This flag had been flying next to our federal MP’s office since February 2022. I may disagree with him on thousand different things, but I am deeply grateful that he keeps the flag up for over two years now. I am also grateful that he doesn’t change it for a new flag. I hope it stays up until the war is over, until the victory.

I’ve been reading numbers on the news: numbers of drones, numbers of missiles, numbers of destroyed homes, numbers of people killed in a concert hall by, I believe, their own government. I have seen other people writing the same thing. The two number that stuck with me: the number of electoral fraud in this year’s russian election is believed to be between 22 and 40 million votes; there have been over 39 000 air raid alerts in Ukraine since the beginning of the full-scale invasion. I am trying to understand this number. I am dividing 39 000 by 800 days, the results comes up to almost 50, then I am dividing it by 24 hours and get over two an hour. I know this math does not reflect how things happen in reality, but still – try to imagine that for over two years twice an hour your life, your sleep, your daily activities, your laughter, conversations with friends, reading bed time stories to your kids, making love, walking your dog in the park, is punctuated by wailing, howling siren announcing that someone is trying to kill you. Imagine living in this reality, raising kids, making babies, writing poetry, volunteering, pouring lattes, doing yoga, shopping. Imagine being scared. Imagine not being scared. Imagine getting used to being scared, so that even fear becomes familiar and routine and only hope and rage remain searing. One never get used to hope.

I know that if I wrote this on social media, someone would reply, or think “but what about…” Compassion has become a zero-sum game. So, I no longer say anything on social media. I am scared and I am losing hope.

Tonight, my youngest was too tired to settle down. He refused to go to bed or accept any help. Instead, he sat in his bed and cried with a force of desperation of an overwrought five-year old. I sat in his bed next to him. When he finally finished crying, he settled down on his pillow and I stroke his cheek until he fell asleep. I wish someone was sitting on a bed next to me, because I feel very tired and scared and guilty. I am sorry that I can’t protect you. I am sorry you have to spend the nights, sometimes entire nights in the bathroom or in the corridor, hoping that this time the building will not collapse on you. I am sorry you have to walk your elderly parents down to the bomb shelter, finding way with the flashlight of your phone, because there is no electricity and the elevators don’t work. I am sorry you have to build shelters in the schools. Does my old school have a shelter? I am sorry I don’t know all that. Not in the way you know. I am sorry, so so sorry.