Spring has been coming

I was woken up by birds. They have been singing for a while, I believe, when the day has been falling asleep. I was sleeping for too long. My afternoon nap had to turn into longer, deep sleep, making me awake in the middle of twilight; in this moment when the day is no longer here but the night hasn’t arrived yet; in this scary time when it is not dark enough to make you absorbed by blackness around you but not light enough to make you feel secure. It’s this scary time when you see the world around you in shades of grey… I have never counted if there are fifty of them…

The melody of the birds song comforts me. I can’t recognise which species is singing but their anthem to the end of the day, or the beginning of the night, is the best confirmation that spring has been coming, despite the fact that evenings still are cold. I shudder but a blanket seems to be too heavy to wrap myself up. My arms are too heavy, hands too clumsy, I have this awkward feeling that my all body is twice or three times bigger than it should be. 

Spring has been coming for much too long. It should have been here already, with its daffodils in blossom in every corner, juicy green lawns in my neighbours’ gardens and the sun shining strongly, making us blind. But days still are gloomy, flower buds are closed, grass is yellowish after winter, showing proudly my neighbours’ cats poos. Spring has been coming but hasn’t arrived here yet.

Death has been coming too. Slowly. For the last 6 weeks. For way too long. It should have been here already, with its coldness spreading through all of the body, making the colour of the skin something between yellow and blue. It should have arrived but it hasn’t done this yet.  

It has been playing with her, giving her enough time to keep forgetting where she has been for the last 6 weeks, why she has been there and what this tumour on her neck is.

How cruel death can be, making her forget over and over again that she is dying?

I have been visiting her every day from the time when she was admitted to the hospice and now I hardly believe that 6 weeks ago I didn’t know her.

Do not expect a fairy tale story now. Remember, death has been playing with us, giving us no hope. It’s not a story with a happy end. I’m not going to change facts just to keep us away from bad and upsetting stories. It is a matter of death.

When I close my eyes I see a deep colour of the turquoise wool given to her with a knitting set to keep her occupied. She was working on a waistcoat but didn’t finish it before she felt too poorly to hold the needles. She was trying the undone parts of the garments on her skinny, consumed by cancer body, saying: “Don’t you think it will make me look fat when it’s finished?”   

Death has been coming slowly. But it will come. So spring will. But now I shudder. My blanket seems to be too heavy to wrap myself up. My arms are too heavy, hands too clumsy, I have this awkward feeling that my all body is twice or three times bigger than it should be. Why I’m so tired when I was sleeping for so long? I’m absorbed by turquoise behind my closed eye lids, waiting for her death, scared that it will finally come.

Her name was Rosalind

– Please, can you visit my mum? She would really appreciate this – a young woman with big eyes asked me. I agreed. I agreed because of those eyes. They were staring at me with this desperate question mark hanging between us in the thick air. Therefore I agreed.

Rosalind was lying in a bed. Her face was so pale that the colour of the white bedding seemed to be gray. Her eyes were closed but when she heard my steps she opened them. She looked at me, with all her consciousness and curiosity. Her pupils were huge, probably because of the medicines she had been given. The intense shade of blue, or rather navy, of her iris's embarrassed me. It didn’t match to her nearly translucent skin and petite body. Her eyes were too determined to belong to  such weak flesh. She looked at the chair next to her bed so I sat down.

– I was waiting for you; my daughter told me that you would come – an old woman with the biggest eyes I had ever seen said. I nodded, looking straight in those eyes. I tried to say something but for a moment I was speechless, enchanted, hypnotized, so she carried on.

– She had a wedding last Sunday. It was a lovely celebration and she looked so beautiful. I wanted her to be happy but I believe that because of me she couldn't.

– No, Rosalind, it’s not true – I disagreed but the words didn't come to me easily – I talked to your daughter earlier and she was so pleased that you could be with her during this special moment. She showed me the pictures – you both looked absolutely amazing. You need to be proud of her.

– I am, but I'm not proud of myself. I cause so many problems to people around. – Her eyes became darker – It’s challenging to stay with me now. It’s challenging for people who love me, don’t you think so?

– Life is a challenge, Rosalind. Everything we need to face is a challenge. But that’s the sense of us being here. – I said, despite the fact that I didn’t know what to say.

Rosalind smiled. She touched my hand, squeezed it very gently then she looked at me even more intensely than before – Do you know what Franz Kafka said? Let me quote him to you: The meaning of life is that it stops – she said as if she fully agreed with this statement. She opened her eyes widely – 

– What do you think?

I agreed because of these eyes. They were staring at me with this desperate exclamation mark hanging between us in the thick air. Therefore I agreed.

She closed her eyes.

She died a few days later.

White Other

09/03/2010 - How did I become White Other?

That day I was standing in the front of a railway station in a small city in the middle of England and I was looking around curiously. During the next couple of years I was going to hit the bottom and overcome my fears and then achieve more than I had ever dreamt of; I was going to reject myself to discover who I was and then accept myself; I was going to cry so badly that it made me laugh. That trip was going to be my own wordless but meaningful scream. But that day, in the middle of March, when I was standing in the front of the railway station in a small city in the middle of England, looking around curiously, I didn’t know this.

I looked at the old surface of the station, made from carefully laid red bricks; at modern buildings with huge windows with offices inside; at shops, one with posh suits and another one, on the other side of the road, with cheap shoes. I drank in, absorbed this scenery. I inhaled the smell of my take away coffee, mixed with curry from an Indian restaurant next to the station. I absorbed, imbibed every single person passing by: a black woman carrying her lovely cappuccino baby, an Indian lady wearing a pair of flip-flops despite the winter weather, a very old, pale gentleman with his very old, ginger dog on a leash, its red collar reminding me of something. I soaked up the sounds around me and I noticed that I hardly understood anything. It wasn’t the Queen’s English I had been taught at school. Even if it had been I wouldn’t have been able to, as I had only got a C. But the words around me were a strange mixture of different accents and pronunciations which made me confused… and would carry on doing this for a long time… for too long…

I picked up my rucksack, spilling my coffee. It was either bad luck or a good omen. I didn’t know and didn’t care. I just grabbed my not quite heavy belongings: the rucksack with 5 t-shirts, a jumper, a pair of trousers, underwear, a laptop I still needed to work on my projects and a book I always hugged as a mascot when I was sad, and I went to explore the city which had picked me to live in. I was childishly naïve enough to believe that these were enough to settle down here and be happy. I didn’t know that day that courage is not enough to face all problems, that openness should be secured by a door chain and that an attitude fades when it’s watered down by negativity, like brandy. As I didn’t know this I courageously walked into the city with an optimistic grin on my face, stopping every time when any guy said something to me I was unable to understand.

Then I heard this low voice which gave me goose bumps: “Kurwa!” Definitely I was able to understand this, and it made me ashamed. The guy looked at me and said in our first language: “A new arrival?” I looked at him surprised. How did he recognize this? That day I didn’t know that during the next couple of years I also would be able to identify our people at first sight.

Always the same

Always the same... the same story...
the same script...the same emotional feast
after which I feel like a core...a rotten core...
I was sure that it's different this time... but
I needed to hear "it doesn't matter to me"
to understand what my role is in this story...
the same story...the same emotional feast...
it's always the same.

I painted my nails red... because my vagina asked me to do so!!!

WHAT: V-Talk! - The Vagina Monologues workshop 
during the Everybody's Reading Festival.
WHEN: 5th October 2013; 11-17
WHERE: Duffy's Bar, 8 Pocklingtons Walk, LE1 6BU, Leicester,
HOW TO BOOK: contact Magda on malena.korytkowska@gmail.com
THIS EVENT IS FREE!!! WOMEN ONLY!!!

I painted my nails red today and I thought: “It’s time to act!” It was the second time I’d painted them in the last year.

I looked around carefully, and my room’s tidiness made me happy. My last year hasn’t been the easiest one. The last two years haven’t been the easiest… to be honest, none of the years have been easy, but what happened just in this last year is more than enough to talk about now.  Back when it began I was in a mess… in a big mess. It had started when I quit my job. I wasn’t happy there… I wasn’t unhappy either, but the days had begun to be too hopeless to face. So I quit. And then I noticed that I wasn’t the same person I had been before. The woman full of energy and confidence had walked away, leaving me alone, thinking only that “I should be better”, that “I’m not good enough”. I had let someone make me sure “I couldn’t”, to make me think to myself that “I can’t”. That someone was, first of all, me…

The first time I painted my nails red was after a couple of months stuck sitting alone in my rented flat, on my second hand sofa, worrying about the future, longing for being useful and being absolutely unable to do anything about it. It was on Tuesday, 27th of September 2012. I woke up, slapped my face, dressed up in my favourite clothes… and painted my nails red… and then I went out. In the Central Lending Library Magnus Gestsson and Jo Twist were running a workshop as part of the Everybody’s Reading Festival 2012. When I reached the library I could only think about running away.  (Jo said to me a couple of months later than he had thought that I seemed to be very confident… how wrong can first impressions be?). I didn’t run away… I not only stayed at this workshop but I also took part in other Everybody’s Reading events. It was the turning point in my life - I can say so proudly.

The next months weren’t any easier – but they were better. I engaged with my life again. I joined groups and went to events and I enjoyed them. I met wonderful people and I started to work with them on different projects. Finally I found a job – a good job – a meaningful and useful job. And in the meantime someone lent me “The Vagina Monologues” by Eve Ensler… and it was another turning point.

When I sat down to read the play for the first time I was sure that it was nothing more than feminist propaganda. In my opinion, feminists often fight for their cause … their good cause … with the wrong weapons. But this book, as well as the V-Day movement which it inspired, helped me to discover exactly what being a woman means. For the first time in my life I’m not only proud that I’m a woman but what is more I enjoy being one. There is massive work still to be done – but I’m on the way to understanding myself better and respecting all of my needs.

I would like you, Ladies, to join me in this work on Saturday 5th of October, at Duffy’s Bar. I will be presenting a workshop based on “The Vagina Monologues” so we can bring the V-Day spirit to Leicester. It’s part of this year’s Everybody’s Reading Festival. We will talk about the play – although you don’t need to read it before – I’ll bring my copy! There will be a couple of activities which will show us how our image – the image of women  – is shown and seen publicly. We will discuss how happy we are with these images of us. We will start to build a new network together. This network, which will be part of the V-Day movement, WILL make a difference … to us, and to all who see us.

I painted my nails red today… because my vagina asked me to do so… and I’m proud that I do not ignore this voice any longer! Are you with me? Can’t wait to see you there!

Eeyore by any other name

I was a 3 year old when we moved for the first time... and that was the last time…until I reached nineteen and I moved out from my parents’ place, to start my adult life…which was probably too early…probably too seriously… but never mind…I don’t want to talk about all of this now… I would like to talk about that day, when I was three years old, when we moved.

I hardly remember our first flat. It wasn’t even a one bedroom flat. It was a studio with a small kitchen annex and a bathroom the size of a wardrobe. My parents’ bed was next to the window, with a view of a busy street in the city centre. My crib was on the opposite side, in a quite dark but calm and cosy corner. I do not remember this, I know it from pictures… But I recollect without any problems the corridors in our building, wide, even spacious, with shiny floors and massive windows. It was a fifteen -floor block of apartments. Most of the flats were tiny so we lived almost like a commune, surrounded by our neighbours’ voices, their lives. We were a commune – quite appropriate for the time of communism… but never mind…I don’t want to talk about all of this now… I would like to talk about that day, when I was three years old, when we moved.

We moved to a one bedroom flat, with a kitchen big enough for a table and three stools. My parents slept on a sofa bed in the living room. I had my own room, which was at the same time my bedroom, my study and the room where I practised the piano. For a while the piano lid was my desk as well. I also used to climb on the piano and play with my doll. I fell off once, on to the radiator and I cut my head open and I bled badly… but never mind…

So… I was three years old, when we moved. My parents must have asked someone to look after me, but I still remember carrying a couple of light things, like a lampshade and my huge elephant-mascot which my god-father had given me. But I don’t remember any truck or any problems with the furniture which must have been too big to fit into the old, creaking lift. Or maybe the lift was too small for the furniture… but never mind…

I would like to talk about that day, when I was three and we moved. I was kneeling in the middle of a freshly painted room, purely white, with a lot of boxes and bags around me. My parents had organised our removal well so all our belongings had been put in the right rooms, but obviously higgledy-piggledy… so I knelt in the middle of my new room and looked at my toys through their plastic bags. One wasn’t inside a bag. It was my tired rocking-horse, nick-named The Horse, covered in worn and faded fabric. He was too big to fit into a bag. Or the bag was too small for The Horse.  I was cuddling him as he had lost his long, black tail that day, and so I was trying to cheer him up…that’s all.

The taste of home

Have you ever thought about the taste of your home? No? My home tastes like a cuppa - strong black tea with raspberry syrup. Have you ever drunk black tea with raspberry syrup? No? You need to try this! But make sure that the water is boiled on a gas hob in a traditional kettle. Do not cheat! I tried to cheat and it didn’t work. It has to be a traditional kettle put on a gas hob, or even better over a fire.

My Mum drank this special tea with raspberry syrup even if there was completely nothing on the shelves in the shops during the time of communism. Do not ask how she did it, but her tea and syrup was always there – at home – together with feeling happy, feeling safe and feeling a conviction that I belonged to something, to somewhere… whatever happened outside.

So why was I stupid enough to move out without a traditional kettle, a couple of tea bags and a bottle of my Mum’s special raspberry syrup? Do not ask. I just stupidly did it and I stupidly believed that other tastes would help me to build a new home. But it didn’t happen.