Not Laura

Get to know G

I like spooky shit. That is probably the best possible opening line for a “get to know me,” and honestly, it tells you a lot already. I like spooky shit. A haunted house? I’ll be there. An old abandoned prison? Let’s go. Someone says a demon lives in a shed? Excellent. I would like to irritate the demon and see what happens.

I have done this enough times that I’ve developed a certain reputation among my peers. If someone has a weird haunting event, a family member in distress, or a suspicious amount of bad luck, they reach out to me and ask for advice. I don’t see myself as any kind of supernatural expert. I have never visited a friend’s house and actually discovered a ghost. What I have discovered is a need for someone to talk to, and apparently, I am quite good at sitting there and listening while they unpack the weirdness of their lives.

I guess I should address the question I get asked the most. Why. Why make this post? Why not stay anonymous, as many people do?

Well, my writing is a little too personal for that. I write about my own life so much that pretending to be someone else would feel ridiculous. I am me, sharing my thoughts and memories. They might work on their own, but I think they come together better when you know at least a little about the strange human behind them.

Why am I writing?

The answer is because I have to.

My writing days go way back, but for years, I mostly wrote poetry. I have always been very closed off inside my own thoughts. Sometimes they get so locked up that writing is the only way to drag them out into the daylight. So for years I secretly wrote poetry, both in Estonian and in English. It was a kind of therapy.

After I had my daughter, something changed in me.

I spent years trying to figure out who this new version of me was. She is much colder and more calculated compared to the older, very heated version. After years of hibernation, I picked up my pen again.

But something was different.

I did not want to write short poems anymore. I wanted to write stories. I was always too restless for stories before. Now the new version of me has the patience for them. And the desire.

I am not a good writer. I have never tried to sell myself as one. But I do have some interesting stories. My life has been a little… unusual. And I have not even told the story about the time I slipped and fell into a pile of dead calves yet. Yes. More decay stories are coming, don’t worry.

When I write the first draft is a disaster. Absolute chaos. The words are not in logical order. They are just a pile of spelling mistakes and half-finished thoughts. I throw everything I am thinking into one long line, and then later I sit down and slowly turn this chaotic G-English into something resembling real English.

I am spite. I run on spite. I was named out of spite.

My mother always loved telling the story of my name. My father vetoed the name she originally wanted for me, so they agreed on Laura instead. But when I was born, my father was living with another woman, so my mother was alone at the hospital.

She named me whatever she wanted. Which, of course, was the vetoed name.

And when my father eventually showed up and wanted to move back in, he just signed the paperwork with his head down.

My name is not Laura.

From very early on, I knew I did not want the life that was written out for me. A low-paying job, some guy from the hometown, a couple of kids, another low-paying job while he works in Finland, cheating on me with every woman available, and then yelling at me because the dusting wasn’t good enough.

No, thank you!

So when I got my first job at eighteen, I didn’t wait very long to escape. A friend told me she knew someone offering her a job in Sweden on a farm. I immediately said, “I speak English quite well, take me with you.”

So the two of us left the country to work on a random farm, not really knowing who was meeting us there or what exactly we had signed up for.

I’m not going to lie, the first few days I was on the edge of tears.

But eventually I learned to love it.

My body got used to the long, hard days. I did everything there. Remodeling houses, supervising work, and changing the oil on a tractor. I was lucky that our boss was an incredibly patient and easygoing man. I liked him a lot. He would literally be on the phone talking me through how to change the damn oil step by step.

The amount of patience this man had with two confused young Estonian girls was honestly impressive.

I learned a lot from him. I learned not to take things too seriously. I learned that getting angry changes absolutely nothing when things get hard.

And things did get hard sometimes.

All together, I went back there six years in a row.

Selling my health to a rich Scandinavian country paid well. It gave me enough money to break the dark little life path that had been written for me back home. I never moved back.

Instead, I went to the big city and worked all kinds of jobs. A photo store. A cruise ship. Eventually, I ended up in hospitality, and it felt like home.

Some of the many professions I have taken on over the years.

I probably would have stayed on that path in Estonia. I even got a very nice offer from a hotel I really wanted to work for.

But then things changed.

I fell in love.

I went on a date with this American guy who was just about to leave Estonia after almost two years there. Eight months later, I was standing in Shanghai, China, with him, giving him a very enthusiastic and probably unnecessary lecture about communism.

Right in the middle of my speech, he asked me to marry him.

And I said, “Why not.”

I don’t know why I said it like that. I think I was trying to play it cool.

So I ended up in America, starting a completely new life. I didn’t come here looking for a better life. I already had a good one. I gave up everything for that new start.

Even my wardrobe.

I regret that part slightly.

I came with one suitcase.

After years of being a mother and a wife, I got lost inside those roles. A full identity crisis. So I started writing again to find myself.

I also started working out. This has become one of my biggest passions. You can find me at my home gym four to five times a week on a very strict schedule. I love it. It keeps me sane, clears my head, and I enjoy what it does to my body.

So here I am writing nonsense on Substack, balancing between two identities.

Am I American now or still Estonian?

Legally both.

Emotionally… still figuring it out.

Random facts no one asked for:

I am quite a basic girly girl. I love makeup, styling outfits, skincare, all of it. I research everything before buying anything. I read about lipstick like I’m preparing a thesis. You will rarely see me outside in sweatpants looking unassembled.

I am a Sagittarius, if anyone cares about that.

I love sweets. Chocolate, baked goods, desserts, all of it. I cannot say no.

I speak English quite fluently. I still have an accent, and I actually like it. Unfortunately, the Estonian accent is not very sexy. It sounds… aggressive. Also, I cannot pronounce the word “suggestion.” My tongue simply refuses to cooperate.

I am very introverted and shy. I don’t usually walk up to people and start conversations. You are more likely to find me hiding quietly in a corner somewhere. But once I warm up, I can become very chatty. And I think I am quite funny. Although in America, my dry sarcasm does not always land properly.

I like dark jokes. Make fun of me, I enjoy it. Just don’t be mean about it.

I don’t have a resting bitch face.

I have a resting “I might have cursed your entire family” face.

But I mostly don’t curse families. It’s just my face.

I am Estonian. We don’t show emotions on our faces. I like to call this my anti-wrinkle strategy. Wrinkles can’t appear in places where there is no movement. Nature’s Botox.

I love animals and nature. I have a soft spot for snakes. The common viper is my favorite, and of course, the king cobra. Beautiful creatures. My favorite moths are the white witch, the black witch, and the atlas moth.

My favorite color is red.

I am quite a good cook. I’m not always great at expressing my feelings directly, so if I really like someone, I usually start cooking for them instead.

I choose very carefully who I restack here. If I restack someone’s work, it means two things. I think the writing is good, and I like the person behind it.

My comfort show is the TV show: What We Do in the Shadows. I quote it far too often and laugh at my own jokes. Mostly people don’t recognize the reference when I say it in the accent, but:
“This is the way we talk in Tucson, Arizona.”

I am a big music lover. I like to take my time with songs and really listen to everything. The instruments, the lyrics, the message.

Albums that have been especially influential for me or are just ridiculously good:

• Reanimation – by Linkin Park

• Violator – by Depeche Mode

• TEKKNO – by Electric Callboy

• The Works – by Queen

• Post Traumatic – by Mike Shinoda

• Once – by Nightwish

My favorite album of 2025 was The Sky, the Earth & All Between by Architects.

I love that album. Every single song is an absolute banger and could stand on its own without the rest of the tracks backing it up.

So that’s it, I guess.

If you made it to the end, I’m sorry. Next time, we can go back to rotting animals.

I would genuinely love to hear some random facts about you, wonderful people who survived this entire post.

Please share your strange little details. I am very excited to learn about you.

Aitäh, et sa oled siin!

G.