Category Archives: Personal Essays

The gloomy Sunday that wasn’t

These waning days of July have been bad. The weather is maddening – in a city that gets so little heat and light, people require a proper summer. When summer peters out a month and a half early, as if the quotas on warmth have been reduced like the quotas on foreigners, you don’t knowContinue reading “The gloomy Sunday that wasn’t”

On the day that I enter the last year of my 20s…

I remind myself that there are ways to be old and awesome: I’m also very, very grateful. I’m grateful for the love I’ve experienced over these years, and the pain, and the boredom (like Eddie Izzard says, you can’t be afraid and bored at the same time). I’m grateful to my family, my colleagues, stereotypicalContinue reading “On the day that I enter the last year of my 20s…”

The last of the binkie wars

I found this month-old gif (originally a cine via Cinemagram) of mine on my phone today: That was the day before we moved, leaving Novogireyevo for the older and stranger neighborhood of Kuzminki, also in eastern Moscow. Grandma had introduced Lev to the binkie when he was a few weeks old (without asking my permission,Continue reading “The last of the binkie wars”

And the cars, and the bars, my Carmen

I told the hostess I needed a nice table to work at, and I almost meant it. Almost. But what I really needed was to just watch the Skytrain pass overhead, suck on a cocktail straw, and read Caitlin Moran. I needed to remember myself, and so I got to remembering. What it feels likeContinue reading “And the cars, and the bars, my Carmen”