Dear Kyiv
A Love Letter to Our City One Day Before Russia Invaded
This chapter was written on February 23, 2022 and echoes some events from the previous day, but they have not been edited out because they take on a new relevance. This memoir is better shared with you, the reader if most of the content is presented in chronological order. This way you get to experience most everything as it happened. This letter was written on the evening of the full-scale invasion.
Dear Kyiv:
Yesterday, all our truths so far away were revealed globally. We all knew what was coming, didn’t we? There was no surprise for us as the West soiled its adult diapers. Nope. I walked through the Botanical Garden with my dogs and the old guy who plays guitar on the path from the Metro was playing “Yesterday” by The Beatles. You know that guy, right, my fellow Kyivites? He is there all the time, strumming except in the dead of winter when it is too cold for his fingers to be nimble. Sometimes I see him in those months below the tunnel that leads to Symon Petliura Street. Anyway, his strumming made me smile, my fellow Kyivites. The sun was shining brightly, and it smelled like spring even though the news was bad. “I heard the news today, oh boy.” I felt warm towards you, brothers and sisters, as I walked on past St. Volodymyr’s Cathedral.
