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A Doll of Straw and Coal: A Memory That Shaped My Heart. By Masguda Shamsutdinova
In the quiet embrace of a hidden Tatar village, nestled at the foot of the Ural Mountains in Bashkortostan, my childhood unfolded like a gentle folk melody. I was five years old, a tender age when the world feels both vast and intimate, and every experience carves itself deeply into a young heart. It was there, in the simplicity of our rural life, that a small straw doll with coal-black eyes became my first muse—a fleeting yet profound companion whose loss would resonate through my music and memory for decades.
My mother, with her skilled hands and boundless love, crafted the doll from golden straw, its form delicate yet sturdy, a reflection of our village’s earthy resilience. She gave it eyes of coal, dark and gleaming, that seemed to hold secrets of the Siberian winds. To my young eyes, this doll was no mere toy; it was a friend, a confidant, a living presence in my world of imagination. We played on the porch under the warm sun, whispering stories and dreams as the Ural Mountains stood sentinel in the distance. Those moments were my first compositions—unwritten songs of joy and wonder, sung in the language of a child’s heart.
One day, as the sun cast long shadows across our wooden porch, my mother called me inside for a chore. I left my doll behind, trusting the safety of our quiet village. But when I returned, my world shifted. There, in the soft light, was our cow, contentedly chewing my precious doll. The straw was vanishing into her mouth, and the coal eyes—those sparkling, soulful eyes—were being crushed. The cow’s own dark gaze met mine, and in that moment, they seemed to transform, mirroring the coal eyes of my doll. It was a haunting image, one that burned itself into my memory, blending loss with an eerie sense of connection.
At five, I was too young to fully grasp the weight of my emotions, yet they overwhelmed me. My tender heart churned with grief for my lost friend, the doll I had believed was real, a gift from my mother’s hands. Tears streamed down my face as I mourned not just the doll but the stories we shared, the dreams we spun. Yet, amidst the sadness, a flicker of worry emerged—for the cow. What if those coal eyes harmed her? Even in my pain, my young heart reached out, torn between loss and care for another living being. It was a moment of profound complexity, one that taught me the depth of love and the sting of impermanence.
That day on the porch left an indelible mark on my soul. The image of my straw doll, its coal eyes gleaming, and the cow’s dark, coal-like stare became a recurring motif in my life. As I grew, I carried these memories into my music, where they found expression in the plaintive melodies and intricate harmonies of my compositions. My work, deeply rooted in Tatar folk traditions, often explores themes of loss, memory, and the delicate beauty of fleeting moments—echoes of that childhood wound. The pentatonic scales of our Tatar music, with their haunting resonance, became a vessel for the emotions I first felt at five, when my world was both broken and expanded by a cow’s unwitting act.
Years later, now living in Seattle, far from the Ural Mountains, I still see that doll in my mind’s eye. Its straw form, crafted by my mother’s love, and its coal eyes, sparkling with imagined life, remain as vivid as ever. The cow, no friend in that moment, left me with a lasting image: her dark eyes, transformed by my grief into something akin to coal, staring back at me across time. These memories, so impactful to my tender young heart, shaped me as a composer and a scholar. They taught me that even in loss, there is beauty; in pain, there is creation.
As I weave Tatar folk motifs into my symphonies and chamber music, I honor the village girl who wept for her doll. That girl, with her fragile yet resilient heart, taught me to listen—to the sounds of nature, the stories of my people, and the quiet stirrings of my own soul. My music is a tapestry of those early lessons, a tribute to the straw doll and the mother who made it, and a reflection of a child’s heart that learned to hold both sorrow and care in the same tender embrace.
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