Five years ago I bought a one-way ticket for
Vietnam. I had no job, no long-term plan; only two large suitcases and enough
savings to last me a year. More importantly, I had an unfinished novel
manuscript that needed working on and enough existential dread and anxiety to
propel me forward. I didn’t end up staying long in Hanoi; four months was just
long enough to finish my manuscript, and to realize I was missing something.
The truth is, by 2018 I had a master’s and a career but was missing an aspect
of my life that at the time felt vital: love. And I ended up going back to the
only place I thought I would find it.
It is said that
we don’t
follow our hearts, we
follow our fears.
So who’s to say what I
was following when I
traveled 5,534.98 miles away
to find love. Was I
following my heart? Or
was I
so afraid of being lonely that I
bought a ticket
to the only place I knew
where I would find it.
Back in 2017 I had met a man in Paris, and I
had been romanced, wined, and dined as if I were the main character of a swanky
rom com. But I left before we even had the chance to begin anything, and I had
spent over a year wondering what we could have been. So, when my time in Hanoi
was nearing its end, I thought love was propelling me back to the City of
Light. What I thought was love, was fear—as referenced in my poem from my
soon-to-be-released poetry book The Other Crown. Fear of being alone,
fear of being unwanted, fear of being unloved. It’s true that we can find love
anywhere, but for some reason, I was convinced I had to go back for this one
person. So I did.
I ended up back in Paris, once again, with no
job and no long-term plan—except to fall in love. And fall in love I did. With
my ex-lover, with the city, with my newfound anonymity and independence. The
guy didn’t last, but my plans adapted, and I ended up planting roots where I
thought I wouldn’t. And I ended up letting go of fears I thought I’d never let
go of. In place of relationships, I re-found the love that had sustained me in
the past—that of my female friendships and of my mother. And that’s how the
final chapter of my poetry books ends.
It’s always been very important in all the
stories I tell—whether they’re poems or novels—to not have the female protagonist
end up with a guy at the end. I always purposely leave it ambitious. Because
that’s not the point, ultimately. And although I was writing it, I finally had
to live it too. I moved to Paris for love; or rather, because I was afraid of being
alone. But I ended up staying because I grew to love everything I could be and
do while I was on my own. In reading my work, I hope that other women can see
that they too can be strengthened through their friendships and their own
tenacity to take care of themselves and the world around them. Once we realize
this, there’s really nothing that can stop us.
My illustrated poetry book The Other Crown
is currently available for pre-order on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Google Play, Kobo and other
online bookstores. Check out my Instagram
and TikTok @emmy_speaks to connect with me further.
Book blurb: The Other Crown is a collection of poems that asks the question:
how much power do women have to give up in order to fall in
love? Hristova's second poetry book explores themes of
love, romance and sexuality as they are intertwined with the
patriarchy. Questioning how she gains her power as a
woman, Hristova attempts to unwind the complicated nature of
relationships, societal expectations, and the imbalance of power between the
sexes. The Other Crown is a love letter to women: their
love lives, their heartbreaks, and their friendships with one another.
Available for pre-order on: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Google Play, Kobo and other
online bookstores.
Author bio: Emmanuella Hristova was born in Oakland, California and
grew up in the Bay Area. She is the third daughter to Bulgarian parents who
immigrated to California shortly before she was born. She began drawing at the
ripe age of four and studied the fine arts for five years in high school.
There, she received many art accolades including a Congressional award for her
piece Boy in Red in 2009. In 2015, she received her Bachelor of Arts in
Linguistics from the University of California, Berkeley. She began writing
poetry at age twenty-four when she was in graduate school. She earned her
Master’s in Education from the same alma mater in 2017. Emmanuella spent two
years as an English teacher in Richmond, California. During that time, she
self-published her first poetry collection: The Day My Kisses Tasted Like
Disorder. Her poems have been published in For Women Who Roar Issue 2:
Power, 365 Days of Covid, and She Rose Issue 3: The Goddess. The
Other Crown is her second self-published poetry collection. Currently, she
is writing her second novel while seeking literary representation for her
first. She speaks English, Bulgarian, Spanish and now resides in Paris, France,
where she is teaching English and learning French.
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