The Little One Who Followed Me Into The Skies

The day I brought Nova home - so tiny in her carrier - I was smitten. When we met at the shelter she came straight to me and settled herself against my chest and didn’t want to let go. I knew I had been chosen and something special had happened - that we had a rare connection that had the power to brighten one’s world, even in the darkest of times. Sadly, for both of us, there were dark times ahead. Very dark times.

I did my best to protect her, to keep her away from the worst of it, but as time passed, all I could do was try my hardest to escape. And so I wrote. I wrote The Lost Valor of Love driven by the desperate hope I might get a lucrative book deal that would give me the agency to escape my domestic situation where I was kept in a very small space to exist within extreme boundaries of isolation and coercive control.

There was a lot of interest in the book I put up on Wattpad who took me in as one of their talented writers and fielded interest for my book. When Alibaba made a bid for the audio rights, my hopes reached their peak that the gates of my imprisonment would be unlocked. But with the kind of cruel fate one usually finds in fiction, the deal fell through after months of waiting when the leadership changed and the new CEO ditched every deal the previous one had on the table. That was a very hard day. But Nova, as always, was there to comfort me, to lick my nose and keep me grateful. Instead of giving up, I kept writing and wrote and published the sequel to The Lost Valor of Love in under eight months. It was while I was in the midst of writing the final book of the series, The Rise of the Goddess that my imprisonment came to a rapid end, but not in the way I had hoped for.

On Midsommer Day, June 21, 2019, while I was in the shower, my husband left me (I later found out it was for another woman), and just like that I was alone. While there were many benefits to this unexpected development, I was also keely aware how precarious my living situation had become since my husband owned everything in his name, even my mobile phone number. All the utilities were in his name, and of course the house. I found myself confronted by my worst nightmare. He took my car on a legal technicality, and left me stranded with a sick cat that needed veterinary care, then he demanded an exorbitant amount of rent to live in a house that cost almost nothing for its mortgage, money I offered to pay and was refused.

Meanwhile, the first wave of COVID-19 was in full effect. The world sunk into the silence of a global lockdown. As my personal situation went from bad to worse, I asked my best friend if I could move into her house in the UK to weather the asset settlement (we were already divorced on paper, in Sweden they deal with the assets after the divorce if they are contested).

Normally when couples divorce in Sweden, because of the no-fault system, they usually agree to split their assets fairly 50/50 to avoid the insane costs of court, but my ex was in no mood to do things the way every one else did things. Instead, he submitted a bill to the court for the cost of having had me as his wife, even going so far as to detail the cost of food, electricity and water, and demanded I repay him thousands of Swedish kr in compensation. More and more bizarre demands were dumped into the court and as we rallied to deal with each battle, and even prove he was fabricating evidence with doctored documents in his favor, my legal bills grew and grew.

My best friend was happy for me to come to her, but the next hurdle was how to get out of the country with my three cats before we would be put onto the street in the middle of a global lockdown. I wasted an entire afternoon trying to book a flight to the UK. Never before had I seen such a thing, no flights at all from anywhere in Scandinavia flew to the UK. Neither did any boats transit to the UK.

The irony of my being trapped once more and unable to escape hounded me but I didn’t give up. Every day I monitored the news about COVID, and in the meantime searched for a place to rent until I could get out. It was a terrible time, there was nothing for me to rent. At least nothing I could afford. I was offered a place to stay in the women’s shelter, which might sound terrible, but in Sweden is practically luxurious. They had a new building with small studio apartments, and a floor where pets could be taken, but with a caveat, only one pet could come with me. The other two would have to be taken into foster care or be rehomed by me.

With nothing moving on the lockdown front, it seemed my chance to go to the UK with my three cats was turning into a pipe dream, so I did the unthinkable - I had to decide who I would keep and who I would give up. It was horrible. I cried very hard as I wrote to the veterinarian who knew of my plight and offered to try to help me find a foster home for my other two cats, Ninya and Neh’h. I knew it had to be Nova who I would take with me into the shelter because she was the closest to me, plus the other two were more active and wild and would not cope with the stress of being confined to a studio for an indeterminable period of time. Regardless, they were still my little ones who had been in my life since 2012 and 2013 and I was sick that a man who had the wealth and means to allow us to stay in the house until I could reasonably leave without lockdown restrictions could prevent this outcome. But no. Despite my desperate emails to my lawyer to intercede for them, there was no leeway coming from my ex’s side.

And then, a chink of light. The UK lifted the lockdown for flights. I contacted SAS to book the cats to fly in the cargo and was told, no, there could be no animal transport during COVID. I tried British Airways somehow believing maybe it was going to be OK with them. I was wrong. It was a full blown ban all over the world. I wanted to scream at hitting yet another brick wall.

Instead, I searched Google for other ways to get my cats out of Sweden. After hitting a dozen dead ends, I found an animal transport van from the UK - the only animal transport company that was functioning to the UK in COVID. I called them, fuelled with hope.

They said they would not be coming through Sweden until late July. Almost a month after the deadline for me to be on the street.

I did what any desperate cat mom would do. I booked them on the transport anyway, deciding I would figure out the rest later. Then I booked my flight out and called my friend to let her know we were on our way so long as the flights weren’t banned from landing in the UK again.

Then I called my lawyer and told him I might have a problem because I wasn’t going to be able to get out of the house on the arbitrary deadline laid on me and could I please stay those three weeks because I was definitely on my way out. He said to expect the worst, so I did.

The answer came back. I would be charged rent, 15,000kr for the three weeks that would be taken from me out of the court decision. It was a ridiculous sum and absolutely a case of profiteering but what could I do? I didn’t have the money but I stayed anyway and packed, terrified at any moment the electricity would be cut or the Internet would be disconnected, or the lock would be changed while I hurried out to buy food and my cats would be locked in the house and I would have no way to get to them. It was a tense three weeks, made worse by the fact that the animal transport was held back trying to get into Sweden from Finland because of COVID.

The days dwindled and my flight loomed. Still no animal transport. I had to get on my flight. I found a cattery and asked if they could help me. They were fantastic and looked after the cats for the four days after I left the country and handled their transition to the transport van.

And then, just like that, we were in England and together again, safe at last. It was an incredible feeling not to live in total fear, not to have the gnawing awareness that someone has total control over your life. And even though it was the hardest way out, I knew I had made the right decision to fight to the bitter end to keep my cats with me.

We stayed with my best friend until Sept 30, 2022 as I waited out the court case fight and decision on the divorce settlement, and made plans for my next steps. I lost little Neh’h in the spring of 2022, so that left Ninya and Nova to travel once more to their new home with me in Poland at the end of September.

Ninya’s story is covered in a previous post in this blog, which you can read here. But with Nova, things were much less complex. She’s a tiny little girl, and easily fit into the dimension and weight restrictions set by LOT Airlines for her to travel with me in the cabin. She was a great traveller and many other travellers commented on how calm she was in the airport as she looked around and watched the world go by, as if she knew everything was going to be alright.

On the flight, she had her own seat and the airline staff made a fuss of her. And once we arrived to the house, she left the carrier and explored with curious little meows discovering all the nice things waiting for her, and has been living in spoiled contentment ever since.

And so, here we are, settled at last in our lovely new home with a man who loves us all like crazy and after years of uncertainty, abuse, and trauma it is something like a miracle to me. At last everything I fought so hard for back in 2020 has come to fruition. I was told I would never be loved by anyone, and that I would end up in a ditch.

Unfortunately for my aggressor, neither of these predictions came true.

The Bed That's Crossed The Sea (Twice) To Live In Four Countries

What you are looking at is a survivor of multiple assemblies and disassemblies, shipping containers, and a shipment from the UK in a dodgy truck from Romania.

Over the course of 17 years, two relationships, marriage, divorce, and moves to four countries this bed has become the sanctuary where I read, dream, fall in love, fall back out of love, argue, cry, heal from trauma, and conceive ideas for my books. This bed is, in short, an extension of my existence. If I were to have to give it up, I would lose a tangible piece of my history.

Which means it too has a story to tell (in photos at least)

In the summer of 2006, I wandered along the shady lanes of Holland Park, London and gazed into shop windows. With the heat of the warm July sun on my shoulders, I discovered this bed - and fell in love with it instantly. In one of those moments where you simply know, I knew it was destined to be a part of my life, maybe for the rest of my life, a constant for years to come that would travel with me through the days, months, and years of my own story.

It’s now lasted longer than my marriage, and the relationship before that, and is now well into my third relationship…in Poland.

That’s constant.

When my marriage ended in 2019, I had to leave my marital home in Sweden and I had nowhere to go. My husband was less than chivalrous, but my best friend in England was more than happy to invite me to live with her, and so in 2020, in the middle of the first and second COVID lockdowns, I did. I packed up my things and moved back to the UK, the country I had left in 2006.

I rented the master bedroom and ensuite from her. That bed was my solace during the time that followed and the divorce dragged on. No matter how terrifying my future felt, I always felt safe in my bed surrounded by my cats (and books).

Before my bed headed back to the UK, it had lived for almost ten years in my marital home on the Baltic coast of Sweden, in a house we completely renovated (and I loved). At first, my bed was the guest bed, but as my marriage degenerated in a daily fresh hell I moved into this room, and so did the cats. I remember getting into the bed each night and thinking tomorrow will be a better day. It often wasn’t but that bed gave me respite from the trauma of a coercively-controlling partner, and when you are alone and isolated, that counts for a lot.

Going further back in time, the first place my bed moved was to Denmark, in a pretty suburb outside Copenhagen. I rented a three bedroom apartment and this bed tucked perfectly into the second biggest room (image above). Even though I had a bigger bed I had bought in Denmark for the master bedroom, once my relationship ended with my Danish boyfriend, there I was again, tucked up in my bed with my cats and a book, happy as a clam.

And so we arrive at the beginning, to when my bed’s story started. This is my flat in London, in Holland Park where I lived until I moved to Denmark to be with the rhythm guitarist in a band I met while playing in World of Warcraft (I know, I know!) But if one is going to make a mistake for love, why not make it epic?

If you look closely you will see little Niut sleeping there when she was just over a year old.

And now it’s 2023. After 17 years, me and the bed are both somewhat more worn, patched up in places and don’t look as new or shiny as we once did. But I don’t care. I love that through these years, loves, loss, and trauma, it’s been there for me every single day, a shelter, a thing of beauty, and a constant.

And the damage. That’s life. That’s experience.

That’s living.

How A Writer's Winter Retreat Lifted The Lid On An Eight-Decade Old Family Secret

It started innocently enough with a 450km trip south of Warsaw to spend a month in Poland’s beautiful snowy mountains to work on two books, read, and enjoy creative rest - but through a bizarre chain of connections, I happened on an incredible discovery that could unravel an eight decade old WWII family mystery that went to the graves with my grandparents.

The beautiful view from my writing desk in Rabka.

And a mystery no one has ever been able to begin to solve.

Until now.

As I followed a very cold bread crumb trail, I discovered I had begun to open a Pandora’s Box of Nazis, Soviets, and perhaps, at last, the true reason why the KGB pursued my grandfather and his children for four decades...and why I was told I must never travel to Russia.

But first, let’s begin with the historical narrative that I was given since childhood with each of the unsolved mysteries that appear to point to my true heritage and ethnicity.

Mystery #1: I grew up with a false surname that didn’t match my ethnicity at all.

My mother came from a good British family, linked to blue blood and very easy to trace. My father’s parents’ story (as it was told) began in Ukraine after Stalin’s Holodomor genocide between 1932-1933. My grandmother, Natalya, was the daughter of an illicit liasion between the General of the Ukrainian Army and a beautiful young woman who went mad, was abandoned by the general, and died alone in abject poverty. I never knew her name. My grandmother never told me.

Her father married well and while Natalya was raised in the general’s home in Kyiv, her stepmother hated her and she was treated as a servant, forced to live in the cold attic and serve her step-sisters in a bizarre version of a real-life Cinderella story. Fortunately, Natalya had inherited her mother’s beautiful looks and as she grew older she began to attract the attention of many suitors.

One of these suitors was my grandfather, Piotr. He came to Ukraine from Moscow, presumably as part of the resettlement of Russians into Ukraine post-Holodomor, although why he was in Ukraine was never adequately explained, and is part of the mystery I hope to resolve.

I was told he was a tenor in the Moscow Opera, fell in love with my grandmother and pursued her relentlessly. It seems he came from a family with money because he was able to holiday in Odessa with his brother (there is a photo of them on the beach in 1934 and they look healthy and well fed), something Ukrainians would surely not have as they struggled to rebuild their lives after the Holodomor’s forced starvation of 12% of the population in just one year where 4.5 million died.

This is where the story becomes extremely scant in detail. Between when they met and the next “scene” of their story, we know almost nothing of what happened in the years between then and several years into WWII which began in 1939. We know nothing of where they were, what they did, if they were in Moscow as my grandfather continued to sing, or even anything about their wedding, where it happened. Nothing.

The next “scene” simply fast forwards us straight into 1943, almost a decade after the end of the Holodomor and they are on a train leaving (supposedly) Ukraine behind.

Mystery #2: Soldau was the termination point for trains coming from the east. For those who were not registered as part of the Nazi system, Soldau had a holding station for processing men, women, and children. My grandparents certainly arrived at this destination as their first port of entry since my father was born before they took the train and was only registered one month later after they arrived which means when they arrived, he didn’t even have papers. And yet, instead of ending up in Soldau’s death camp, he was given a Nazi birth certificate and a German name.

Mystery #3: My father’s birth certificate is stamped with the Nazi stamp of the eagle holding the swastika in its talons. His birthplace is stated as Soldau, (then Nazi Germany). His name is written as Wolfgang Vladimir, the German and Russian spelling of his name (not Ukrainian which is spelled differently).

In the next “scene”, my grandfather has somehow managed to secure work as an opera singer in Berlin where he claims to have performed before the SS, and even hinted, before Hitler himself, though no explanation was ever given how this could have happened considering he was most likely Russian and therefore a defacto enemy of Nazi Germany.

Mystery #4: If my grandfather, grandmother, and my infant father traveled by train from Ukraine (or Russia) into Nazi Germany, how did they not end up being processed into one of the labor camps as Russians? How did my grandfather speak German? How did they escape the fate of millions of others displaced by war?

The next “scene” came from my grandmother about her life in Germany during WWII, and how there was plenty of food, no bombings, and everything was calm, clean, and organized. They were given an apartment with running water and electricity in the city, and my father spent his first years there. At one point he wandered off as a toddler and a friendly policeman brought him home. Another anecdotal story tells of how, as my grandfather was performing before a packed house, a bomb fell through the roof and landed on the audience, killing many people, although it didn’t detonate.

Mystery #5: My grandfather claimed to have changed his true surname upon arrival to Canada in the early 1950s because he feared being tracked down by the Soviets and taken back to the USSR. However, my father’s birth certifcate issued in 1943 already had this false surname, which means my grandfather changed his surname with the help of the Nazis. The surname? Japanese (for reasons of privacy I will not share it here). So I grew up with a Japanese surname and never learned my grandfather’s true surname.

My grandfather died when I was two, so I barely remember him. That only left my grandmother, who lived until 2009 and died at the age of 93. In all those years, she gave no more information about her past than what I have shared here, although I did discover during my teens a wooden box under a bedroom dresser filled with letters from Russia. I knew enough Russian to be able to translate them only to realize they were letters from the KGB offering an olive branch to my grandfather, and then to my grandmother to “return to the motherland”. I asked my father about them, and wondered at how the KGB were able to find my grandfather when he had changed his name (and why they wanted him back so bad, since the letters spanned right up into the 1980s and followed their addresses as they moveed).

My father was circumspect in his answer, since he could only speculate from the the scant information we had. “The KGB are very good at finding people when they want to. I am sure they simply wanted their opera singer back, he was a national treasure after all,” he said, and then continued with this: “But Grandpa hated the Communists and knew they would punish him if he went back. He said that neither he, nor his children, or his grandchildren (so me, then) were to go back to Russia no matter what, that the KGB would even punish his grandchildren so serious was his crime.”

I questioned this: “I don’t think an opera singer would have that much worth that it would be dangerous for his grandchildren to go to Russia.”

And my father said: “There’s a lot we don’t know.”

And for decades that, it seemed, was that.

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My desk (and writing companion Nova) at my cozy writing retreat in Rabka-Zdroj, Poland, close the Tatras mountains.

Fast forward to Rabka-Zdroj, Poland, 2023 and a completely random connection suggested to me by the woman whose apartment I was renting for the third time in as many years that I should meet her English tutor for coffee since she also lives in Rabka and it could be nice to meet another Brit. I was happy to arrange and so it was done. We chatted and the connection was great, I really enjoyed her company, a lovely woman who has mainly lived in Poland since 2003.

Now, Rabka-Zdroj is a rather small, special place, nestled into a valley and surrounded by mountains. It’s not a common destination (especially for internationals) since Zakopane further to the south became developed into Poland’s popular Tatra Mountains resort. So I asked her, how did she end up in Rabka of all places? And she then launched into an engrossing tale that spanned over a decade that at last, led her to Rabka through a man she met while back in the UK who had come from Rabka and was one of the descendants of the survivors of the “cleansing” of Rabka’s Jews. I learned then that in one day, the Nazis gathered up all of the Jews they could in Rabka and forced Poles to shoot them in the forest nearby. A few days later she took me to the memorial site of the mass grave. It was a terrible, and sobering experience. Up until she told me, I had no idea about Rabka’s gruesome history.

Her sharing this with me prompted me to share what little I knew of my family’s history, and she then mentioned perhaps I might want to dig a little deeper to learn the truth about my grandfather and how he really managed to get a nice life as a Russian in Nazi Germany.

I said to her, as she watched my reaction with an intensity that made me feel as though she could see into my soul: “After what you shared with me about what happened here in Rabka, I am not sure I want to know.”

She asked: “Why not?”

I said: “Because I am afraid what I will discover, maybe some secrets should die with those who kept them.”

And then she shared an astonishing thing with me: That she knew of Germans whose whole town had terrible misfortune over and over, and at last they decided to pull back the veil on their past and see what their grandfathers had done during WWII. It turned out, they had lied about everything to their family and in fact, had done dreadful things and were Nazis.

These grandchildren were deeply saddened to know that their history had not only been a comfortable lie, but also filled with horror dealt out by their own blood. They set out to try to make amends in any way they could and resolved to honor those Jews who had suffered at the hands of their grandparents. It was only after this that the misfortunes of this town ended with the healing of past wounds in the present, by those who perforce needed to expose the weight of their inherited burden.

Now, I had shared about my deeply traumatic marriage and divorce and of my exile in the UK for my own safety. During this (at times, tear-filled) conversation I had mentioned that I felt like I was being punished, that no matter how good I am to others, absolutely absurd and terrible things have been done to me.

And so her words about the Germans who learned about their true history took hold of me. I noted my resistance to find out the truth, my half-curiosity to get to the bottom of the many obvious inconsistences and mysteries that lay in my inherited past and decided it was time to get serious. So I did.

I contacted my father and found a bread crumb trail, one that had been there all along, hiding in plain sight.

Last autumn, I moved from the UK to live with my partner who is Polish, and when I investigated where my father’s birth certificate was issued, it turns out there was a labor camp / death camp for Poles and Soviets in Soldau which is now Działdowo, Poland. This place is less than a two-hour drive from where I now live. Strangely, my life’s journey had brought me back almost to the very place where my family’s mystery ripened. And this will be where my investigation will begin - in the archives at the museum of the Soldau Concentration Camp (opened in 2019).

To think I was born in Canada and have traveled and lived in many countries over the ensuing decades, but was always drawn to Poland as though it were my true home. That I fell in love with a Polish man, stayed three times over three years in a little town in the south of Poland to write, and on my third visit, met another British woman there who is an expert in the Polish history of WWII who opened my eyes to why I should not be afraid to explore my inherited past.

I have five mysteries to solve and have only my resourcefulness, will, and courage to do it. I have only a tiny amount of leads to work with: that my grandfather’s brother was active in Stalin’s regime and was part of the oppression, and that my grandfather hated Communism so much he wouldn’t let anyone wear red around him.

There are three possible theories I have so far:
1. My grandfather also worked for Stalin, and had knowledge of real value that he gave to the Nazis in return for the safety of his family upon their arrival in Soldau, but such information would have to be of critical importance, and it is hard to imagine what he could know that would be valued so highly that it would gain him such a generous reward. This theory aligns with the four decade long hunt by the KGB not only of my grandfather and grandmother, but also of my father’s siblings.

2. My grandfather was a spy and a Nazi, which would explain why he could speak German and why there is almost no information about what he did for the decade until they left either Russia or Ukraine for Nazi Germany. This also might explain why he and my grandmother were able to travel on a train with Nazi soldiers instead of one of the usual trains for people who are rounded up and taken to camps for processing.

3. In a hybrid mix of the two theories above, my grandfather was not Russian at all, but a German-born citizen who lived most of his life in Russia and who had access to state secrets through his opera connections with Russian high society. He never told us anything about his parents, or his siblings. We only know of the one brother who worked for Stalin and the one in the photo in Odessa. So two other known siblings (or perhaps there is only the one and they are same sibling). My grandmother also did not share anything about his family with us. Additionally, when my grandfather and grandmother left, her step-sister and her husband were sent to a gulag in Siberia shortly after in retaliation.

So here I am, finding myself researching history once more, only this time, it is not for a fictional book, it is to at last learn the truth of where I really came from, and how I can be alive today when really, my story should have ended before it even began on a cold 1943 December day in the Soldau concentration camp of Nazi Germany.

No Cat Left Behind

Last year was a pivotal year for me. I made some very big, very scary choices. One of them was to permanently move from my temporary home in the UK back to the EU, to the country I fell in love with, and to the man who loved me, just outside of Warsaw in the beautiful countryside of Masovia.

Still. It was terrifying. Despite my due diligence in investigating the pros and cons of making this move over the course of a year, I had my hand forced when my friend (from whom I had been renting two rooms since I fled Sweden in the summer of 2020) said she needed to double my rent from £600 a month to £1200 because of the cost of living crisis.

I let her know this was not a tenable price for a room-renting / house-sharing situation and gave her my notice. But, I never had any intention to remain in the UK, blighted as it was by its foolhardy departure from the EU and everything rapidly falling apart under one new country-wrecking PM after another.

So really, her rent hike only served to expedite my move. But not to another rental in the UK. I made up my mind. It was time to stop weighing the pros and cons and go to the country that made my soul come to life and whose beautiful nature filled my creative heart with imagination and joy. It was time for courage.

Once I made up my mind, I felt relief because the UK post-Brexit was depressing. I wanted nothing to do with that sinking ship. I wanted out. I had wanted out ever since I landed in 2020, but my divorce forced me to sit there for almost two years until my ex couldn’t drag it through court any longer and I could finally start to think about healing, and putting myself (and my ruined finances) back together again.

During my sojourn in the UK, I went to the mountains in the south of Poland for a month (in fact, I am currently writing this right now from the very same spot) to rest and to write my book The Lost Letters, to help other women see the red flags of a toxic narcissist, cope if they are caught, the aftermath of what they will face when they are discarded, and how to find themselves again once they are out the other side.

That month-long stay in the autumn of 2020 was my first trip to Poland, and I fell in love with Poland’s beauty, tranquility, and simplicity of life. It was like Sweden, only without the Swedes (or the insane cost to live there). I knew those beautiful mountains would one day be my home. I just didn’t know how I would make it happen.

That was two-and-a-half years ago. It took two years for me to realize my dream of being a resident in Poland when I moved here for good at the end of September 2022 - and a whole lot of courage. Remember, I moved to Sweden to be with the man who ended up abusing me and leaving me with nothing, which meant there was a symmetry to my decision to accept the offer to move into my partner’s home that brought with it acute wariness.

To say I have a patient partner would be a massive understatement. Not only has he handled my moments of real fear and reassured me over and over he will never put me on the street as my ex did, but his mother and father support me and care about me as well. He even went so far as to legally register me to his home, which means he cannot remove me from the property, only I can. When he explained what he did, I cried. I hadn’t felt secure in years. And here, in one huge act of trust, he basically handed me the keys to his home. I had more rights with him in a few months than I ever had in Sweden with my husband of ten years.

None of the behaviors that I faced in Sweden from my ex or his parents were being realized here. It took time, EMDR, and medical care, but my triggers slowly, and quietly calmed down. I didn’t jump as much at loud noises. I didn’t scream as much from nightmares. I realized I was beginning to do more than just function like a robot, simply going through the actions of living. I felt myself coming back. My imagination, long dormant was beginning to reawaken.

I felt calm. I started to do things I used to enjoy. I colored. I played World of Warcraft (I’m not very good at it, but I love the lore, working through the storyline, and collecting pets). I read through a pile of books. I watched K-Drama. I didn’t feel judged, or fearful of the next wrong move that would net punishment.

Going back to my abrupt move from the UK to Poland. It was easy enough to stash what little furniture I had into a container until I could afford to move it to Poland. And what I felt others could make good use of, I gave away. I gave away many things in those short weeks prior to my departure. I made a lot of people happy. It felt good and liberated me in a strange way. I only kept my antiques and those items that really held the most value to me. It turned out not to be much, after all.

But the tricky part about moving out of a post-Brexit UK is when you have two cats. Those of you who have followed my journey from the beginning will know that I fled Sweden in between the lockdowns of 2020 with three cats (my third cat, Neh’h died in January 2022 of illness).

My departure from Sweden was a total nightmare, not least because my ex hounded me every step of the way (including taking my car from me on a legal technicality so I had to rent one at great expense) but I needed the protection services present the day the movers arrived to take my things to make sure I was safe and make photographic evidence of what I had left behind (which came in handy later on when the court case dragged on simply for the purpose of bankrupting me).

Now, I had moved cats before across countries, but always when the UK was part of the EU. Even when I entered the UK in July 2020, it was relatively easy to enter the country with pet passports that were up to date with vaccinations, and microchip information.

But none of that mattered now. If I wanted to take my cats to Poland, I needed to go through a whole new routine to get my cats on the way that involved getting a 16-page document filled in (in Polish) for each cat, plus brand new rounds of rabies injections because my Swedish pet passports were useless now (since UK was no longer in the EU). Worse, these papers had to be done 24hrs before the animal left the country. Stress galore.

I did my homework. I contacted the transport company that I used to get my cats from Sweden to the UK. They couldn’t help me because they were not going to Poland when I needed to travel.

I contacted the airline and discovered LOT amazingly allowed cats in the cabin, but only two animals per flight and one in each class. I told my partner about it and he agreed to fly over to bring back one of the cats with him while I brought the other. Everything was looking awesome. Until…

They told me about the weight restriction. I did the math.

The cat and the carrier (I bought Sherpa), can weigh no more than 8kg in total (17.5 lbs). And they do check. (In fact, when I turned up to check in, I had to put my cat carrier on the luggage weight scales and was told if Nova had been over the limit, they would not fly her, which would have been a total disaster).

Well, this was going to be a problem. Nova would be easy since she is tiny and weighs about 3 kg, and with the bag, she was a comfortable 5.5kg, well within the allowance. Ninya was another story. Ninya is a big girl, weighs nearly 6kg all by herself, and she is far too big to be squashed into the Sherpa bag size they allow for the 14 hours the entire trip would take door to door. But anyway, she was over the allowance by a good half kilo. No flying over for her.

I went back to the transport company. They said maybe they might have a trip coming up in October because they would be doing a run to Ukraine to pick up animals to bring back to their owners who had fled the country. I told them to sign me up and to make sure they could take care of all the necessary paperwork that has to be done in the 24 hours before departure. They agreed.

My friend was more than happy to take care of Ninya in the interim. She made noises about wanting to keep her, and at the time I admit I took it under consideration, but my gut told me Ninya belonged with me, even if it was going to be another stressful trip to get to me. My friend was very disappointed but when the time finally came (and it was incredibly short notice, we had one hour to prepare Ninya to be collected), it was a stressful, messy situation and one that caused a permanent fracture between my friend and me that never healed.

Ninya was finally on her way, but I had very little contact with the transport company or the driver. I lived in limbo for days not knowing where in the EU she even was. Then I finally got a notification she was in the country and would be delivered that day at 4pm. My joy was soon replaced by anxiety as the hours rolled by and no delivery. I went and stood at the end of the lane in the freezing cold and dark, eagerly watching for the lights of the transport van to arrive. I checked my phone a hundred times.

Finally, when my fingers, toes, and nose were completely numb, and three hours after the appointed delivery time, I got a message. The driver said he was outside my property and couldn’t find my house. I checked the location he sent me. He was miles away. In another city. Despair. I sent him the address for the third time. Panic took hold, maybe he wasn’t even there, maybe he would never come and I would never see Ninya again.

I ran back to the house, to my partner who had just greeted our overnight guests. I was incredibly stressed, close to tears and certain I would never see Ninya again. The whole transport had been a debacle, even how it began was crazy. I never felt worse or more powerless in my life. Terrible stories formed in my mind, how I had been conned, and she was gone, sold for her beautiful fur.

My partner rose to the occasion. He wrote to the driver, who had tried to find the house again and had gotten himself thoroughly lost in the middle of the countryside. I had no idea where my cat was or how to get myself there. My partner decided to take me there and left our guests to fend for themselves. The whole way in the car I felt a terrible fear, that we would get to the remote spot in the middle of a forest and there would be no van. This was it, the moment of truth.

My partner murmured something about how we should have found the van by now, but only darkness lay ahead. I started to cry, my worst fears were confirmed. I had sentenced my poor cat to a terrible fate. And then, my partner said. Wait Wait Wait… I see something in the distance.

And there it was. The transport van. And my little girl inside it.

A quick hello to the driver and he turned the van around and followed us back to the house. And then, the door was slid open, and she was there, among a selection of cats and a dog, all looking bewildered in their cabins.

She cried as I carried her into her new home, and smelled of urine where she had peed on herself, but otherwise, she was safe. I settled her into her room and she ate a hearty meal, and purred with contentment. I cleaned her up as best I could and left her to herself to adapt to her her new environment and meet her sister again.

And so, after five days of great uncertainty, my girl was finally safe and sound in Poland. It cost me a month’s salary to get her to me, but it was worth every penny. She is my forever girl, and has settled in to her new life beautifully. She adores my partner and follows him everywhere, and hearing him talking to her is just about one of the nicest things in the world for me.

At last, we are all safe, and we are home.

Escape To The Wilds Of Scotland And Sleep Under The Stars In The Ultimate Getaway

I’m starting off The Writing Life with a post for a friend of mine that I admire who recently accomplished something incredible. I have long been planning to write about getaway places I recommend for creatives and writers so felt this was the perfect post to start with!

Enjoy!

Let’s talk about fires, books, stars, and cozy times…

Meet Chris McCrindle, a Scotsman, ship’s navigator, and a man driven to create an oasis of calm in a world of noise.

Chris can be found diving in the cold lochs of Scotland.

Chris and I connected through our love of books back in 2020 when he read my novel, The Lost Valor of Love. In response to some of my posts on IG, he shared encouraging thoughts about relationships, healing from trauma, and just trying to make sense of a world where things were changing faster than the speed of light. I found him to be an interesting and kind-hearted person and was fascinated by his work as a ship’s navigator. I later learned he lived deep in a forest in Scotland where he could enjoy silence and peace and clear, unpolluted night skies.

At work in the North Sea, Chris navigates the ship as it moves an oil rig.

It was during this time I also learned Chris was building something unique that celebrated both the unspoiled Scottish sky and the forest’s pristine nature and wildlife in a glorious fashion.

The dream becomes reality in 2022.

It was a Herculean project, and one he, for the most part, accomplished and financed himself - the building and outfitting of the largest geodome in Scotland, named The Dark Sky Dome, built especially for travelers looking for a true reset from life - under the stars.

The ultimate glamping escape in Scotland.

His website states The Dark Sky Dome is: “The largest Geodesic Dome in Scotland situated in the heart of the Carrick Forest within the Galloway Forest Dark Sky Park. It is an ideal getaway for those wanting to experience the wilds of South West Scotland whilst having the full comforts of home.

Whether you are a couple looking for a weekend break, an author or artist looking to stay somewhere to find creativity or a family of 4 wanting to spend quality time together the dome is for you.

“Galloway Forest Park is the largest Forest in the UK. The Dark Sky Dome is situated in the heart of the Carrick Forest, within the Galloway Forest Dark Sky Park, Scotland. The geodesic dome provides a peaceful and unique stay, with all the comforts of home.”

Enjoy your own private view of the night sky from the dome’s mezzanine floor.

The Dark Sky Dome is located in the Carrick Forest at Tallaminnoch (from Scottish Gaelic ‘talamh meadhanach’ meaning the ‘Middle Ground’. Surrounded by miles of Forest, Lochs, and moorland.

Sunset in Galloway Forest

The Galloway Forest is a paradise for walkers and hikers. The Merrick is a Corbet of 843m and is the highest knuckle of the Awful Hand range, making it the highest hill in the South of Scotland. There are at least 10 Grahams (hills over 610m) in the Park. There is so much to explore that one might spend a whole month starting from the dome and rarely repeat a walk.

Just you, the trees, and the sky.

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FACILITIES & AMENITIES

Central Heating, Log burner, Fully Fitted Kitchen with 4 ring hob and twin oven, freezer, an enclosed toilet and shower room, Kingsize bed. There are 2 mezzanine nets which are accessed via a spiral staircase. The nets are perfect to lie under the 4m wide skylight and see the stars whilst being warm and cosy or lie and read a book whilst the clouds fly past overhead. The larger net supports up to a 1000kg and the smaller net 120Kg.

For groups of 3 or 4 guests will have a double futon. There is also the option to sleep on the nets. The dome is only suitable for people of 12 + years and they have a no pets policy due to the surrounding wildlife.

Chris faced many setbacks bringing this geodome to life but he never gave up, when many others would have. His grit, determination, and vision to build this beautiful refuge for creatives, nomads, and nature and astronomy lovers is a rare gift in a world of fast consumption and instant gratifcation.

If you have the desire to get back to nature, sleep under the stars, and wake up to the sounds of untouched nature, then you need to put this on your bucket list.

As a writer, I can think of no better place to reach into my deepest well of creativity than under the gaze of an entire galaxy of stars.

Chris has extended a 10% booking discount to anyone who mentions this code EACARTER2022

You can contact Chris to access this discount here.

Alternatively, you can book his dome via Airbnb without the discount here.

I am not an affiliate of The Dark Sky Dome. I just wrote this to support an awesome person, their dream, and their dome. And to thank them for being there for me when the chips were down.

Until next time.

E A

Words Are All I Have

For me, the writing life has never been a choice.

Ever since I could hold a crayon, I have had the experience of words surrounding me, fluttering to and fro, caged within a place I cannot comprehend, living things, like birds. Lost, lonely, unheard words that can only come to life through the attention, time, and effort of a writer who listens.

It seems I am a good listener.

So they flock to me, crying to be freed from their imprisonment - where they have been abandoned and forgotten, fading away from disuse. I unpick the chaos and turn those lost words, themes, and emotions into something…relatable.

If this writer could ever be described by a single word, it would be diligent.

Even if I am tired, or have absolutely nothing in mind to say, I let the words flow through me, without resistance. And they appear on my screen, precisely as it is happening now. A mystery to me. A wonder at times. The words are kind to me, perhaps because I am kind to them, my little neglected bird-like words beating their wings against the corners of my mind. I try not to think about it too much, for fear I might break something fragile and precious.

Instead, I just write.

Sometimes it’s nothing more than a stream of consciousness posted on social media, an in-the-moment snapshot of what it is to be alive in today’s society with all its pleasures and subsequent terror…or it’s a poem, a short story, a blog post, an article, or, at times, it’s the months-long determination of gathering up one hundred thousand stray words and bringing them to life in a novel.

The words especially like that. They love to be crafted into stories. They snuggle up against the characters, the world, the tension, and the conflict. They positively revel in becoming stories. And so, I write stories, sometimes fast, sometimes slow. If I don’t, an unusual sadness begins to permeate me, a sense of grief, as if those trapped words and I are somehow entwined, and by not writing, I realize I am both the jailor and the prisoner.

Writing, for me, is not a choice. It’s a requirement of my existence. If I were to stop writing completely, I suspect I would go mad. The words would overwhelm me, and I would simply collapse into them, to wander winding corridors of untold stories, silenced forever. This will never happen. To not write, would be like not breathing.

I must write. And so I do.

If you are reading this, you may already enjoy my writing, and I thank you for your support - but the words thank you, too. Because what we create in our minds becomes real in some way, somewhere. Writing is a strange kind of alchemy that gives life to something built on the foundation of words that would not exist without you, the reader.

So together we create. A glorious triad of words, writer, and reader. Together, we make something out of…nothing.

Welcome to The Writing Life, the place where you will be able to get up close and personal with me, the writer behind the words, and get to know me outside of social media, press articles, and posts about books.

I am a digital nomad, a life I discovered in the aftermath of a very difficult divorce that led me to question fundamental beliefs about who I should be and how I should be living.

Since I fled my marital home in July 2020, I have effectively been homeless. I have no roots, having rented space in my former best friend’s home, and now in Poland where I lost my heart to the country and one of its citizens. My furniture. kitchenware, and in fact, the entirety of my life sits in a container, locked in darkness and silence. It is a choice to live this way and not a sorrow for me.

In fact, the freedom I have discovered by letting go and traveling light has liberated me in ways I never would have otherwise known. So in a way, my awful divorce, and the loss of my beautiful home and garden was a gift. It set me free to write.

And the words have never been happier.