a day in the life

More explosions. More dead, injured, lost in the smoke - just trying to get home. Looking for loved ones, and taxis to achieve some crude sense of safety as Moscow just keeps plodding along. No one here seems to be disturbed. It is not mentioned in conversation. Meetings go on. Fresh milk is delivered. Schools are open.

I am at a loss for words. I turn and turn in my sleep. I can't remember any of my dreams. I do not feel safe here.

I cannot shrug events off so easily. I see the baggage carousel in my mind's eye. After the journey, and passport control there is that fantastic sense of relief. That moment when you study everyone else that was on the flight just one more time, now with your foot up on a cart. Now pulling a fresh piece of gum from your pocket, the juice sliding around your mouth as you wait for the belt to lurch into motion.  You start to wonder if your bags made it, as each lump of luggage plops down, awkward as turtles on their backs. And in this lost stretch of time you are realizing the journey is over, that your girlfriend or your uncle is just past that glass wall waiting to squeeze your hand or kiss you twice on the lips, to look at your face with a sense of wonder as they try to see how your journey has changed you.

Instead, the explosion. Body parts around you, men and women missing legs and arms. Smoke everywhere, your eyes tearing, a deafening sound. And maybe lost in this moment you imagine what you would be seeing, smelling, feeling if you were not here right now. Those crude details of an ordinary day in your life that are transformed into something epic, majestic. The low rumble of the metro, the smell of vomit on the seats by this time of day, your child in school, dressed in her gym class uniform as she stands in line, a broom left outside in the cold air.

2 spoons

Some people have the saddest eyes. Some have empty eyes, angry eyes, lying eyes.

I met a woman a year ago with eyes that actually laughed. Squinting, then suddenly wide open, innocent, believing, curious - she sat in my kitchen as I served her a chickpea salad, as I filled bowls with homemade pasta in an arugula pesto, as I spooned into a fresh tiramisu. A stranger, but by the end of dinner the way her hands waved around like little birds she already seemed familiar to me. Over the next days and weeks we shared odd little facts about our lives, cautiously, gingerly.

I asked her for coffee on a Saturday afternoon. She sat in my kitchen, her feet wrapped beneath her. We spoke in low, quiet voices. I cooked a number of coffees in the little moka, filling the red cups in a small dance with her. N, the private woman. Reserved, discrete. N, an open book and a mystery in the same moment. Her face holding no secrets, always asking a question. Her lips half-parted in thought.

E liked her. She said she was beautiful. She said she smelled good. N always brought a little gift for E, even if she was not there. A chocolate egg, a tiny doll, some lip gloss. Little artifacts in the house began to remind me of her.

Now, everything makes me think of her. The barista who is missing teeth, laughing a giant laugh with tiny cups in his hands. The sound of the neighbor woman singing opera while I wash dishes. The shells of lychees left over from last night's dessert. The man with a mustache who wanders around the little market, asking for Katya, who he loves. Asking when Katya will be back, telling all of us how kind she is, how sweet she is, his hands raised as if he is praying, his baggy pants and wet shoes making a great puddle on the floor. He is pleading and the cashier ladies are just staring at him.

I wrote about her, and she was shocked, flattered, pleased. She showed her mother some of the things I said about her. I told her not to worry, that I would always respect her personal life. She is a profoundly private person. I shared one photo that she was embarrassed of. It showed her bare shoulder, as she slept. Of course I thought it was a terribly innocent pose, but I was wrong. She forgave me.

A year together now, and like any relationship it takes work, effort, attention to detail. But it doesn't feel like work to me, it feels effortless for the first time. We anticipate each other's thoughts. We often have the same feeling at the same time. We share a bed like we have known each other for decades.

We are two warm spoons in a drawer. We are some wildflowers pressed between the pages of a great book.

Almost two years ago, I sat in the sandbox on the playground with the corkscrew yellow slide. E was jumping around, her hair flipping in the early summer breeze. I could smell the fresh grass, some orange left on my fingertips. I knew then I had to move out, but nothing more. I understood something had run itself out. Me, the train conductor who would ride the infinite rails had reached some kind of destination I had never foreseen. I was sending emails to a stranger that had appeared in my awkward expat life, a stranger that wanted to help me. I asked "will I ever love again?" It was a question I could only ask a stranger. It was easy for some reason. The stranger wrote back, quickly. "Absolutely."

I sat in the sandbox, watching E swirl down the slide. I closed my eyes, listening to the air going in and out of me. I stopped thinking about everything that would need to happen first. I stopped worrying. I stopped feeling like I had failed. I wiped my eyes, that smell of mandarine oily and sweet on my face.

the last time I fell

The dogs are sleeping on vents to keep warm, clouds of steam chugging from them as the morning unfolds. It is -21celsius. The sidewalks a labyrinth of ice, the ground itself is cracking beneath car tires in fierce snaps. I smell something burning. My mouth feels like it is full of copper pennies, heavy, a sour metallic taste on my tongue. E is crying softly, her tears shining on her red cheeks. Even taking the metro to school does not help. She does not want me to leave.

I dress her in silence, hang her coat carefully on its hook. We enter the tiled room with the line of tiny sinks, the row of towels hanging under numbers. She tucks her shirt in, her legs wobbling under her. Her hand stretches out as she stares into space. I guide E to her desk, where a bowl of porridge and a glass of compote wait for her, a mammoth, ancient spoon resting on the edge of the bowl.

She sits in the tiny chair like a balloon half-deflated. I promise to take her early today.

Outside the wind smacks my face. I forgot my gloves somehow, shove my hands deep into my jeans past the magic rocks and lucky pennies. An old woman falls in one short movement to the sidewalk like a bag of wet concrete. No impulse to catch herself. I cross the street, try to help her up. There are no more than four teeth in her mouth. She wears an ancient fur coat covered in bald patches. She thanks me quickly. She is not hurt, just startled.  I point at the street and then back at the icy sidewalk. She nods in agreement. No sand or rocks or salt, I try to say.

"It is a different country." She says in a kind of Russian slang.

Walking carefully, I realize I have not slipped all winter. I have not fallen in more than a year - since last December.

It all comes back to me. The olive branch being extended by E's mother when I moved out -  that we would all go to Ikea together so I could buy dishes, sheets, glasses, forks. I did not have any way to go there. Desperate, tired, foolish I agreed. She owed me money. I told her if she drove me I would deduct a bit from her debt. The traffic was bumper to bumper, the diesel stench of giant trucks sitting for hours on the three lane highway was unbearable. They stood motionless around us for minutes at a time, great stinking elephants. I sat in the back seat with E, trying to keep my eyes closed and just sleep to avoid conversation. It took more than three hours, and it was after 11 when we pulled into the dark, snow-drifted parking lot. They would close in an hour. She dropped me at the front door, and as I got out she asked for 1,000 rubles.

"For what?" I asked.
"For driving you." She said.
"But we agreed I would deduct it from what you owe me." I said.

She leaned over, slammed the door closed as E burst into tears. The tires spun hard as she pulled away. I stood there, watching my breath in the air in front of me, stomping my feet in the cold, furious - not at her, but myself for being suckered, for being such a believer. I assumed they would come back soon, to negotiate. I thought to go inside and get warm.

Fifteen minutes passed. She would not answer her phone. I wandered the parking lot trying to find them. I started to believe they were gone, that I was stuck somewhere close to the airport in the middle of the night. The wind was picking up, swirling snow around the streetlights. I stood there, my jeans turning crisp as I tried to understand if she could really just leave me here over 30 dollars.

I saw what I thought was them on the far side of the parking lot. I ran, and fell hard, snow in my face, burning on my forehead. I got up, adrenaline and fear surging in me. I ran until I could see the car better. It was not them.

The battery on my phone was low. I called Sergey, gasping for air, whining like a little boy as I tried to tell him what had happened. I stared at the phone, wondering how long the battery would last in the cold. I looked up at the dark sky, wondering what E was feeling. I realized she must be hungry.

Snow started falling in giant clumps. Time was passing and I did not want to look at my watch. It seemed like thirty minutes had passed.

He called me back. She was coming back now, but I would have to give her 2,000 rubles immediately or she would drive away again. I thought to stay warm inside but then had some idea that I would miss them.

They returned. E was screaming, her face behind the window as they approached. I threw a fistful of rubles onto the dashboard when she opened the door. I pulled E from the front seat and stormed inside. There was maybe 15 minutes left before they closed. I sat her in a shopping cart and wheeled into the kitchen section. My leg was throbbing. I grabbed randomly at glasses and dishes. E was suddenly laughing at me. I laughed back at her. I spun the cart in circles, started singing some Motown songs at the top of my lungs. E sang with me, her mittened hands conducting me. I stopped the cart, went back for things like a cutting board, a colander. I grabbed at pillows, at a giant purple blanket. E was laughing and laughing. I spun us towards the cashier, filled giant bags, slapped my only working card on the counter to pay for everything. We bought hotdogs and ate them in giant bites, mine with mustard, her's plain.

The car sits in the pickup area. Her window is open. She is smoking cigarettes, hands shaking. I crack the back open, nest the bags inside. I get in, saying nothing. E's hands are wrapped around my neck. The way back is faster. I say nothing. The radio is off. E is sleeping in my arms as she has most of her life. I close my eyes, waiting for the sense of the turn onto Kutuzovsky when I will open them again.

I have to leave her there in the back seat. Go upstairs with these giant bags. Throw the purple blanket across the fold-out and sleep under something more than my jacket for the first time there. My leg was a mess. When I woke up, I could hardly move. All of the doctors were at home then, during the January holidays. E ended up with me for two weeks as I limped to the pharmacy, tried to tell them what was wrong with me as I bought tiny glass capsules and needles, as they broke in my hands as I gave myself injections in the ass, looking in the bathroom mirror. My fingers bleeding, I would twist around on the floor, trying to find a position that would lift the pain a bit. E was patient. I taught her how to play Go-Fish then. We watched a lot of cartoons. I cooked a lot of eggs.

That was the last time I fell.

I walk inside the new place. That purple blanket is for E now. The glasses sit on the windowsill of my bedroom, where I wake up next to N so many mornings. Most of those glasses broke, there and here and during the move. I find myself singing Motown songs today, as the sun pushes through the cold sky, as smoke and steam draw the city in sharp lines.

Later, I take E from school a bit early as I promised.
She asks me if I am sad. I shake my head no.

"I just miss summer." I say, after a moment.
"Pop." She said. "You just have to think of the sun."
"Ok." I say.
"And don't miss Summer. "She added. "Just think Spring is coming."

what we all need

The winter sun is banging through the windows, drawing greasy fingerprints and reaching into the corners of the rooms.

E is twisted like a kitten in her bed in the living room. She snores lightly, an odd collection of dolls caught in her armpits and elbows. She never sleeps without them.

I walk carefully between the legos and miniature doll furniture on the floor. The kitchen is half-clean. I will sit here and look at the empty sky for a while.  Making coffee would surely wake her. The room still smells of the Amatriciana I made last night for guests. The dishes stand, a messy tower in the sink. I smell crushed red pepper, the sweet residue of tomatoes, the white wine left open. There are three corks on the windowsill - one from New Year's Eve, one from last night, one from a few nights ago.

The year has begun and everyone is sleeping.

My skin itches with plans, wishes, daydreams. We need results, not limbo. We need to thrive, not simply tread water. This is a rare moment, when the fridge is full of food and there is no battle on the immediate horizon.

These are the moments I give thanks for the two women in my life. These are the moments I stare into the horizon, painfully aware of what we all need.

the year of the rabbit

I don't sleep well any more. When E is in my house, I jump from bed at the slightest sound to make sure she is not crying in the dark. When she is not with me, I lay in the darkness for hours, fighting my imagination, my thoughts that explore the avenues and possibilities of the coming day. Only when the ceiling grows pale and then white to do I nod off into something sleep-like, as I know the day is already here.

I celebrated New Year's Eve with N and her lovely mother in our warm little kitchen. I cooked and cooked, finding beauty in the tight pink curls of shrimp, the mahogany lacquer of a roast duck, the fragrance of country pate on fresh bread. Fine champagne crossed my lips. Kind toasts were made. The year of the rabbit was here and I looked to fill myself with great thoughts of safety and love.

After midnight we brought N's mother home and visited her cousin's party. A roasted pig's head sat in the center of the table staring at us. The glasses were filled and filled. Toasts splashed all around us, wishes of health and happiness, toasts to children, to money. Young women and children danced like mad, the tables pushed away from the sofa so they could wiggle around in funny hats for hours. I sat and watched it all, N next to me as beautiful as ever. I felt quiet.

Hours passed as more gifts were exchanged, as husbands and wives, aunts, uncles, grandmothers, boyfriends and girlfriends, brothers and sisters all laughed and joked and nudged each other with kisses and hugs and frequent shouts of "S'novim godom" (with the New Year). Over and over they wished each other happiness. The champagne was finally gone, and we shifted to great cups of black tea, plates and plates of homemade napoleons, dried persimmons, chocolates. The pig's face remained in the center of the table, a sort of anchor. N's cousin Michael would eat it when he woke up in the afternoon, the brains a delicacy as he explains it.

I could not finish the giant cognac in front of me. We ventured out into the cold and the eventual warmth of the covers waiting for us. The sun was coming up, and I saw myself nested against N's shoulders, smelling her new perfume. I was closing my eyes, my hands awkwardly stretched across the pillows. I was going to sleep.

The next day I would take E in the afternoon with any luck.