, I am Katerina, and I do love the way it sounds in my mother tongue, with a royal sharp “r”.
Names are labels. You know, if a Peter broke your heart, you’ll try to avoid all the Peters you ever meet. The same is true for numbers. We normally use them to represent us as professionals, so my professional numbers are:
6 years of university studies
3 years of experience teaching English
2 IELTS exams with 9.0 for Speaking
My personal meaningful numbers are different:
1 sister who I love so much I let her borrow my clothes
8521 km between me and my friends and family
1 kid who breaks my heart every day and heals my soul when falls asleep next to me every night
And one blog which I’m starting to develop as a writer. Dream big, right? Start with small steps. Let’s see where this road goes.
Are your meaningful numbers different from the professional ones?
