History Books & Hungry Animals

 I'm sitting in a coffee shop, surrounded by Albanians. I live in East Oxford, and on a Sunday this seems to be where every Albanian in the vicinity collects together! 

For the eight years I was with my ex partner, this was a routine environment. In the years afterwards I avoided being around the Albanian chatter that had become so familiar and
that I largely understood. It was a time of healing, rather than any rejection of race or culture. I feel lucky to have had the opportunity to learn about a country and community of people that I probably otherwise wouldn't be aware of. I spent summers rattling across the countryside of Eastern Europe in a falling apart van, meeting some of the most extraordinary people I've come across. I certainly wouldn't have tried some of the foods I was given at weddings there!

I sit comfortably and anonymously now in a sunlit corner of a generic coffee shop in Oxford. I can absorb the humming of a language I once knew with no sadness or resentment. I feel grateful for my experiences. If I hadn't been present for them then this blog and my way of writing most probably wouldn't exist. I have an enormous mug of green tea to one side of me, a good friend of mine to the other, and I'm about to head off to aerial rehearsals at the ballet st. What more could I have dreamt of back then?

Time certainly allows space for us to find perspective. It can provide opportunities that move us further away from the experiences we have become jarred by. But clocks can never surpass the power of conscious choice. The choice to keep turning the pages of your life, instead of staying stuck in the margins of one chapter. Or indeed destroying the chapters and characters that have gone before. 

We all have our histories. Our unfinished arguments. Our frustrating last conversations. We share in our wanting to put that last word in, or indeed to erase the last words said. They seem to be  never ending stories. But they are important pieces of our lives that feed the hungry animal of our existences. They deserve recognition. We all do. 

The acceptance of my history came not in one moment but in many; through the course of living out the future days of my life. There was no cinematic 'eureka' moment. True growth was borne from the moments in which I chose to be so happy that a little bit of what I had been gripping on to fell from my distracted hands. I moved on in the times when I stood up for myself a little more than I used to. And especially in the times I chose to dance, write, or create. These were the true moments of healing, more than any I tried to force from any yoga mat or major life success. 

And then, sometimes, you find yourself sitting in a coffee shop surrounded by your past. And realising you are perfectly comfortable in your very own self created present. 

No one said letting go would be easy. But they also never said how wonderful it would feel to free yourself from what holds you back. 

All my love to you, for your present Sunday and future days.

H E L E N  V I C T O R I A  
#liberté