My Crimean-Tatar side of the family has been dealing with displacement due to war and genocide since 1944. Throughout the four generations of my family we have been forcibly displaced, killed, have had to flee, and be separated from our home and culture. On Feb 24, 2022, the day my mother and I fled Ukraine after Russia’s full scale attack, my mother said in tears, “My grandparents were forcibly displaced because of Russia 80 years ago, I never thought that my child would as well.” Unfortunately the traumas and displacement due to war and colonialism have been present for centuries and are growing among more people, communities, and nations today. 

From Feb 2022-2023 I “lived” in 17 different cities while working as a journalist, cultural activist, and filmmaker. Now I have come to California, a new place to settle and adapt into. Whenever I move to a new place I cannot help but compare it to my previous home. Even my PTSD is a kind of sensory comparison of California to the reality that exists in my previous home in Ukraine. I have become aware of the differences in perceptions and reactions that I was having to the environment and life around compared to those who haven’t experienced such proximity to danger. Being in California has given me the time and space to actually take a step back, look at these reactions and perceptions and analyze them. While I do not have to focus on running to bomb shelters and lack of electricity, I can define the various stages of grief and PTSD I have experienced since leaving Ukraine. I realized that this awareness and process is also a part of my own longing and grieving of my “home”. That pain and longing has become palpable in peace, and that this longing has quietly run deep in my heart for much longer than I thought.

“My heart is on fire, I lit it.” This is the title and first sentence of one poem of Ukrainian poet Lesya Ukrainka. I found out during this process that due to her illness during a portion of her life she had spent a lot of time healing in different countries abroad away from her home, Ukraine. She struggled from this distance and ‘exile’ as she put it in her writings. Her writings include these emotions held and Ukraine’s fight against the oppressor which still resonate to this day. This too is another generational struggle that continues amongst Ukrainians. 

This film started out as a project to go through the various stages of grief that people feel during a massive change in their life. Such as the shock and numbness when you first discover such a change, the anger and disbelief that the rest of the world can continue while your personal world has completely stopped or fallen apart, the sadness that affects you and those closest around you. It varies from person to person, but we all experience a range of intense emotions and reactions triggered by the world around us. We all take our own time to process this journey as well. But eventually whatever is built up needs to clear away, or find some release. We cannot stay stuck, because time and life continues. But time alone does not heal, action does. Whether it’s dancing, reconnecting with friends, prescribed burns, or making a film, we eventually clear away built up debris to allow for the growth of something new.