1. Morning

“Wake up! Come on, get up!” 

I am awake but refuse to open my eyes. The sound of my father’s voice is coming through a blurry dream that is now fading and flying away. “Jarka, get up now!”

I slowly crack my eyelids open but I see nothing. My room is still pitch black.  A dark silhouette of my father emerges through the darkness, leans over the bed as he impatiently urges, “It’s getting late! Get up, we will miss the train! Hurry up!” He sounds stressed so I sluggishly move my body that still feels like molasses. “But I am still tired, daddy.” 

I don’t understand, uh, isn’t it Saturday? There is no school on Saturdays and I want to sleep. Why do I have to get up so early?

“Don’t you want to learn how to play the piano? You will never learn if you are lazy. Last warning, we have to leave in 20 minutes and it’s 5:30 already!”

Yeah, I remember now. We are going to see daddy’s friend. He is a professor and a very good musician. He will teach me how to play the piano. It is very special that he agreed to teach me because he is a very busy man.  But I am not a morning person, especially not at 5 years old. 

“Ok, ok, fine,” I sigh.  I rub my eyes and drag myself to the bathroom. 

“Get dressed and eat your breakfast, hurry!” I hear his impatient voice again as I reluctantly get dressed and plop myself in the chair at the kitchen table. In front of me sits a piece of poppy seed strudel. I hate poppy seeds and he knows that. Yet, I get it served for breakfast every single morning. I take a bite and slowly chew the layers of the gooey white dough. It is full of lots and lots of ugly little black angry poppy dots. They get stuck in my teeth. Blah, I am not even hungry. I never have much appetite in the morning, not to mention this early in the morning. I keep on chewing but can’t swallow. I am about to gag. 

“Go brush your teeth. We need to leave in 2 minutes! Why are you so slow?”

“Ok daddy,” I say with tears in my eyes and start brushing my poppy dotted teeth, food still in my mouth. Gross, yucky poppies, I spit them all out. Now it is a disgusting mess in the sink that makes me want to gag all over again. 

Dad waits for me at the door, his hand sitting on the door handle. I put my boots on, jacket, hat, and scarf too, grab my music book bag and I am ready to go. It is freezing cold outside. 

I don’t know this yet. My father is mentally ill. He is obsessed with piano and he is obsessed with me becoming a pianist. He has predetermined and predestined my path. It is his decision alone that will follow me for the rest of my life. And I have no say in it. Why does he have this power over me? He is no God, is he?