The undivided self

I really hope this article will be read by millions! It deserves every minute of your time. Simply wonderful!

I have a memory of how it started.

I was visiting my Dad in New York and my big sister had taken me and a friend to the fairground. I was thirteen years old. It was summer. I was dressed in shorts and t-shirt. When our turn came for the Ferris wheel my friend and I went to take our seats. As the fairground worker placed the safety bar across our laps he raised his eyebrows and nodded towards my lower half. ‘Nice legs’ he said, directed not at me but at the man operating the controls. I remember feeling both strangely flattered with the attention (were these nice legs like the ones I had seen in magazines?) and confused (why was a strange man who barely looked me in the eye commenting on my body?) and in that moment I did for the first time what I would learn to…

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Why do I blog?

I am still slightly insecure about this blogging world. It scares me at times but I love writing and love connecting with people and I guess this blog is my method for reaching out… reaching beyond borders, beyond social grouping and time constraints.

My professional life restricts my publishing rights so I write about daily matters, values and challenges and I find that it’s enough to build bonds with people.

I had different reactions to this blog, words of encouragement and congratulations, surprise and polite or impolite critiques. Some words gave me wings, others tried to snip them. That’s life…

And it’s this life which is worth writing about… because a lot of learning happens during it that we often don’t take any notice of… because daily life is a lot to deal with and a lot to be grateful for… and to me this is fascinating… to me this is worth capturing and documenting… because we are made of small moments… we are made of everyday conversations and exchanges of smiles, winks and grimaces… we are the reflections of it all… so why not to write about it? Why not give it its due status? The daily life that’s made so infamous… because it sometimes overwhelms us with its chores, choices and charades.

I hope that with time you see more stories of people here… of the quiet celebrities of our daily lives… the people that deserve the space because they just simply are there for us and they are doing their jobs with passion… like the greengrocer that I wrote about and the glass decorator that I encountered while travelling through Wales… There are more people that I admire… a young Sardenian man that I knew as a waiter that decided to open his own little restaurant, a Cypriot mum that has been forever dedicated to bring up her sons and daughter, a picture frame maker that I meet in my local park, a professor who’s turning his knowledge into jazz music, and a young and beautiful woman who’s fighting with the not-so-uncommon mentality among young people that it’s not worth to do things for free… this woman is all about volunteering… about being society-oriented about not forgetting, about others that are less fortunate than we are. These are people that I admire. These are my celebrities and I want to write about them.

All too often the stories in the media tear people up. The Roman Colosseum in print. We are forced to be spectators of those cruel games. I refuse to sit there and watch. I had enough. Because humanity is precious and the human spirit should not be slain. We are too good for that. You are too good for that.

The truth is that on a daily basis we are also charmed and inspired… we are challenged and made curious… by events and occurrences, by our friends, family members and acquaintances, why not to pass these feelings forward… why not to write about them?

What are your reasons to write, photograph and share? How do you feel about blogging?

Thank you!

I just wanted to say Thank you to all of you who read, follow, comment on or just pop in to this blog. I feel honoured and quite overwhelmed with your kindness and support. Have a great weekend! Alicja x

Thank you Space Monkey Twins and Making Life an Art for nominating this blog for awards. You’ve been very generous. Thank you. x

Love Stories and a Responsive Reader

I used to write love stories when I was small where I would set myself as one of the protagonists, of course ;) and then hid the notebook in a secret place that would quickly be discovered by a very avid reader of my prose… my younger sister.

I knew she was doing it… rummaging through my drawers and devouring the stories in seconds. I knew that sometimes she was mocking me a little… I knew that there were times when she found my writing all too cheesy and emotional but still… she was reading it… and I felt privileged by her interest in them.

I think I understand now why I felt like that. You see… the moment she giggled or rolled her eyes while reading: “I waited a second and he kissed me gently”, she ratified my work.

The moment her mind travelled out of our country when the story said: “We went together to meet them in Ireland”, she endorsed it.

The moment she found consolation in reading that: “There is always a new beginning… and a better end.”, she validated my work.

The laugh, the mind wandering and the sigh of relief – here’s how the work of writers comes to life. The reader doesn’t need to like it to respond to it.