In that segment of my life, I almost always lay in bed not being able to walk a couple of meters from the door of my apartment. I often watched YouTube and I got interested in photography. When I was still working as a courier, I was thinking about buying a camera, but in the end, I bought an expensive phone with a high-resolution camera. The quality of the images left much to be desired, although the macro photos were pretty good. Now I had done what would have been nice to have done before – I learned better about cameras: sensor size, aperture, photosensitivity, etc. I was thinking about buying a camera, but I had very little money left after buying a laptop. I knew for sure that I wanted a camera with a large sensor, but I did not know which one.
One night I had a dream in which I was told something like: “We will buy you a camera”. I confess that in the morning I had questions for this dream. Firstly, I was a little confused by the fact that Thiaooubians (from whom I thought that dream came) spoke about money – although now I understand perfectly well that each tool can be used for the benefit of others, and money is no exception, even if it is one of the main dangers to humanity that Thao spoke about. Secondly, during that dream, I had a feeling of “parenthood” emanating from the speaker. Of course, if we recall that our Planet of Sorrows is comparable to a kindergarten, then Thiaooubians could well be comparable to the “parents”. But, I think, I felt a little awkward because my mother was in the same room with me, and somewhere in the back of my mind I did not want to “betray” her. It is not easy for me to describe all those feelings in words, but the important thing is that soon in one of the stores there was a discount on a camera with a Micro 4/3 mount. The discount was 30%, and the camera itself was perfect for me. It was compact and lightweight, as were its lenses. The quality of the pictures was very good for my modest needs. I spent ten thousand on it.
In mid-January 2012, a courier brought the camera, and the next day I tried to make my first outing in the long months. Naturally, I took the new camera with me. It was not easy for me to walk, and after a few meters from the entrance door the panic came over me. But if earlier during such moments I immediately wanted to go home fast, remembering well the incident on Boytsovaya Street, during that time I lifted my camera and started taking pictures to refocus my attention from the panic to what was happening on the camera’s monitor display and around me. It helped, and I went a few meters further forward! I reached a small square not far from home, taking new pictures.
The next day I was able to walk a couple of hundred meters further. And the next day, my growing confidence that everything would be fine allowed me to go even further, although I still could not go far, because the thought of how much I would have to go to the house in case something bad would happen would bring me a new panic and I would turn back.
Thus, the camera helped me a lot in my efforts to recover and return to normal life, and I understood the meaning of my previous dream about buying a camera for me.
But, unfortunately, pornography continued to “call” me to return to it in order to “watch” a video with another new beauty. As usual, I hated myself after another such “viewing” of porn videos. But on other days, on the contrary, I wanted to masturbate to porn. I remembered the words of Thao that they could, at will, experience both male and female sexual sensations at the same time. I am not at all surprised by the fact that I managed to force myself to believe that this somehow made masturbation the right thing. And so after many porn sessions I had a dream in which a familiar female voice said with a condescending tone similar to what people say to small children who do not understand simple things: “But these are different things!”
It must be said that this was not the first time that I confused erroneous activity with sex. So, I remember exactly how from my 13 to 18 years of age, I had thoughts that by masturbating I was having sex, which is safe, since for obvious reasons you cannot get infected with sexually transmitted viruses. Now, of course, I realize that I was very wrong when I thought masturbation was sex. The very mechanics of masturbation and sex are completely different, and, therefore, the sensations are also completely different.
Meanwhile, in early March, I again went outside with my camera. I walked a good walk that day, but coming up to the house I could not help but think about the still open window in our house. Mom went outside before me, and when she returned, she usually closed the window that was left open for airing. She really was not at home, and she did not answer her cell phone. I started to worry. First, I called aunt Zina and my father – no one knew where she was. Then I began to seriously worry. Having phoned a couple of hospitals and morgues, I found out that walking along the cemetery, my mother slipped on the icy yellow slope of the sidewalk and broke her thigh neck. This is one of the most serious fractures that a person can get. She was lying in the 29th Bauman Hospital, almost five kilometers from my house. I needed to bring a medical policy so that she could be treated.
Father was drunk at the time, but promised not to drink anymore and sober up to help me and my mother. But it would take several days to sober up for him.
I had not traveled this far for many years, and I was in mild horror. I went outside to take the tram on the first day, but did not dare to get into it. I decided to meditate at home in order to put myself at least somehow in order, and the next day I forced myself to just go into the tram car without thinking too far ahead. I also took with me the camera that helped me deal with panic attacks. It was not easy, but I came to the hospital and visited my mother, bringing the medical policy card, the charging device for her discharged phone, water, and some food.
The next day, we visited her with my father, and then, when I came alone, being already more confident in my well-being, mother’s sister Zina was visiting her.
Doctors performed tests to understand if mom could have had surgery on her leg since she was already sixty-one years old. Lord, sixty-one! I totally forgot, immersed in my inner world and worries, that time continued to go down its course and did not want to wait for anyone.
As a result, she underwent surgery to fasten the bones with osteosynthesis. After some time, mom was released from the hospital, and my father and I took her home by car.
But I need to mention one important dream that I had immediately after I found out that my mother was in the hospital with a very serious fracture, and that it would be my task to help her for the rest of life. Of course, I was ready to help her the best I could, but a clear thought did not leave me that my wish to go to the USA had met its end.
That night I had a dream that answered one of my questions which I often asked in outbursts of anger at my fate and misfortune – Why?
In the dream, me and two other girls were walking from the Sheredar’ River towards our village. We were lightly dressed, as it was a clear and hot summer day. Strange, but the fields on both sides of the road were completely covered with deep water. There was something like a spear in my hand, and as we moved further, I noticed some movement in the water to my right. Then I cried out very loudly: “Beavers!!!” – to warn people of imminent danger. I think that I got scared and ran away, leaving those two girls behind even though the spear hinted that I had to protect those people. While I was running back to the river one of the huge beavers, about 3 to 4 meters in length, and about one and a half meters in height, jumped out of the water, and as its huge mouth opened, getting closer and closer to my head, completely absorbing it, the picture stopped, and a message came from Thao saying that this was the reason why my mother broke her leg. I left her then, and now I need to be with her and help her.
There are some interesting moments from my life related to this dream.
One is that a very long time ago, when I was a little child, my mom and dad went to the village. It was spring, and the snow had already melted. We went to the river Sheredar’, and we were met by exactly the same picture as in my dream – the water completely hid fields underneath on either side of the road. Only the sky was cloudy and the air was cool. Having come to the river, I entertained myself by throwing sticks and pebbles into small funnels on the water, which formed as if spontaneously in different parts of the flooded field.
Another synchronicity lies in that my mother once mentioned that she saw stumps and trees nibbled by beavers. She said she was a little afraid of them because they had such sharp teeth. Then her fear of beavers seemed a little funny to me…
Then I found out that in North America there really were huge beavers over 12 000 years ago.[5] Additionally, I found several Native American legends about giant beavers attacking people, but that webpage is no longer available.
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