bones

While in England, I discovered yet another thing that my dad and I have in common: our hands. My mom, she gave me her body shape. Our wide hips and narrow waists and muscular thighs form our hourglass figures akin to those in biology textbooks. (Though, given the fashion industry's fascination with the heroin-grunge look and all-around flat models, this has NOT been a blessing in the least.) Her long graceful fingers, however, those I did not inherit. Instead I got little hands with shapeless fingers, ones that I have been embarrassed about for so much of my life. (To the point that I even avoid wedding pictures that include close-ups of my hands.) So there I was, going through life in agony of my orphan ugly hands, completely unaware that this is yet another proof that my dad did in fact contribute to my genetic makeup. And this clarity, it blinds me!

I will admit though, that despite my parents living on different continents, it is a calming thought that at least I have parents. I can trace back the proverbial DNA breadcrumbs they left for me on my path and hopefully end up somewhere at the origin. Because this tree, it needs the roots.

focusing

At this point we are in Michigan, visiting all sorts of family all over the state. Coming back to the Midwest after some time in Europe was a huge culture shock, one that I wasn't prepared to handle. It mostly revolved around strip malls and convenience and patriotism and I guess, general societal organization. I know I am signed up for 4 more years of grad school in the States, but I bet it will be really hard to convince me to stay here once I am free to choose where I want to live (which is such an American (not only, obviously, but at least it gets reinforced that much more, here) concept - free to choose? I should count myself lucky to be able to sit here on my well-nourished (though the nourishment part can be debated, given American food industry) ass choosing where the hell in the whole wide world I want to live, eh?). But seriously. I miss Europe and I miss my family in Europe: I miss going to castles with my dad, I miss taking the train to the sea side, I miss walking the streets of St. Petersburg, I miss specialized stores, I miss making myself baguette sandwiches with real, yummy bread and real, yummy ham and mm-mm the cheese! It just doesn't taste the same here. In short, I might take me a while to recover.

Something that is nice about Michigan, however, is the Great Lakes. The nature around these gargantuan bodies of water is a bandaid to my aching heart. You just can't pass up sipping wine at sunset on a Lake Michigan beach. This is what I have to focus on.

even when refusing the labels

Independent book shops, especially with used books sections, on cute streets in small American towns get me every time. My actually-no-money-in-a-quite-literal-sense self always manages to scrape together the $3 for an Oldie But Goodie. This time it was The Plague by Albert Camus. Feeling a little reluctant about the translated version and a little guilty about skipping out on the French one, I decided to dive into it anyway.

That time period, the first half of the 20th century, kind of amazes me. The amount of thought and passionate philosophies emanating from authors, teachers, leaders, people all intermixing and challenging each other is quite a contrast to our relatively quiet times. Of course, they also had wars and whatnot, and the world was changing shape, but people were reacting and writing about it! There were the nihilists, the socialists, the communists, the fascists, the existentialists all concentrating in one melting pot. Do peaceful times come with complacent citizens? Or am I, no surprise, being pessimistic about the people of today?

But basically, man, I miss Europe.

mind the gap

I have tried to find something to say about the last week and a half, but my heart has been exploding with all sorts of emotions that cannot be easily contained to a single post.

For example, just a few days after finishing exams, we joined family in backpacking the Tahoe Rim Trail.



This is when I remembered that forests are my second home. For three days straight I reminisced about roughing it as a child in the woods, making friends with trees, biking with the neighborhood kids to the lake and jumping off docks because no one else was around. Sometimes it just feels so good to get out of the city and sleep on the ground, next to the earth, while listening to the sounds of nature. Amazing!



Next, we were off to Boston for a few brief moments, and I never thought I'd say this, but that city pulled at my heartstrings like whoa. I would've never thought I'd miss those damn brownstones and the New England hills... and when our friend drove us down the Pike, all I wanted to do is keep going and end up in Connecticut. I wanted a piece of New Haven! I guess I mostly missed the life I had there, adult but carefree, and my friends, with whom I had many an awesome night. I wonder if I'll feel this way about San Francisco, too, when/if I leave. Probably. Needless to say, we promptly had ourselves a bowl of New England Clam Chowder and some Sam Adams Summer Ale. Yum!

Which brings me to the days we've spent in London (which, by the way, IS gray and gloomy and has romantic potential). This city is some odd combination of other cities I love: St. Petersburg, Boston, New York... Neighborhoods change their aesthetics from white Parisian monstrosities to dark germanic brick houses, from modern glass business buildings to Gothic abbeys. I think I still have a mixed impression from this new experience, but all in all, it's still a good time and more to come. Phew!

happy summer

I just sent off the last e-mail pertaining to my program, which means that it's officially: SUMMER (echo echo echo....)

Of course there are still the two classes I am taking over the summer term, and there is that research proposal due in August, but I have three months to do those things, which means that I can legitimately relax for now and enjoy a few weeks off. A few weeks during which I will travel to distant lands, backpack the Sierras, join in celebrating joyous events with friends, visit family, and drink entirely too much whiskey. I am getting drunk just thinking about all the possibilities! Happy summer!

artist stranger

So yesterday, I spent a few hours at a local Starbucks studying for horrible horrible torturous not-fun-at-all upcoming exams. I was at my little round table, sipping on an Earl Grey and contemplating something along the lines of population mean differences or frequency distributions, when this guy came in, walked past my station and made himself comfortable at a table next to mine. You probably think that you'll hear a description of his hotness next, but no. This guy was kind of on the hobo side. He was older, appeared unkempt, had a ginormous canvas backpack and random objects in his hands. As he settled down, he took out more random objects from his ginormous canvas backpack and proceeded to plug in some crazy-looking machinery right below my computer. I am ashamed to admit this, but I thought, great! Here is this guy, shamelessly taking advantage of a business, when he could clearly find fitting accommodations at a local library or in an alley downtown or I don't know, in the alcove of the building of that McDonald's on the corner of University and Shattuck.

However. When I came out of another statistics-induced trance and glanced over at his table, my jaw nearly hit the pristine Starbucks floor. He was reading a book on Primitivism in 20th Century Art and painting with pastels and watercolors. He carefully studied the lines and brushstrokes of the figures, replicating some and creating some of his own. Sometimes he softly muttered to himself something about amazing works of art. It was a Goodwill Hunting moment like I've never experienced before, and I think I learned my life lesson.

Oh, and the crazy-looking machinery was really an electrical pencil sharpener. For his pastel pencils.

almost there

I know I should write more about life in California, it being different than any other place in which I've lived so far. But it's hard when said life is being spent on producing page after page on ambiguous topics like emotion regulation. While not effectively regulating own emotions.

Soon though, summer vacation will begin, and with it, a trip to London. I will try to capture what I can of the gloomy romantic city, because this is exactly how I imagine it: gloomy, romantic, gray buildings and moist cobblestone streets, dreamy strangers passing secret gazes in coffee shops while writing existential poetry to distant lovers. And if it isn't like I imagine, well, then Oscar Wilde owes me an apology.

As for my 5AM distraction, here are some songs from a movie that first got me into Radiohead, which also happens to be the movie that first got me into Leonardo DiCaprio. That is, for a whole few months, until "Titanic" blew up in everyone's faces:





Ok, and now I am sad at the concept of young passionate love. Is it wrong that I kind of want someone to defy the rules of society for the sake of being with me? Although maybe I'd take the life of my cousin over one lunatic teenage boyfriend... It's a close one.

an m.d. special

Дорогая мама,

Thank you for not doing what every freaked out 21-year old in Soviet Russia would have done, and that is, end my beginnings of a life in-utero. It sounds so trivial now: mom, thanks for letting me exist. But really, what else could I ask for? You went against the odds of your time, perhaps, dodging the hardships of being a young mother-graduate-student in times of a collapsing government. You were a survivor and we survived together.



Thank you also for these hips and these legs. They may not look like what the world tells me I should have, but I have seen you carry them with poise and I am honored to have you as my predecessor. I am slowly learning ways in which they are amazing as they carry me through the streets of our world. And with every day that I use them, I am grateful to have yours for mine, to share with you our biology.

And thank you for your determination and drive. It has already saved my butt on more than one occasion and I cannot wait to see where it takes me. I know that you will be there, watching as I navigate the layers of time, and I'll be proud to show you all that I can do. I plan to prove to you the rightness of your decision on some wintery night in 1984.



I couldn't have made it without you,
Д.

catchup

I am grumpy from studying multivariate statistics all day and frustrated from writing a proposal on an exhaustive impossible topic all night, and look!, it's May already and when did this happen? I haven't been sleeping a whole lot and my brain is exploding with all sorts of delirious information, but hey, in just about a month I will be one year closer to becoming a doctor of psychos. And then you better beware, because I will be able to read your soul.

I guess things are finally starting to take shape and become more hopeful. I know now that come September, I will be empowering adolescent girls not to commit suicide or working through the grief of those who have witnessed a suicide or homicide. In any case, it should be pretty exciting, albeit terrifying.

We are also this close to buying tickets for all of the summer traveling that will be going down in the next few months. I am determined to meet my New Year's Resolution and am so glad that we are making it happen. Even if this involves spending a lifetime two months in a place to which I vowed never to return...

Ok, Ann Arbor is not all bad. It has its perks and its eccentricities. In fact, most people who have ever lived there have loved it, so you will likely hear great things about this ex-hippie place. It's just that I spent there my awkward adolescence as the foreign kid from a broken family and now whenever I go back, I regress and end up smoking pot on the hood of a car atop a parking garage. And that is just no way for an adult to behave, is it?

The mood and shape of my forthcoming summer down memory lane became all the more apparent when we spent date night watching Adventureland. It may not be the most profound movie and some might not get it at all, but we left the theater on the warm spring night knowing exactly the confusing taste of youthful carelessness. When great music and sleepless nights with wonderful people add just that bit of meaning to life.

Actually, maybe, these next summer months will blow my mind after all.

oy

You know, graduate school must be very similar to caring for a newborn. Of course, I might be biting my tongue in the future regarding this, when/(if) I ever actually have one of my own, but this makes sense to me right now, at 2.04 in the morning. I mean, as with a child, you think about it every waking moment; it consumes your mind, your memory, your physical energy. You worry about it at breakfast, you rework something about it in the shower, you prepare notes on the commute, you sit through hours and hours of lecture, you spend evenings typing up research ideas, you spend nights deconstructing theories. It exhausts you, it infuriates you, it gives you great pleasure. It is your pride and joy.

And maybe one day, it'll even support you in your old age.