My grandmother was made entirely of metal. She had just turned 17 when the Germans invaded her village. She hid in the attic so she wouldn\u2019t be \u201ctaken away for work.\u201d They didn\u2019t find her then, but a few weeks later, she was caught in a field, put in a cattle car and taken to Germany. She escaped en route, hundreds of kilometers away from home, and walked all the way back to her village. Grandma used to say that everyone had a hard time during the war, and that she got lucky. She fed stray cats until the day she died. Grandpa didn\u2019t like it, but she fed the cats anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But this piece isn\u2019t about her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Somehow, over the past month, two people I know started feeling trembling in their hands during aerial attacks. They didn\u2019t use to, but now they do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I know this because they told me. Everyone knows that I shake during attacks, so people tell me these things. One shelling in Donetsk Oblast shook me up so completely that it has never let up since. You could say I\u2019m an ambassador for people who shake during aerial bombardments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And so, over the past month, two friends have written to me. And both began with the words: \u201cI don\u2019t understand why this suddenly happened to me.\u201d That\u2019s what both of them said to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For five years, the Russians have been bombing these women and their children with drones, missiles, missile drones and drone missiles. They threatened them with a nuclear strike. For the first time in human history, they launched a medium-range intercontinental ballistic missile. They tried to besiege them. They threatened them with a nuclear strike. They tried to freeze them out in the middle of winter by destroying their power grid. They shelled the dam to flood two districts of their city. They threatened them with a nuclear strike. They tested on them every available technology for delivering explosives over a distance of more than 300 kilometers. They organized terrorist attacks. And, once again, they threatened them with a nuclear strike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On the night of July 6, the Russians launched 37 ballistic missiles at Kyiv \u2014 the largest number of ballistic missiles ever fired at a single city in a single attack. The previous \u201cworld record\u201d was 28 ballistic missiles, which struck Kyiv on the night of July 2, 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nAnd then Valia texted me: \u201cEverything was fine, and then, ALL OF A SUDDEN, something happened to me. Everyone else is asleep at home; I\u2019m the only one who\u2019s feeling kind of on edge.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
I have a colleague from Germany, a German woman. Last week, she sent us an email saying she wouldn\u2019t be able to review the report on time because construction work had started near her office. \u201cThe construction workers\u2019 schedule overlaps with ours, and the noise is distracting us, so we\u2019ll have to postpone the deadline,\u201d she wrote. I opened this email at night while working with my Ukrainian colleague. We work at night to meet deadlines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The women I know \u201cpull themselves together\u201d after an attack, drop their children off at daycare and go to work. Because they have to feed their children and also pay for private daycare with a shelter if the public daycare doesn\u2019t have one. The women I know sleep with their children in the hallways of high-rises, in underground parking lots, in the subway and in underground walkways. \u201cEverything\u2019s fine,\u201d they say. \u201cIt was loud, but everything\u2019s fine,\u201d say the women I know after a record number of ballistic missiles were just fired at their city. And if their hands are shaking, they\u2019re surprised and even blame themselves for being weak. After all, everything is fine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My grandmother\u2019s name was Dina, according to her passport, it was Anisia. That was common back then. Her parents liked the name Dina, but their preference didn\u2019t matter. She was registered \u201cas required,\u201d that is, according to the church calendar. That\u2019s why my grandmother had two names. When someone asked me my grandmother\u2019s name, I\u2019d say, \u201cDina, but her passport says Anisia.\u201d The adults weren\u2019t surprised; they just nodded in response.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And my grandmother was made entirely of metal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Grandma Dina called me \u201ckid,\u201d just like she did all the neighborhood kids. Sometimes I doubted that she even knew my name. It really annoyed her when I went up to my loved ones to give them a hug. Once, Grandma\u2019s sister came to visit, and I sat on her lap and hugged her. Grandma Dina yelled at me: \u201cGet down, don\u2019t embarrass yourself \u2014 you\u2019re a big girl already!\u201d I was seven. She was very worried about me getting spoiled. When I cried, she\u2019d say to my mother, \u201cSee? You\u2019ve spoiled her \u2014 how is she supposed to survive this life?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Grandma Dina fed stray cats. Grandpa didn\u2019t like it, but she fed the cats anyway. And when she went out to feed them, for a few minutes, she became a different, unrecognizable woman. At first, with her usual expression, she scolded them for causing trouble, and then, as they ate, she began to smile slightly, stroking their thin, fluffy backs. She would rest her hand on her hip, lean down, run her hand over each cat once or twice and smile. Then she would take the bowl away, straighten up, and her face would return to its usual expression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One morning, I found the body of a big gray-eyed cat under a bush \u2014 one of the cats that had been visiting my grandma my whole life, for 10 years. He must have died of old age or illness. I started crying and ran to my grandma. She twisted a towel into a rope and hit me on the side: \u201cStop wailing \u2014 you\u2019re a big girl now!\u201d That evening, when Mom came home from work, I said, \u201cI think our grandma is a robot.\u201d Mom replied, \u201cDon\u2019t be silly \u2014 finish your soup.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Grandma Dina was made entirely of metal, with no soft parts at all. If she had lived to see today, she wouldn\u2019t have had to adapt. She knew how to pull herself together. She didn\u2019t know how to communicate with people, but she sure knew how to pull herself together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I now understand, she had no right to feel compassion for herself, and therefore she did not feel that compassion for others. She found compassion dangerous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We truly can no longer afford such emotions, such compassion, as we did before the war. We wouldn\u2019t be able to survive like that, let alone work. We don\u2019t write emails about uncomfortable working conditions, as that German woman did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Moreover, life during wartime starkly contrasts our reality with Instagram \u201cselfie culture\u201d \u2014 the cult of the self and self-realization under the motto \u201cI owe nothing to anyone.\u201d Fashion blogs about \u201csuccess, resources and self-determination\u201d are irrelevant to people whose apartment has no heating and who have to care for a sick child.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The daily deaths and the brutality of the Russian attacks have changed us all irrevocably. Ukrainian women have built up a layer of armor over their skin. They are fighting, living under daily attacks, working and caring for their families despite everything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But if it were possible to choose, I\u2019d want to keep my soft little belly. I\u2019d want to hug people, hold them close and feel the warmth of their hands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Grandma Dina would have said I wasn\u2019t ready for this life. But I believe that love is worth the risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Translated from Ukrainian by Liubov Kukharenko<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n