versant versatility

I am at the window. holding my little cat back - we are both enjoying the night air, it smells like spring, but she is enjoying it much more lively than me. for her, a housecat - this world just starts to exist, it is new, it has so many smells!


I wonder, how does she see it, our world? for sure, different from me. maybe, the same way as I see this world different from you - and you see it different from them... we live a reality which Einstein cursed to relativity - and it has not changed since then.
each word has thousands of meanings even in one language, what to say about views? decisions? thoughts?
how can you be sure that your opponent will understand you exactly as you meant it? it happens very very rare...
most of the discussions, fights, break-ups, wars are caused only by misunderstanding each other.
I am not an exception. and, perhaps, if I was wiser, better, less egoistic and less impulsive - I could have avoided so many disasters in my life... 
but I am not. I am just as you are - not better not worse, lost in each and every meaning, trying to understand what's real and what's false, trying to make understand my truth, which - in the end - might be only true for me...


well, I am looking at the roof out of the window - how the fat transparent icicles break down and slide and fall onto the street. like my past, that is breaking off - just be careful that it does not pinch you on the head!
I am not proud of many things... but today I finally found an icicle-proof umbrella for my past, an answer to the most common, most desperate and therefore most boring question 'what to do?'


who are we to judge? how can I judge anything - everything has a right to exist. just as me. the only catastrophes start when this right is being taken away from someone...


I am not proud of many things... but I found a way to make it up. not to my past but to myself.
because the endless versatility of this world makes me - good and bad, devotional and egoistic, timid and arrogant, serene and impatient, cruel and forgiving. and nothing has changed - and I haven't changed. it is just very hard to admit and stand up to both sides of you - not only the one you want to see. and then you can start changing. if you can see it now, you will not be afraid of being everything.


and it makes me feel happy.

all I want for Christmas...

first of all - thank you, guys.
for your appreciation of my photography and my writing, and for those non-facebook comments - which I actually value the most. 
I don't really think much about the showing-off status bars etc. I also do not really fancy wall-to-wall artificial posts. those of you who know me best, know how much I actually hate the 'new-style' emoticons - nothing goes deeper to the heart than a good old-fashioned smiley )) right? so - special thanks and my admiration to those who avoid the facebook-exhibitionism and stay non-virtually human.


it's russian Christmas today... and I feel oddly connected with my home country - although it is for that country that Christmas was not allowed to be celebrated for more than 70 years and we almost lost all our roots... I don't know any single old-russian Christmas tradition, I don't have even a memory of those - how could I, me, who was even baptized secretly, in a russian 'banya' of the priest, at night. we never had Christmas. but somehow - not on the 24th of December, but on the 6th of January - it is here now, in my heart.


It's Christmas Eve and I should probably make a wish - the One, the True and Most Wistful wish I have. oh how easy it sounds - and how difficult to choose! the funny thing is - the older you are, the harder it gets to choose your only wish, remember how simple it was as a child? 'A doll!' 'A tractor!' well, in this age it probably will be 'A mobile!' 'An iPad!'...
and yet, I have a line in my mind speaking from my heart, that goes:
"all I want for Christmas is... the New Year's Day."


is it because I was always very impatient? or is it because I am so tired of 2010 and its surprises wrenching my soul and my heart?
or is it because I am curious? so curious as I was and always will be - as a girl, of course, and, of course, as a scientist! - to see what's so new about this New Year??
just because everything is always moving before me, like that Louvre here. eternal and modern. wise and silly. still and - at the same time - faster than the camera's eye.


they say, you get older when you get cautious. they say, you get wiser when you get older.
I say - you wish!! well, it's true. at least, I do. 
to get cautious, to get wiser and yet - to stay young. to be able to reach for the stars... being wise enough to thank the Earth we're staying on.


because the thing is: sometimes the One and Only wish we reach for in the sky - is actually just a step away... holding us by the hand... and the true wisdom is, when you finally grasp that.
I wish us all that moment before it could be too late.


or shall I just say - Happy New Year!

wannabe a 'wannabe'?

so isn't it right to leave a party when it just started to be great? isn't it right to cover the signs of loneliness with a pretty white coat of cheerfulness?
just like the snow in winter covers dirt...


I guess, now we all have to face the fact of that 'evergreen' upcoming question of the 'new-year's-resolutions' once again... well - it's the end of december, right? see.
everyone is eager - to change, to evolve, to do things differently now... and all that - of course, from the very beginning of the poor first of January. probably, the day known for the majority of suicides.


the New Year has something very fascinating in it - it feels like a white sheet of paper, tempting to forget all the slip-ups of the past, pretending they were never there.
well, 'pretending' is actually the key word here...


did you ever wonder if we maybe constantly act our lives up? 
why do we do things that way and not this? isn't that because we're expected to do so?
we think about things we want to change next, things to make us better... but - how is this 'better', exactly?
how do we know whether what we want to do is the right thing to do? 
how can we be sure what is wrong and what's better? 
are we really sure about what WE want to be? and more important - is that really OUR choice?


you want to be fitter - why? is that really the case that you wake up in the morning and feel better thinking of the gym? is the body cult really YOUR cult? are you crazy about your thighs, for example? or your biceps? or, let's say - do you want to be?!


you want to have more friends - why? because you feel threatened by someone who has more than 400 friends on facebook?! but did you ever ask yourself the question - is a facebook-friend the real world? isn't that just a way of pretending?
after all, can 400 facebook-friends ever be there for you when you're devastated and puke into the toilet? won't you want a real person to hold your hair?!


you want to quit smoking - why? is that because they tell you how bad it hurts your body, damages your lung, pollutes your breath etc etc... or - is it because it really does not satisfy YOU anymore?


relationships are a constant chain of events - 'what you want' versus 'what the other person wants'. but - do you want to change it because YOU really want to change it or because it's what you want to be in the other person's eyes? 
isn't the pressure of the 'wannabe' killing your 'Want To Be'???...
and, anyway - what do you want to be? isn't BEING already enough? after all, that is exactly what Shakespeare was not sure about at all...


if I ask a person 'are you really happy with the way you are?', with the few lucky exceptions, the majority will find lots and lots of things they're not satisfied with. but there are different ways to deal with that - some are going into their shell and hiding the 'dirt' under the snow. 
and others seek attention in every way possible - just to prove they're worth something, just to get any acknowledgement at all... which is turned and recognized as egoism, in the end.
so - why can't we just stand still for a moment and acknowledge ourselves, just the way we are? so there is no need to tell the outer world what we 'wanna-be'?..


I am standing at the window after two weeks of non-smoking. just to test - what is it all about? and just like that - I discover that the first half of the cigarette is what I was missing. 
but the second half - is what I do not want to be. so I quit. that is why - because that is MY choice. and I don't need the New Year's Eve to start with...
after all, they say 'actions, not words'.


so - do you Want To Be? 
or are you a 'Wannabe'?


location: tram no.13, to Dresden-Neustadt. time: pretty late, I guess after midnight. 
in Germany they call it "Adventszeit". in Russia, we say it's the "Upcoming New Year".
it's coming. 
and I guess, I don't wanna be a 'Wannabe'.

to have and have not

confronted with an infinite desire to smoke and - careless! an awful, careless oversight! - having a fresh pack just over here in the kitchen... drawing circles around it... concentrating on the chewing gum... 
i am asking myself - what the hell is it all about?
it cannot simply be the craving of my body to have nicotine in the system - since it is nowadays a widely known fact, that the addiction of the body is gone after 3 days... 
well. i guess it is true - it is simply all just about the habit. 


the mankind is constantly fighting against 'bad' feelings - anger, jealousy, envy, ignorance etc etc... fully ignoring the most powerful emotion which is ruling our each step and does never let it go. the habit. 
well, don't you agree? what is the most frightening thing for everyone? something one is unfamiliar with, something yet unknown, something which has never been experienced before. whereas things we have been experiencing all along - become normal. even if they were quite inconvenient and irrational at the beginning - once we get used to them, we do not notice the abnormalities anymore... and that is with every category in life, isn't it? here just the example of smoking... 
but what about jobs? enthusiasm in the beginning, routine in the end... however - familiar routine, something we won't be willing or even afraid to change.
and what is with our eating habits? our apartments? cities? home countries? 
and... relationships?... 


if you had something... someone. and lost it, and with it - all the things that went along with this relationship, with this person, with this way of life... you're facing new land again, and haven't got a slightest clue about it! and the old doors are closed, you cannot enter anymore, although they're just there - come and get it, like the pack of my cigarettes in the kitchen drawer. 
but if you can't get it - you need to find a substitute, another style of life, different habits, another person... which is difficult, because you know how to handle the old habit, but it's hard to imagine something absolutely new! it's tough for everyone... so... isn't that what it is all about in a break-up? 
and then, to give up a habit - what's the best strategy to go? to shut down step by step? well, of course not. don't you remember? you slam the doors, you throw out the cigarettes, you delete the phone number, you rip old pictures apart...
unhealthy? of course... human? most certainly.


so, in the end, how do you know for sure whether you really gave up the old habit and are free from your addiction? 
i'll say, it's when you smell the smoke - and don't want to follow the direction it's coming from. when you hear the familiar name (even if that's not the same person at all...) and don't shiver anymore. 
when you see an old picture - and you smile. instead of crying. and can enjoy the things for what they are - not because you are used to them, but because you want to.


location: Dresden-Neustadt. time: quite late, thank god! (the forth day without)
and not so cold anymore...

past perfect

things happen for a reason, they say... how i hate such sentences! they are sooo infinitely right, but do not help you with anything, being that way - overwhelming, righteous, perfect, clean. 
you will never grasp the meaning of such a philosophical cliché, unless something happens in your life, which would make you scream one of those exact axioms out loud... then you get it. on your own.


things happen.


today i searched my apartment for the very last time, most thoroughly i ever could - in order to find three books i have written during some of the past years. one of them was my diary. two of them contained all of my poems. called "Four Years of Solitude". i was on the way to get them published, but typed in only a part - well, i guess, the other part is very much lost now...
this made me absolutely sad at first, desperate even. until i had one of those conversations that sometimes happen in life - out of the blue, with people you hardly know, or have known very good years ago and lost track of them, but then met occasionally... people who knew you very good at some point. and somehow, those conversations let you feel like you are talking with your own past, your undeleted memories...
now, some words which were said along, hit me and got stuck: 'i try not to look back and focus on the things that happen around me, things that are to come. this way, i miss a lot, but it helps me going and i don't get confused.'
i've heard these words probably a zillion times before... and yet, now they got stuck for some reason. maybe, because loosing a good portion of my past along with my bookds finally will set me on the way forward. not looking back. helping me going.


and about the memories... well, it's good to miss things once in a while. 
after all - occasionally you'll meet someone on your way again who will remind you on them...


location: Zeiss META confocal microscope station, Max-Planck-Institute, my alma mater and sometimes second home, the place that gave me my workaholism along with my PhD. time: late evening, going home.
without looking back...

serenity versus serendipity

staying home while being sick has one great plus - you get to think a lot... now, while realizing that my first post here did sound a bit of an overreaction to a normal daily life routine - we're adults now, remember? - i'm trying to react differently. 
so - while in kindergarden that icicle was a major trouble of the day causing damaged eyebrows and many unshed tears, the 'icicles' you get on your head in your adult life - not so deadly anymore!


which brings me to the latest thought inspired by a talk i remembered hearing at the last AmericanSocietyOfCellBiology in San Diego last year... i believe it was held by Peter Walter - an amazing scientist and a great philosopher of our days. for the first time i my life i was fascinated by the easiness one explained how science works...
he used the term 'serendipity' - the major thing you recognize you need and cannot get on your own by studying hard and working your ass off. wikipedia - the modern shrine of wisdom besides the Chinese fortune cookies! - explains it as 'a propensity for making fortunate discoveries while looking for something unrelated' 
use it as you wish - in the daily life or science. 
i just hope i will find my serendipity. just because my serenity is regained by now...


6th of december. location: same. time: early afternoon, just right for a cup of coffee. without cigarettes.

old year's new resolutions

hey, who hasn't ever shut down an icicle as a kid?! 

the memory of my first one just hit me - russian (rather soviet i'd say, at that time...) kindergarden, me with some boy, red old roof covered with snow and ice beginning to melt down, us with a long branch hitting on the icicles cause we wanted to test whether they still taste the same as ice cream... then one of them flew down and hit me on my eyebrow.

since then i have this little scar covered by the eyebrow hairs... but if you supposedly would shave them off - awful! interesting how'd it look though... - you would see it, white and clear, a memory of that childhood day when this boy came with me to the school med room to stay with me while i wasn't crying waiting for the disinfectant iodine to burn away...

i just recollected this memory cause outside of my kitchen window one of the icicles fell down when i crushed the window close. i was furious - at myself - cause i just smoked one, which i wasn't supposed to do, since its my fourth day of quitting and i was doing pretty good until this morning. i really don't know what's with these mornings lately - i get all the bad messages and news very early - supposedly so that they could REALLY spoil the day good. 

anyway, realizing my ex-best friend talking shit about me to my ex-boyfriend behind my back and trying to bond with him so to get closer to using his photo gear for free isn't exactly the thrill you want to wake up with. 

and since i couldn't - or, rather, didn't want to, cause we agreed on handling things different this time! - ring my husband and moan to make me feel better... a cigarette was a gentle reminder how else you could dissolve your emotional baggage for a while.

interesting thought here - why the first half of the cigarette always feels awesome and the next just shuts you down into depression?! does that really have something to do with your blood pressure? i'm a biologist, i should - in theory - know...

it's 6th of december, "Nikolaus-Tag" in germany. location: dresden-neustadt (which is - honestly! - not the same as the rest of the city, vibrant and with a feeling you actually live among other people...). time: morning. state: sick but with a strong NEW RESOLUTION for the rest of this old year. 

resume: strong will - keep it going ))