Babul'

This is my grand-mother, Ljatifa Dzhangirovna Bykhovskaja, in 1964, ten years before my birth. She came from Azerbajdzhan. She died of cancer in 1999. Her birthday was on 28 February. I love her very much.

Last night I dreamt of my grand-mother. She was standing in her kitchen in Moscow preparing food, the sun was streaming in through the yellow curtains. The window was open and I could hear the birds outside. There was nothing special about this scene, apart from her being alive. She looked younger than in the last years of her life, more like the person I'd known as a child. She was also very small, it was one of the things I found most remarkable about her in the dream, her smallness. Yet she was substantial too. Solid. Warm and round. She turned away from the stove and smiled at me. She reached out her arms and we embraced. And love came pouring out of her, straight into me. Incredible love, inexhaustible love, warmth, trust, power, waves and waves of it, she was a sun, love was shining from her, she was the source of life, and she was sharing it with me.

I felt blessed. Seen. Loved. That feeling is with me still.

I know that place is inside me. The place where all the women whose blood runs in mine have left their trace, their strength, their love. For me to draw on. Whenever I need to.

I want to thank all of you who have responded to yesterday's post, here or elsewhere. It is through you that my grand-mother's love shines on me today.