A Girl on a Wheel dreams

war story

Ukraine - Dec 29, 2023

A Girl on a Wheel
dreams

By Oksana Astapovych

Ukraine,
Dec 29, 2023

ai–painting and story by Maria Ivashenko
ai
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ai"Honor, achievement, dignity" was the motto of Pasha's life, he never gave up. I am Maria, the wife of the deceased military senior sergeant Pavlo Viktorovych Ivashchenko.

aiPasha and I met not as children, but as adults, each with our own baggage of joys and sorrows. But a miracle happened. There was no need to make an offer, we understood everything after the first conversation.

aiThis is a love that happens once in a lifetime, when you don't have to say anything and prove anything, just look into your beloved's eyes and everything is already clear. When you don't have to call to feel what's on your beloved's mind.

aiPasha became for my son a father, raised him as a man. His son became for me like my own. Fate also gave us a wonderful son, and the cherry on the cake, dad's joy and happiness, daughter Anna-Mariyka, who unfortunately will remember dad only through photos and videos because the damned war took him away from her when she was only 1 year old.

He allowed me to be that girl on the wheel... full of happiness, looking to the future... always caught by strong loving hands

aiThe war caught us at home in Kharkiv. I still remember how I stood at 5 in the morning under artillery fire between sleeping children and my husband and was unable to wake him up. Life was divided into before and after, because I knew that he would go to the defense, and I would not hold him back, because "Who but us?", because the catastrophe has come to our home.

aiOn February 24, 2022, in the afternoon, we left our native city for a safer region. On February 27, Pasha had already joined the ranks of the Armed Forces as part of the 28th OMBr named for the Knights of the Winter Campaign.

aiFrom the first days, they were constantly at the frontline, defending Odesa at first then the Mykolaiv region from the russian invasion. On August 29, 2022, near the village of Stepova Dolyna, their unit went on the offensive to liberate Kherson Oblast. It was in that battle that Pasha received multiple shrapnel wounds incompatible with life.

aiALMOST A YEAR HAS PASSED and I still can't believe that I will never again feel his touch, feel his strong embrace, hear him quietly and so tenderly saying "I adore you, girl". We had so many plans, but...

aiHe has allowed me to be that girl on the wheel, who forgets all worries, is full of happiness and looks towards the future. Because the girl know - even if she falters, she will always be held and caught by strong loving hands. I will definitely remember how it is to be that girl, to keep balance, because I feel like my Angel is always near and protecting us."