January, 20 - Breaking the law

Think about the last time you broke a rule (a big one, not just ripping the tags off your pillows). Were you burned, or did things turn out for the best?

Everything was silent.
It was bound to go smoothly. No chance of being caught, not a single witness.
It made things even trickier. Spicier. It was surely worth it, and the confidence grew in her with every minute.

However, it was no good in tempting fate. No time to waste. It's now or never.
And still, it would be a mistake to say she didn't have a slightest doubt. For a moment she thought it was too much. In the end, did he really deserve it? What was so terrible in what he'd done before?

Nothing.
It was his very essence which disturbed her more that anything in the world. His seemingly innocent eyes that let everything off his hands. The fact that he was always somewhere near. Maybe if he didn't exist at all...

But no, she hadn't thought that. Not so harsh. Instead, she only grasped her weapon of revenge even tighter and headed for her goal.

It was now or never.

***

Looking at the kindergarten teacher who was desperately trying to wipe off the first letters of a word written on one of the cupboards, the little girl could hardly hold her tears.

No doubt, the word was a curse one, and the marker she accidentally found in the yard was really hard to remove.

Moreover, she had even less doubt that her parents would give her a hard time at home, having listened a detailed report about their angel-like daughter and her little unexpected revenge.

Now she didn't really know though what she was going to revenge for. The spite that reigned in her small heart just a couple of hours ago was already giving way to the guilty conscience.

And only after some years when the girl grew up she knew what another teacher told her parents as they were leading their rebellious kid out of the kindergarten yard:

- Oh, that boy... Nevermind. I would beat the crap out of him if I were her.

January, 16 - Toot your horn

Most of us are excellent at being self-deprecating, and are not so good at the opposite. Tell us your favorite thing about yourself.

In a couple of weeks I'm turning 24.
This number, though dividable into 4, 6 and 12, and thus one of my favourite ones, frightens me.
When you come to think of it, it's quite a lot. It's a load of events, different things, happy and miserable moments, rows of people who came and stayed or walked away with the flow of time.

And, what is more important, through all these years I pull someone very peculiar which is myself.

You see, I didn't publish this straightaway and I didn't have any plausible excuse except for one thing: I didn't really know what to write. I can find a dozen of positive things about me which other people might like and appreciate - and I cannot say I'm elated with them at the same extent. It's just me being me without any visible efforts.

But suddenly I found something I like about myself; something I simply adore and admire in myself.
The very thing I hated in myself once.

I'm a geek.

It has hardly anything to do with the most exact definition of this word. Or maybe it has everything to do with it. Sometimes you just have to see or feel something to understand its true sense.

What I like about it?

I like it that there is a whole lot of stories which take a special place in my heart. I'm not one of those guys who prefer reading books than talking to real people, but some characters are like dear people to me. I like it that I can hardly remember my going out of the movie hall without tears in my eyes - on the contrary, I find it really creepy when there's nothing that can move a person AT ALL, especially in the world offering so many wonderful books, films and songs. I like it that sometimes I sing at home pretending that I'm in some kind of a music video or I talk about something just to myself imagining that there is someone who's taking my interview. Or sometimes I imagine taking an interview, and I swear, I could ask a lot of the most curious questions in the world. I like drawing, or rather, copying pictures because when I do, I get great satisfaction, and I wanna look through them some day and remember all the funny stuff that happened to me and that I once liked so much. And though I have a musical ear and long fingers, I suck at playing the piano, but wait for it - when I do, I feel happiest of all, because what I play is shitty and thus unique at the same time; and in my head I play perfectly.

I like it that I have finally accepted a simple fact - I'm nice AND weird.
And all these imaginable moments make me who I really am.
And no matter if all people I know will someday start getting married and having kids and I won't (at the given moment, I mean) - I still hope there's someone for me who will accept all this in me the way I do. 

January, 15 - Polite company

“It’s never a good idea to discuss religion or politics with people you don’t really know.” Agree or disagree?

This post is going to be the shortest but I want to keep here the idea that has existed in my mind for quite a long time.

I'm sure there are two things which are better not to be discussed AT ALL - religion and salary.
Do not misunderstand me, but I guess these are two topics which always leave at least one participant of the conversation disappointed and unsatisfied; moreover, the truth is never born in course of such discussions. Then why do it at all?

There are so many other brilliant topics.
Discuss cats. Everybody loves cats. Only awful people don't.
Then why talk to them? : )) 

January, 13 - Clean slate

Explore the room you’re in as if you’re seeing it for the first time. Pretend you know nothing. What do you see? Who is the person who lives there?

- Well, let's see what we have.

The doorknob, so ordinary as it could be, felt a little chilly in his hand. Although he knew, or at least he thought he knew why he was here, he still didn't know what he expected to see behind this door. However, the chipped white paint of the door hardly suggested anything grand.

What he saw, however, puzzled him a little more than he was ready for.

Despite the fact all the furniture was covered with white gauze which was quite mysterious itself - the room didn't belong to any old mansion but to a typical five-storeyed house - some details gave away... what? He had it yet to be discovered.

- She had lived here for about twenty years. Then... nobody knows what happened. Everybody just disappeared one day. And you know what... as if she never existed. No documents, cheques, phone numbers... just nothing.

Which makes everything even more interesting, he thought. That was strange, but he suddenly had a feeling that the room used to be quite nice once. He couldn't tell whether it was due to the light but quite warm shade of the carpet, or the seemingly rich dark red curtains which hardly matched the latter; he was oddly sure that the sofa and the table were also quite ... warm.

- Why didn't they remove the ... these things? - he waved vaguely in the direction of a number of things hanging on the walls.

- Who? Nobody cares about that stuff as long as there's a person who just vanished into thin air. When new residents come... I mean, IF they come, you'll agree with me if I say it's quite a delicate matter...

He didn't listen but just stared at the walls instead. If the three of them (excluding the one with the window) were shown to him on different shots, he would never guess they belonged to the same room and, therefore, to the same person. The very one who decorated them.

- It's... German, isn't it? - he asked, knowing the answer already. The giant flag was carelessly pinned to the wall; that kind of carelessness, however, demands some time to be achieved. He couldn't help touching the smooth folds of three-coloured silk; there were bits of dust between them.

The light-brown wall unit on the right was no less interesting object; it reminded him of a teenage girl and of a hard-working college student at once. The numerous and nevertheless disconnected souvenirs, statues and boxes and rows of various books and copybooks, however, gave a strange mixture, not actually that repulsive. His attention was riveted on a number of perfume bottles - they were all purple. He supressed a sudden desire to smell them all.

A postcard, a child's painting and a "Queen" poster of an unusual size, all hanging under the row of shelves, didn't clear the picture at all.

He sighed and lowered himself on the floor.

A strange image of a girl who could be anything in the world didn't leave him.
Moreover, he couldn't get rid of a weird idea that this room was nothing similar to anything he had seen before.
He hasn't seen a place which was so obscure and so finite at the same time.
He has never seen the owner of the room but he was somehow sure she was absolutely sure in the seeming chaos around her.
All of a sudden he wished he could just for once have a look at her.

January, 11 - This is your life

If you could read a book containing all that has happened and will ever happen in your life, would you? If you choose to read it, you must read it cover to cover.

Under the cover of night you stunned the last watchman and entered the old building.
Walking through a long hall framed with mighty carved columns, you were watching nowhere but ahead, your eyes wandering from one niche to another. You fought, deceived and starved for this moment, and there it was, somewhere in the deep of the house, hidden from strangers' eyes - the very thing you came for.

And there it was, lying on the stone floor, as if carelessly thrown during some fight for something more precious, like a forgotten folio bearing no real value; for you were the only one who could appreciate it in full vigour. The only curious thing about it was that you had no clue about what you were going to find there.

Bending on one knee, you touched the cover; it was cold and dusty, but you didn't shake it from your fingers as if the very dust was as important as the thing hidden under it. Carefully taking the web from the book - for it was nothing else but a book to a common stranger - you looked at the cover attentively, as though the letters were some kind of a code you were first supposed to decipher. The title, however, didn't contain anything but two simple words.

Your life

Two words carrying a great amount of weight under them. A whole chain of events, days and moments of a common twenty-something, each of them, no matter sad or happy, ordinary or amusing, printed into every page with no chance to be wiped away.

You turned the book in your hands hoping for any kind of bookmark, but it would be too easy. You could not make out the page you were standing at the moment; what is more, opening the book would determine your fate finally and inevitably. Having finished the book, you would get the ultimate knowledge of your life path, all the ups and downs, lucks and failures. There would be nothing left to fear or to hope for, no secrets to discover and nothing to be surprised at. You would know your every step before even thinking of making it, like a complicated mechanism programmed to do an exact sequence of operations.

You weighed the book in your hand and suddenly thought that it was the hardest thing you ever held.

Your index finger touched the corner of the cover.

***

The first rays of sun lit the chamber through one of the narrow windows.

Shivering from the morning chill, you put your coat straight. Looking at a piece of parchment being swallowed by a deeming flame, you felt your last doubts evaporating with the last burning page.

Was it a cowardly thing to do? Was all this way worth letting the book of your life burn in the fire made by your own hands?

Anyway, you hardly felt any fear as you walked out of the building without turning back.

It was time to write the next pages yourself. 

January, 9 - 1984

You’re locked in a room with your greatest fear. Describe what’s in the room.

The title of this post is the same as one of my favourite books which touches upon the topic of fear. The fear that finally conquered and broke a man.

We may endlessly talk about what our fears do to us and how they sometimes even help us to grow and change. Still that's simple - we all are afraid of something, and sometimes the nature of our fears is absolutely unexplainable.

When I'm asked about what I'm afraid of, the first thing that comes to my mind is snakes. But that in no way means that I would be locked in a room with them.

Rather...

If I were left in a room with my darkest fear, I would be... left alone.

That's true.

In fact, my biggest fear is being left alone. Or rather let myself stay alone. I'm absolutely sure that every lonely man has to blame himself for that and no one else.

When I hear my closest people talking about their death or something connected with this, my guts shiver inside, I wanna shut my ears and run to the end of the earth. When I quarrel with someone or I don't hear a single word from a distant friend, I'm terrified at the very thought that some words may be the last we ever told each other.

That's why I sometimes cry thinking that there is no man for me in the whole world. It's not the matter of that everybody wants to be loved; on the contrary, sometimes I feel pathetic when I think there is no one who I could give my love to, who could receive it.

At the same time I realise I won't die if I were alone. But I guess such life can make anyone want to kill himself. People need people, and you cannot do anything about it. People need people and people have to be with people. Not with animals, computers or books, We need us in the first place.

Paraphrasing one of my favourite characters, if people valued other people more than gold and all that stuff, it would be a merrier world.

And I'll try to make it merrier, at least for myself, so that my biggest fear will never become reality. 

January, 7 - Helpless

Helplessness: that dull, sick feeling of not being the one at the reins. When did you last feel like that - and what did you do about it?

We are not heroes. No one is. The range of human emotions is so unbelievably wide that sometimes it's shocking to realise how many different feelings a human heart (or soul) can bear.

Sometimes our feelings are so complex that even we ourselves, let alone the most experienced psychiatrist, can analyse, understand and, what is more, get over them.

Right now I have a whole row of situations where I could possibly call myself helpless, but I am not sure about it.

Failing an English contest? That was a lesson - not to think you're the only one who can get all the honours.

Being left with a broken heart? Well, at least, you know there's fewer people to check out.

Losing a friend? One person less not to waste your time and to learn to appreciate the ones who deserve it.

Being unsatisfied with the way the things run? DO SOMETHING FOR F**K'S SAKE. But don't whine.

I'm not trying to sound like a hero and I don't have a slightest idea how long it will take before I'll be lying curled on the bed and crying myself to sleep. It happens to everyone.

But I'll surely know I'll always stand up stronger than ever and I will never be helpless.
Because there is always a way.
You just have to search a little harder.