“I woke up to the news” is never the beginning of a happy story. On February 24th, I woke up to the news that Russia invaded Ukraine, beyond Crimea and the Donbas region.
Yes, but what does that mean? What it means is reading my high school friend saying that she and her family woke up to explosions heard in their apartment in Kyiv suburbs. Learning that at 5 o’clock in the morning, she had to yank her scared toddlers out of bed and hide them in the bathtub. Seeing the face of her 6-year-old son, old enough to understand that he and his family are under the threat of death, and not wanting to die.
I track the updates from Ukraine, unable to focus on anything else for weeks. I have to explain my state of mind to the kids, who notice that things are not okay. I show them the map of Ukraine, with the latest strikes identified in blood red.
This is Crimea, where my aunt Ella lives. This is Odesa, where I spent countless summers with my family and went to architecture school. This is Kyiv, the capital, where my friend and her two small children are hiding in the bathtub.
It doesn’t take long for my children to grasp the gist of the situation. Katia, my 10-year-old, puts it this way:
“So, if Russia succeeds, your childhood will be destroyed.”
…
It feels like I have been holding my breath since February 24. A behavior that makes sense underwater, but for how long? My wedding is scheduled for the month after, I’d have to come up for air long enough for that. The thought of postponing the wedding floats before my eyes like a dark patch of seaweed. How can I be happy when my people are suffering? I only have anger and sadness, and I can’t breathe.
Daily calls and messenger check-ins. Are you okay? Do you need anything? How can I help?
Helplessness settles in, despite the frenzy to gather humanitarian aid and money.
I feel paralyzed. My psychologist friend later tells me that it’s normal, it’s just my reaction to trauma. Some run away or fight, I freeze up. And I know that all too well, this time reminds me of my previous “defining life events,” the scopes of which were a lot more personal. The familiar dreams of being swallowed by a giant tsunami wave come back.
But what is MY trauma, compared to that of my friends and family going through this nightmare now? I push it aside, and it sinks heavily to the murky bottom. Something to dig up later.
Among the stream of war news, I come across photos of a frontline wedding near Kyiv. Bride and groom, both wearing camo, bow their heads while other soldiers are holding tactical helmets over their heads. The commentary from the western reporters says something about this gesture protecting the newlyweds from the weather, but I know it to be an old Orthodox wedding tradition. In a church, these would have been crowns held over the bride and groom’s heads. They would have been crowned, at least for the day.
And it strikes me how beautiful and life-affirming love in the time of war is. How this private miracle is also an act of resistance.
Russian warship, go f**k yourself.
I am getting married.
I push myself up to the surface, and inhale.
The wedding is beautiful. I’ve never thought I’d say something like this, the non-conformist and skeptic that I am, but I love it. My wedding gown has a train. A train! The only other time I’ve worn a big dress with a train was when I was 6 or 7, dressed up as The Snow Queen.
I choose a small hairpiece with a sunflower in it and buy a bucket of sunflowers the day before the wedding. We hang a Ukrainian flag in the backyard where the wedding takes place. Small gestures, all of these, and my heart hurts with a strange mixture of happiness and sadness.
Photo by Chris Bogard
No one holds tactical helmets above our heads as we say our vows, only close friends and family watching us and late California sun forming halos around us. Time flies by at warp speed, and here we are, married, flying to New York City.
New York is a plan B. Plan A, dreamt up before the war, was London. For a number of reasons, we adjust, shift gears and go to New York.
And the week in NYC is glorious. I feel guilty, again, having only skimmed the bare minimum of main updates from Ukraine, since a few days before the wedding. And yet, I owe it to myself and my husband to be…present. To celebrate love in the time of war. To breathe.
Which is what we do. We enjoy the unbelievable views from our corner room on the 38th floor. We don’t make plans and we do what we feel like at the moment. We eat like there’s no tomorrow. We breathe in the city, where spring is unfolding before our eyes, until we feel intoxicated by it. We breathe in each other, both comforted and thrilled by the intense sense of belonging.
View from the hotel window - The Manhattan Edition. Special thanks to the blue and yellow at top right.
Time stretches and flows, like a thick lazy river, and for a long moment, I bask in this private miracle of love.
People who have lived through tragedies know how to cherish the moments of happiness.
In the quiet alone minutes, of course, I can hear the low electric hum of worry and anxiety. It didn’t go anywhere, and I know I will be back to face it soon.
Our last day in New York brings warm sunny weather, and we watch as everything at once begins to bloom. I can almost hear Vivaldi’s Spring in the background, which, along with the honking of cars and rattling of the subway, forms the soundtrack to the complex mixture of feelings inside me. I’m sad to leave - this always happens after a good trip - and I look forward to hugging my children and watching them unwrap souvenirs. I feel the presence of war and pain, just behind my springtime honeymoon glow. And I am so happy.
Morning sketch of the Flatiron Building
We land back in Sacramento late at night and then wake up to the news that just a few hours later, Sacramento experienced a mass shooting. And…I don’t even blink. My Ukrainian friends call me to ask if I am okay, and it feels wrong. It feels insignificant compared to their reality. This is America, of course there are mass shootings. Just another day. As Erik puts it later, “it’s easier to get a gun than health insurance.” Anything wrong with this picture?
By this time, I feel like I am standing in front of the dam, which barely holds back the volume of information about Ukraine that I stepped out of just a week or two ago. I lean into it, and that’s enough to get swept away with its force. The discoveries of Bucha happen. Civilians, children are killed indiscriminately. Women and girls, raped and murdered. Full-blown genocide of my people is happening at the same time as spring in New York City.
All of this hits me head-on, the injustice and tragedy of it impossible to fully grasp. Lara, my trusty psychologist friend, advises me not to rush getting back up to speed, she tells me to wait and enjoy the honeymoon glow as long as possible… but it’s too late. My survivor’s guilt doesn’t let me last in the information vacuum.
And in a strange way, this time, as opposed to the beginning of the war, I am ready for it. I can handle it. Resilience, the sustained strength to resist and recover, kicks in.
There is still anger, hurt, and worry, but the learned helplessness and shock are gone. It is time to act. And my act right now is sending financial help. My hometown of Khmelnytskyi has become a pit stop on the way from Eastern Ukraine to Poland. A lot of my family over there is involved in providing temporary housing to refugees and transportation to take them to the border and deliver humanitarian aid. So that effort has become the direction to focus on. And you can help, too. 100% of revenue from my art sales is going directly to Ukraine.
Explosions of ammunition and unstoppable blooming of flowers, brutal death and miraculous newborns, families broken apart by the war and brand new weddings in spite of it. All of this, at the same time, this spring. Cue in Vivaldi.
