Blog365: Day 118

I was home sick today, and you know what that means? (What?) I'm going to have to make up THREE tests tomorrow, along with a lot of other stuff! I'm still not feeling that great, but I'm probably going to force myself to go unless I get a sudden case of hypothermia in the middle of the night.

I spent most of the day doing geek-related things I enjoy: watching Lord of the Rings, spending way too much time on the computer, and writing a bit. All right, so writing isn't geeky, but it sounds better than "Mostly geeky things with one non-geek activity".

I finished chapter one of my book, and so far, I've got about 2700 words written, give or take a few. I also have the prologue done, which isn't nearly as long as the chapters will be/are. Because it's short enough and I have nothing else, I'll post it:

People must have thought I was crazy.

In fact, I probably was. What would a “properly raised” Jewish girl from Russia like myself want to do with someone as harsh, cold, and possibly dangerous as him? Him refers to the street boy who lived about five blocks from my tenement. He had mysterious scars running up and down his arms, untamed and wild brown hair, and gray eyes that were both shallow and deep---for separate reasons, of course. Chances that he was Jewish himself were slim, yet chances that he followed any religion were slimmer.

Yet, despite all that, there was a simple answer to my madness: jealousy. He had everything I had ever wanted. He had freedom, independence, and seemed fearless. He had no rules to follow, nor did he have anyone to obey. He was simply controlled by himself, a power I had wanted for as long as I could remember.

To think that all those predictions turned out to be incredibly wrong. Mama always said that I was quick to make assumptions, and I guess she was right. I, Temira Degan, was completely wrong about the person I had figured lived perfectly. During one agonizing year, I learned about his scars. He turned out to not have all the luxuries I figured living alone brought. In fact, he didn’t even live on his own. I learned that along with many other incredible and horrid truths in the year of 1916. Some of those truths weren’t even about the boy (Who’s name I also discovered: Mikhail Melor, Mischa for short), but were simply about human life.

I learned that neither the Tsar nor the Romanov line would last forever, and would one day fall. On the other hand, I saw that when something falls, something else must take its place. The Soviet Union, lead by a mix of Marxists and Communists, sprang up in the place of my beloved Russia.

Most importantly, I discovered that life goes on, whether you’re ready or not. That’s just part of growing up: facing the world no matter what.

(It's in its awkward early phase, and I really need to do some historical accuracy-checking. Otherwise, I don't think it's that bad.)