The demon and the burnt king

I remember that I was walking in the woods during the day, with snow dusting my shoulders. Now, it was the kind of forest where the trees are all old and watchful – a forest all of us will walk through one day, and some more than once, too, all the children, and all the men, and all of the women who are restless.

I walked by a castle that had been burned to the ground long before I was born. A single, singed banner hung from its tower. The castle was gutted from the inside, so damaged in places that the stone had turned to spiderweb. It stood only as a reminder of how nothing remains on the earth – how not everything may die, but everything may change.

I was walking away, when a roar startled me. Like a video game easter egg, there was a burnt throne in the courtyard I had missed. A burnt king rose from the throne – almost offended at my desire to walk on by as if he didn’t matter.

There was one second of fear, and the next second the demon inside me took over, squinting good-naturedly at the bright white snow, drunk on the sliding sound the sheath made, happy to be alive.

Weekly writing round-up, featuring Pussy Riot, horror and my favorite bad joke in Russian

“Abandon hope all ye who enter here.” You know what pisses me off the most about the courts? It’s the denial that surrounds them. President PM Medvedev can do a serious interview with a serious UK publication, and wave off all concerns about Pussy Riot by pointing out that the court should decide. This is coming from a lawyer!!! Every Russian lawyer knows what these courts are actually like. Come on. Of course, these are not the arbitration courts we are talking about here. Those function pretty decently, actually. And that’s an important distinction to make. See, you can have normal courts in Russia – if the will is there.

I go and have breakfast with a beautiful woman, and we talk masochism. In a horror movie context. I think it’s true that Russian audiences are more sophisticated when it comes to horror/thrillers. Remember “Hostel”? Every single Russian person I’ve spoken to about it since moving here will say something like, “That movie. It is so immature.” Teenage boys included.

Also, because of my birthday I wrote about what it’s like to be a woman zeroing in on her 30s in Russia. It’s not bad, actually. Especially after you have a kid. You’ve fulfilled your duty, you can just dick around (if you manage to get past the gendered terminology).

I’m 28

I slept for about three hours, because Lev had what appeared to be food poisoning. I put out the paper today and bought cherries for the office. My colleagues repaid me with flowers and kisses – and a paper that came out on time – which was very generous of them. Somehow, my body is still going – even though I’m feeling a bit like the Terminator must have felt towards the end of “Judgment Day.” Fellow parents, you know how I feel.

It’s always best when your birthday flowers are given to you by a handsome man.

When I was celebrating my 27th, Lev was just a little over a week old – and I was still shell-shocked. Alexei and I had drinks and ice cream in a dark playground, while Lev slept in his basket. I wasn’t entirely sure how I was ever going to function as an adult person again – having a small child instantly reduced me to being a small child.

Slowly but surely, life began to come together again. But the patterns were all different. The world, when I came back to it, was there – but changed. The world was a bar of chocolate, melting in Moscow’s summer heat in the bottom of your bag, cooling off into a strange new shape by midnight.

Lev is almost walking now. He’s very tall for his age – so it’s harder for him than for other one-year-olds, or so I’m told. My husband is a bona fide film director. And as for me – I really miss sleep.

No, there’s no “Batman franchise curse”

There’s just tragic coincidences – and one deranged fucker who shot people in a theater (and the deranged fucker even looks like Kevin from “We Need To Talk About Kevin,” based on the photo released to the press at this time).

But I do think that the franchise is associated with a lot of darkness in the popular imagination, and I think that’s going to continue. The darkness is self-perpetuating, at this point.