Once upon a time

Nika

Nika sat on the windowsill, spinning a top. The kids were at school, and her husband was at work. She played with the top and scolded herself for wasting time so ineffectually. Her mind was filled with thousands of thoughts, sometimes forming poems. Nika never wrote them down. She felt like Alice slowly falling down the rabbit hole of her own procrastination, studying the patterns on the curtains. She set a timer, each time giving herself a reprieve. Then she would finally get up and dive into millions of tasks, still berating herself.

After lunch, the children would return, and they would do something together - go for a walk or just chat. Nika forbade herself from feeling anything other than the joy of existence. She had everything for that. “Don’t anger God,” she would hear in her head, and feel ashamed.

Then, one day, the accumulated sadness became unbearable and overwhelming, so she had to confide in her husband and best friend. Her journey was long - not all medications worked, and not all therapists were helpful; often, she wanted to give up. But it was a path of emotions, real emotions, all of them, except for the joy of existence. Now, Nika sometimes wakes up in a vanilla mood, sometimes in a strawberry mood, and sometimes in a gray, heavy one. “That’s just the kind of day it is,” she tells herself, and no longer scolds herself. Days can be different, she says, and sometimes weeks, months, and years intertwine into a beautiful pattern of existence.