понеделник, 1 февруари 2010 г.

Dear Alika,

By the time you are able to read this, your English will surely be much stronger than you Bulgarian, so here goes: some random thoughts that I feel like sharing with you.

I want to tell you what is so special about today.

Today you were born. Not "so-and-so-many years ago today"; the real today. You are less than a day old. Come to think of it, yesterday already belongs to the pre-Alikan era, and that's something which will always seem a little shady for you. We all have the feeling that the time before we existed belongs to some distant, shapeless, surreal "past". The world comes into existence when we do, and your world was born today for you. Enjoy it! It's a nice world, and from what I've seen, it's getting better every day. (Like it did today.)

Every moment of our life we make choices that ultimately shape us and define us, and events happen around us that affect us. For you, today is the start of it - today, on the day of your birth, your potential knows no limits. It is amazing just to think about it. Life abounds in opportunities and chances. Seize the ones that make you happy.

Your parents, whom you know so well, have not always been your parents. They became parents today. You probably cannot quite imagine them as non-parents, but that's all they have been so far. Their learning how to parent you starts today.
Enjoy your time with them, and when they make mistakes, cut them some slack - it's because at parenthood they are just babies, less than a day old at the moment.

Your uncle was nobody's uncle yesterday, and I was nobody's aunt. From today on, we are aunt and uncle. I hope we will have the chance to be close with you, so when you are reading this, it doesn't sound like a letter from a stranger.
More importantly, I hope distance and language will not be an obstacle to getting to know your cousin Deyan. For the sake of both of you, I hope we will be able to make it possible for you to spend time together so you can feel comfortable with each other. Cousins are immediate family, and let me tell you from experience that the Efremov cousins in particular are a real treasure.

So there, I had my first conversation with you, little baby!
Welcome to the world, and have a nice life :)