The Entering

Let Me Explain

     I'm cooking dinner in my apartment in Chicago. It's a simple meal of pasta, garlic, and butter. Simple food comforting to the soul. I live as near to Lake Michigan as one can get without being on a boat. Watching the light change, day turns twilight. Such beauty in this endless view of water and hidden horizon, my heart stirs. There is restlessness at my center and I allow time for pause. You know that feeling you can have when something's just about to happen? A rush of adrenalin, an inner push as if someone's inside you moving you forward. They're saying, "Come on, come on. It's time." I'm feeling that now.

The mind wanders to past and family relations. Previous attempts, fragmented uncertainties. Sitting here in the in-between time of an unusually warm first day of autumn, my mind wanders to another time. Days filled with wonder and uncertainty. Joy and sadness all mixed together. Frowning to myself, what makes me think my life is any different than another? What makes my story any different? I am in a country, far from home and doing my best to land, inside myself.

Reminiscing about Sasha and Poppa, my grandparents that became my parents, who raised me and my real home across the Atlantic, in Bosnia. A yearning, a sadness, a longing. All these thoughts, rushing, pouring over and through me.

      The mind says, "Eat Katya, eat." I've forgotten the parmesan cheese and return to the kitchen to retrieve it. An older style refrigerator, split one third at the top for the freezer and the lower two thirds for the few foods I have; a half gallon of milk, pound of butter, an unopened bottle of red wine given to me as a house warming and last night's left overs. Reaching for the container of fresh grated cheese, I find myself holding a small glass brown bottle and in it, small white pellets. Familiar to me as a homeopathic remedy. And again, here I go. Here I am. Where am I? I don't have time to think about why I've shifted time/place when I can't even say where I am.

      I'm not frightened, not just yet anyhow. Quickly plant myself/transition/settle as best I know how. I don't know how long I will be here. This isn't the first time I've found myself in a new place/surroundings. Alright then, I'll just stay and watch, get a sense of things. Where I might be. All the while, feeling my physical form get grounded. I can't worry about, right now, what triggered me and brought me to this place. Although not the first time, I'm always taken off guard, and in some ways, it feels like the first time.

Unnerving.
My heart racing a little bit too fast, my palms sweaty despite the obvious cold.
Anxious. Looking down at my clothing; a gray woolen heavy coat. Winter. A bright blue cashmere scarf wrapped around my neck. My lips turn up. I'm still me with my quirky ways. In winter I always have my neck covered for warmth. My shoes are worn, black leather.

     The store is pleasing and cozy warm. It feels old and "worldly" with its pendant shaped light fixtures hanging from a copper ceiling with ornate and intricate swirls and dance design and I can hardly look away for its beauty. An elderly woman walks in bringing with her a rush of cold air. She appears European, a wool floral designed scarf covers her head, tightly tied under the chin. She passes me and the waft of baked goods stays behind filling my nostrils. A bright red overcoat hides a body that walks with a steady stride and head held high as she moves towards the counter.

     Where am I? I spy the woman speaking to the young man behind the counter, bending my ear to have a better listen. Another language, German? The man is beautiful, clean faced, mid to late twenties, blue eyes piercing, a head of black wavy curls cropped short on the sides. He's wearing all black; long sleeved shirt and slacks with an expensive soft looking buttoned down sweater. She reaches out her hand to his and he welcomes it with care and tenderness into his long, feminine fingers that could be playing Chopin on piano.

     The two sense me staring, and still holding hands, they look my way and smile with friendly eyes. The woman, grandmotherly, holds my gaze, lowers her chin with a nod. As if she knows. Something. Me? I cannot look away, taken in. My heart flushes blue, feels so intimate, this looking. Whatever anxiety I was feeling has disappeared and been replaced with wondering. She seems somehow familiar and I smile shyly in return.