Good Bye 2018

We are saying goodbye to 2018. It's been such a long and full year.
I had taken a bunch of good resolution and I guess it is time to see how far I've come.
In 2018 I did not get any new degree but I did pass all my exams, leaving me with only my internship, thesis and a couple of papers to hand to get my degree.
I read 48 books, not counting comics and among them were wonderful discoveries for which I must thank my friends. I am still not over Carry on, or Six of Crows. I loved A Darker Shade of Magic. I've discovered with immense pleasure that diversity is now a thing in literature. Thanks Those-Two-Front-Row-Nerds for this.
I read some feminist novels such as the The Power and got to educate myself further. Thanks My-Weird-Sister for this.
This year, I finished the second draft of my novel and it feels like an accomplishment in itself. That story had been haunting me for a while and it now feels like I can finally move on and write something new. Thanks to That-Blond-Gryffindor-Kid for having been such a cheerleader for this project. Hope you'll like it.
I wanted to open my very own Etsy Shop to sell out all those stuff I make but don't know what to do with, which I did, but did not really do anything of it so that will be a work in progress.
I worked on my drawing skills and finished the Inktober, and I am kind of proud of it. I'll try to keep at it. I'd like to really develop my universe a bit.
I finally kicked myself into signing up for a contemporary dance class and I am so glad I did! It takes me out of my confort zone but God, I love it! Thanks That-Quiet-Girl for motivating me without knowing it.
I travelled quite a bit this year. We went to Switzerland several times, to ski or to visit my in-laws.
I went to London with My-Weird-Sister for my birthday, and to Birmingham in the summer to visit That-Girl-I-met-in-Bucarest. (and God I was happy to see her again and test our friendship. She is a treasure.)
I visited Latvia in the summer and Budapest in the winter with My-Lovely-Monster and My-Sister-That-Nerd.
I went to Barcelona as Mrs C, the English Teacher.
I went to Thailand to visit LEAAAAA, and I discovered that travelling by myself wasn't so bad.
I was at my friends' side when they got married and saw couples form and break down. I got closer to some people and farther from others.
I faced my very own nightmare and spent a weekend with my aggressor and still mamaged to live to tell the tale, managed to stand tall, to walk with my head high and enjoy myself. I think that was one of my biggest victories this year. I shall not let this dictate my life anymore. I've proved it to myself.
I got to get out of my confort zone and try new things.

Everything considered, It has been quite an interesting year. hard on my nerves but enlightening.
I've hurt, I've felt hollow and caving in, but I've also felt fuller and more inhabited.
I am slowly getting to know myself and my body.

Some people seem to walk through life, having everything figured out and never doubting anything.
I don't.
I've fallen quite a few times. I've gone through some tragedies. I have been hurt and I have been abused.
And yet I am here.
I don't have everything sorted out, but I am going in the right direction, heading down my own path.

Hairs and feminism

One of the things Budapest is famous for is the bath houses that can be found anywhere in the city.
My best friend, who is travelling with us, is staying at a five-stars hotel that has its own spa, and we decided yesterday to go and relax there.

For someone who's been doing modeling, I am quite prude. I both want to been seen and notice, while being terribly self-conscious.
I am tall but I feel small. I feel too thin and too fat at the same time, never fit enough. My ribs are showing and I am flat chested.
I've always had trouble seeing this body as mine, if that makes any sense. I sometimes look at my feet and wonder when they got so far away. I've tried drawing myself once, and realised that even with a selfie, I don't know what I look like. I look at the picture but it doesn't ring true.
Domesticating my body has been an on going battle for as long as I can remember.
Not that I feel my body hideous. No, no. It's a nice bag of meat. It's just that... It doesn't really feel like it's mine. More like I am getting away with something.
I am both that cute girl in a pretty skirt and that boy in the leather jacket.

That means that I don't pay much attention to my body. I wear make up only when I feel like it.
And I shave on a very irregular basis. Which means that when we arrived at the spa, I realized that I was to walk around in a bathing suit (and not the one I like and chose and feel okay in) and that I was very definitely hairy.
My legs, my armpits, my bikini-line were not the way it is expected for women to be.
And despite all my education about feminism and all the things I know about how hairs are okay and normal and that I wasn't doing anything wrong my not shaving more regularly, I must admit, I felt ashamed. I wanted to recoil in the small cabin and wished the bathrobe would be longer.
I felt... dirty?
But My best friend had invited us here and there was no way I could not go, so I walked on. I kept my bath robe until the last possible moment and I just ran away with it.

I am a feminist and I don't care if a girl is hairy or not, though I confess I made fun of men who were really hairy. And I know I shouldn't feel bad and I should be proud of my body, no matter the way it is. But... I wasn't.
My point here is that... maybe it was okay.
It doesn't make me any less of a feminist to feel uneasy. I guess.

Budapest - Day 1

What happened to us?

I wonder why I am so hard to live with.
When did we stop being best friends and when did we settle for this mockery of a couple. When did we lose each other?
I constantly miss my best friend, miss that person with whom I shared so much. I miss the closeness and the easiness of what we had.
I hate myself for not loving who you have become, for not laughing at your jokes, for not liking your song references, for glaring at you when you make remarks I don't like, for being so thin skinned.
I hate that I feel alone when you are by my side. I hate that I feel empty and cold even when you plant kisses on my forehead.
I miss you. Or I miss what we had, I don't know.
Did I dream those blessed days? did I romanticise it all?

I never wanted to sell you false dreams and fake happiness.
I don't know who this person that you are dating is. I sometimes don't recognize myself. Bitter and distant.

I long for something but I don't know how to get it anymore.

We don't have anything in common anymore. Though I sometimes wonder if we ever did.
There are things I wish we could have shared, but I took too long to start and you went on by yourself and I felt betrayed.
There were things I wanted to do with you, but live got in the way. Family, friends, work, everything.
I can't sit still and you are fine not moving for the entire day.

I want to talk about books with you. I want to talk about movies or TV shows with you. I want to talk about art and history and I want to craft with you. I want to go watch the stars and I want to have impromptu outings to the museum. I want to be surprised and excited, but you want calm and rest.
What is there for us to build together? It scares me.

La Sagrada Familia

  

  

  

I visited La Sagrada Familia today and I fell in love with the colours and the lights. 

Who are you?

Who are you?
I write for myself here, the same way people talk to themselves I guess. It helps clear out my head.
I never wrote in the hope to be read. I've given this address to some people over the years, but no one ever showed any interest in reading it. So who are you?
There seem to be between 4 and 6 people reading this regularly, but for the life of me I can't seem to guess who they are. Not the Sweet monster. He mentionned coming here once in a while. Not my sister, or at least I don't think so.
Then who?
Who
Are
You?
I wish I knew. no one ever brought up my blog in a conversation. Or made a reference to it. There are no comments, no message. So I have no way to know.
So do tell me please. So I'd know. If you've been reading here for a while it means that we know each other.
So tell me. I'd like to know.

Sylvia

I finished the second draft of my novel.
I feel proud and empty.
What should I do?

The small one is the monster. The black one is probably the deadliest, thought they'd rather not know for sure.

They had short hair and a jaw you could sharpen knives on. Everything about them was jet black. their short hair, gloves, boots, even the great coat that bellowed after them. But the most interesting black was their eyes. Not that you could see them behind their clear glasses. They looked grey.
Next to them the girl was vibrating with colours. Fiery red hair woven in a complicated braid, cheeks covered with freckles and slightly reddened by the winter cold. She could have been sixteen or fifty.
- Are you sure this is the right place?" She asked.
- No, but I never am and yet I am never wrong either." Their voice was soft and harsh.
The girl caught a gloved hand and pushed the sleeve up, revealing chalk white skin veined with black.
- Oh, so that's why you are in a mood."
- I am not in a mood. I just wish we didn't have to do that.
- But it's going to be fun!
- No, it's going to be fun for you! For me it's going to be satisfying and quite disgusting, just as it always is."

They climbed up the stairs just when a woman pushed the door open.
- Come on Jewel" she called her dog.
She never saw them but tightened her scarf around her neck as if a cold wind had blown to her face. The air was still.

Three flight of stairs, a door on the left. The floor board creaked heavily under the girl. The one in black made no noise.
They rang the bell.
- I am starving!" She was cheerful tonight. As she always was.
- You always are.
The door opened on a little man. White t-shirt, grey trousers, slippers.
- What's it?
- New neighbours, coming to say hi!" Her words shone like the summer sun. "Can we come in?"
- Sure, sure.
He never stood a chance. But then they never did. He moved and pulled the wooden panel, inviting them in.
They could see the aura around him shift and ooze. They had been right, as always.
He gestured them forward and they walked into the living room. The TV was on but weirdly it had stopped broadcasting anything. The man didn't notice. The room was cramped. Piles of junk, dirty laundry, some plates, some leftovers.
The girl was in the middle of the little place, taking it all in. The stale air, tinged with sweat and smoke. The sounds through the thin walls.
The one in black just sat on the couch and drew out a pack of cigarettes. They looked like they were thirty or a bit less. Probably not more. At least they looked like they had an age.
The man stood there, confused.
- So which flat did you move in?
- Down" they said.
- Like ground floor?
- No, bellow that.
He frowned. Something was wrong, terribly wrong, but he couldn't tell what. His head was fuzzy.
- But there is no flat bellow ground floor.
His voice trailed off as the girl started to take off her scarf. She was pretty. He liked them pretty. She was young. He liked that too.
He never stood a chance.
- Leave me my due." They said, exhaling smoke, their unlit cigarette hanging between their gloved fingers.
- Sure.
And then she opened her mouth. And then she opened her jaw. And she never stopped. It looked like it has no limits.
Blood sprayed but the meat was good. It was warm and it felt spicy on her tongues.
- Don't toy with your food." They said from the couch as she tore the man's left arm. He'd have screamed but she had ripped his lower jaw first so all that came out was a gurgling sound. "We haven't got all night."
She shrugged and took a giant bite.
When the man was about to die, they stood up, as graceful as a cat, or as an ibis. Long legs and fluid movements.
They looked tall and thin.
First they took off their glasses, revealing their impossibly black eyes and store them carefully in some inside pocket of their coat. Then the peeled off their gloves and put them away the same way. Their hands were black. Absolutely and perfectly black, as it they had dipped them in tar, or maybe in the night sky itself.
Then, They plunged both hands and eyes into the man's life, tearing it away, pulling at it hungrily.
The body slumped forward and the black receded from their hands, living only too white skin.
The girl laughed, the bottom half of her face drenched in blood.
- That was good!
They smiled, or at least it looked like what they would have called a smile if they had known what a smile was.
- Yeah, It feels better.

You.

It felt good to see you.
I don't like not talking to you.

Grit.

Grit is to dive straight into work after finishing a challenge.
Grit is to look at the backlog and pull up your sleeves.
Grit is to say good bye early to your friends to get on with whatever need to be done.

To make no excuse and refuse to give in to despair.
To keep your head down and refuse to take the easy way.

To refuse the limitations set by others
To refuse to listen to their voices saying it is impossible.
It is not impossible. It's just hard.

I've comme to realise that This is probably one of the traits I like about myself. This ability to look at difficulties and see a challenge. No matter how daunting the task.
Problems are just mountains to be conquered and countries to explore.

I want my biography to be long and complicated. Full of adventures and projects and things I built and did. Sometimes people say they don't understand how I do all the stuff I do. But there is nothing to wonder about really. I just worked. I toil, I cry, I rant, but I do it anyway.

I feel weak,

I don't know what makes my head buzz like this.
My hands shake. My knees feel weak.
Hunger, tiredness, excitement or stress.
My guts are tied in a knot.
I am restless.

You.

Play with my hair,
Run your fingers on my skin,
Down the collar of my shirt.

Make my heart race.
With your soft lips,
your finger nails.