banners

Friday, April 18, 2014

DON'T LET THE EASTER BUNNY HOP IN WITH A BASKET OF DARK AGES

It's Good Friday, my loyal Students. This is not going to be a rock blog...it is going to be very personal . If you want to miss class and headbang, it is all cool with me! If not, you can have a backstage pass to a private Cavalera moment...Easter in Serbia!

2004, what a glorious year and a stressful year! We had a new grandson, little Moses. It was the circle of Life and each time I gazed into his eyes I searched for that little drop of "me" that was meshed with his entire being. Amazing that you can sprinkle yourself here and there and and never quite leave this Earth...He was happy and fat..all the requirements for a wee one!
Me and Max

Max and Moses
There was a dark side and it attached itself to Max... It took my restful sleep away, my nerves were on the edge hanging on like someone clinging to the side of a cliff after slipping... My recruits had travelled with us, my Dad, Zyon and Fatty, our longtime friend. No way could I deal with this situation alone! Max was loosing it..captured in the grip of a fist so tight, it would not let go. I was trying to keep working and lasso Max's demons. My strength was sapping away....It was supposed to be Easter...but I couldn't see the sun or the hope, nothing but anxiety.
Me, Christina, Fatty, and Dad
Born into a Russian Orthodox family, raised quite in the Russian tradition, I have a strong sense of family, religion, hospitality and cooking, hard work, and yes superstitions that have travelled through time in our family. There is a desire in me to preserve our roots, our history...that is what truly makes us who we are. If you understand your roots, you know yourself.
cemetery in Kraljevo
We decided to do a bit of traveling and I had a mission. Mom had told me about a Russian General who had escaped to Yugoslavia after the Russian Revolution. He was living in secret, hiding in a tiny room. I suggested we all travel to Kraljevo; a city not too far from Belgrade. It would get us out of the house and hopefully take our mind off the Darkness and occupy us with some fun...it was like looking for pirate treasure!

We went to the cemetery first, thinking we could find a grave, but the cemetery was so vast and we couldn't read Cyrillic, no luck but fun. We went in the city for a coffee and a woman who walked up to chat actually knew the story and where the General had once lived. It was in a small room above a shop, just like Mom said. This could change Russian history books, which say the General died in Bulgaria. We were all excited, feeling like we had connected the dots.

Back in Belgrade, the Darkness followed us and I was running here and there, stressing and tense. I sent the boys to a game of basketball, but it only made matters worse...If I could just push that shizzle over the cliff? I couldn't think, it was suffocating me, ruining the day and stealing my sleep.
Fatty and Z playing basketball
I decided to visit the Russian Church. In my quest for my ancestry, I realized that my Grandmother had visited the same church, many many decades before me. Did she think her granddaughter would walk through the same doorway, pray at the same icon? I think not.

I had a short meeting with the priest who pointed me in the right direction. Giving my soul and my spirit a boost, I regained my strength. I was able to focus and see the horizon. I just had to cross the damn bog, wade through the deepest of muck, raise a sword against the evil troll of addiction. I knew I could do it.

I went to our home, in Belgrade, and whooped up an Easter feast, colored eggs and got the Tribe moving. Max was in a heavy spiral, that would take all my energy to contain, but I knew one day it would stop. Zyon and Fatty gave me a routine, a place to step away from the frontline. Occupying my time, every second of the day, in between constant damage control and multi-tasking would get me through this.

Zyon

I never had a clue. I couldn't see the future. No hope, no fear began to have meaning to me. I see it all as I look back through the ages of my life...This was the beginning of the DARK AGES...

Class dismissed.......