My mother was born in the beginning of World War II in a small village. By this time her father was already in war, from where he didn’t return. She was ten years old when her mother died. She was hit by a train.I remember her saying once: “I was at school, in the middle of the lesson, one of my classmates opened the classroom door and yelled: Keto, your mother is dead”. Since then she was raised by her brothers and their wives. I don’t know much about her childhood, because she didn’t like to speak about it. I only have fragments, those I’ve gathered through the years, randomly said by her or her relatives.

Keto, my mother, was 22 years old when she got married in a high mountainous village, where I and my brother were born. She wasn’t a strict parent but she wasn’t loving mother either.

After finishing the school, I moved to the capital, Tbilisi, to continue studying. This was the period when my father died. After finishing the college, I stayed in the city. My mother gave me a freedom, but at the same time, she had no interest in my life there. Because of that I was tormented with the feeling of anger and offence for a long time.

Every time I visited home, back in the village where I grew up and I constantly missed, I could see that no one was waiting for me and I was a stranger there. Slowly an abyss emerged between us and we became strangers to each other.

It took me years to overcome the offence and accept the reality. It took me years to understand that we are both similar in many ways. I know that now, after so many years, my mother thinks that I am an indifferent daughter as well. And I can’t tell her how much I always loved her, how I always wanted her to be happy and how I always wanted to feel that I was someone who she loved.

I wanted this book to be about my mother. But in the end I realized that this book is about us, about me and my mother.