In 100 days of war in Ukraine, countless lives have been forever shattered, ripped apart, upended. For tens of thousands, life has been brutally ended. Those who have survived sometimes barely know how to begin picking up the pieces.
When a house symbolizing a lifetime of labor and memories is destroyed, how does one rebuild?
Nila Zelinska and her husband, Eduard, returned for the first time this week to what used to be their home in a village outside Kyiv. It was in ruins, reduced to charred walls with no roof by shelling in the days after Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine.
“Rex! Rex!” she yelled, calling for the black Labrador they’d been forced to leave behind. Only later did the faithful hound finally reappear, tail wagging under its owner’s loving caresses.
But Rex aside, nothing was as it had been.
Instead of a home, their broken house is now a symbol of their broken lives.
