Exilian

I'd like to express my deepest gratitude to my invaluable friend, Ashot Vartanyan.
He's been helping me sinceuniversity. He was my literary mentor. True, not my first, but my second. After all, when I was studying at the Gorky Literary Institute, I was under the mentorship of Ruslan Kireev.

Ashot helped me with literally everything. He was one of those people who helped without any self-interest, simply because, as he once said, he saw something in me.
Ashot helped me defend my thesis with distinction, and then often invited me to Old Arbat for lunch, just to talk about life, or to have tea. He never supported anything that was going on around him. And he remained steadfast.
And that's why I'm proud to have been his friend.

We wrote two books together throughout our lives. One of them was dedicated to my dear grandfather.

It so happened that Ashot had been getting sick frequently lately. He gave so much to others and helped so many people that he completely forgot about himself.
He completely forgot about his own heart. Many people told him to pay attention. But he continued to live as if nothing had happened. To live and help people.
In the last two years, he called an ambulance very often because his health was getting worse.
And just recently, I learned that he had passed away.
It was a real blow for me. It was sudden. Because I didn't even have time to properly meet him again and give him the book "Genesis of Lacrima," as I had planned.

Honestly, I'm completely dejected now. Because I don't understand what's next. How did this happen... After all, just recently, his being alive was taken for granted. And now everything. Everything is in the past. Our get-togethers in cafes, our conversations, our collaboration on the first two books are in the past. How did this happen? Why?
One thing comforts me. We managed to do a lot together, and he truly guided me all these years. He led me forward along my creative path.
But our paths diverged....

Oh, if only we could truly know that that (other) world exists. And Ashot really is alive, somewhere out there... far, far away. It's just a shame I can't say "thank you" to him again for everything he did. I can't shake his hand anymore...

That's very sad news: I'm very sorry for your loss.

I have similar feelings sometimes about my Masters' degree supervisor, who I didn't manage to stay in close contact with much in the one or two years after I graduated, and then it was suddenly too late because she passed away very suddently and unexpectedly in 2019. It's hard to know how to adjust to these things.

Yeah. Thanks for kind words, friend.
I understand your loss and you understand mine. Ashot was my mentor all these years. And i will not forget him. I will never forget all his help, our dialogues in cafe, our common work with books.
He was my real literature mentor. Its really heavy loss for me and for all literature world, i must say.

We completed our mission with Ashot. But i really want to see him again. I want again to sit in cafe, to drink tea with him, to discuss something, to speak about literature, about politics, about life... And i can`t do it.

Yes, I think that's a very common stage of grief. It's natural to spend some time feeling like that.

Often the best thing you can do to move forward is to think about what you can do to honour that memory. This coming year I'm doing a project with one of my Masters' supervisor's other former students, now we're both post-doctoral researchers, and that feels on some level nice for mental closure as it's something that could never have happened without the work she put into both of our careers.

Yeah, you`re right, my friend. To go forward is only an option.
Ashot always wanted from me to go forward in the literary process. To make more books, more stories.
And i am now thinking, he didnt want to see how people around him are sad, even because of this tragedy. He was very positive man in all aspects. He always smiled, despite of his not easy life.

Today i`m organising the memory evening with my friends. Everyone will say about dear Ashot. Everyone who knew him, will be in this meeting. And i will say about his positive character and about his smile.