It's the End of an Era

I'm sure we all know by now that Aliya got married, but I have avoided writing anything about it. Mainly because of my personal life that took a drastic turn to worse these past few weeks, but also, because what am I going to say?

Hi Aliya, I love you and your gymnastics so much that I take personal offence to you basically ending your career in this abrupt and weird manner, please don't make this any worse by making babies. See you in Tokyo, thanks! xoxo

Just kidding. It's actually an incredibly happy occasion and I wish the best to her and Lesha, may their extremely good-looking babies choose gymnastics over skeleton.

Of course her flowers and nails had to be purple. It's also adorable, how Lesha uses purple hearts in his instagram when referring to Aliya.

But seriously Russia... Grishina, Semy and Ablyazin, Afan, Rodionova, Beliyavski and now Aliya. All married/pregnant/both within one year. What a crazy year for Russian gymnastics, and that's saying a lot since Russian gymnastics is pretty crazy every year.

Marriage in my country is basically an ancient tradition that you might do after you've had a couple of kids, lived together for minimum of 10 years and have enough money to throw it away for a party. And it's still pretty rare even after that. So is this a Russian thing? I checked the average age for marriage in Russia and while it is lower than in western or northern Europe and United States, the gymnasts are definitely pushing it. We don't know if Aliya is pregnant, but considering the way marriage worked for the other gymnasts, it's a possibility. And if she is, we can pretty safely say that Tokyo is out of the question. And so is probably any other Olympics beyond that.

I have been slowly preparing for her retirement ever since she announced that she was going to continue after London, I just took it as a fact then that the next deadline would be Rio and there was no extending it, if she even made it there. And boy did it look like she was not going to make it for awhile, especially since her health started its decline in 2014. 2015 was basically preparation for the inevitable and 2016 was supposed to be the victorious closing ceremonies of her career. So as you can see, I was making the emotional separation process easier for myself, acknowledging the end and preparing for it in advance. Those few credits of psychology I had to take were useful after all...

But then Aliya had to mess it all up, giving interviews how she was not done and would only take a break and then come back. I knew I shouldn't hope, but I did because I wanted to. So to hell with my conscious efforts to end our relationship as planned, we were going to Tokyo!!! So naturally this wedding was a slap to my face. That I deserved. I should have read and believed this interview instead. There Lesha kindly tells us, that Aliya really wants babies more than anything right now.

Anyway, this is probably the ending of an era, the reign of Aliya Mustafina. She was a special gymnast in many ways. Not only was her gymnastics beautiful and captivating, but she had a stage presence that no other gymnast currently has. She had some kind magical combination of palpable ambition, intensity, focus and strength, and every competition without her feels just a little bit empty. And her significance to Russian gymnastics is enormous. She really held her country together during their best and worst times and proved that she was born to be a leader. Her persona and medals alone probably kept their spirits high and funding in place. I feel like I could write a book about how important she is and how her place is among the Soviet/Russian gymnastics royalty right next to game-changers like Larisa Latynina, Olga Korbut and Svetlana Khorkina.

And now I seem like a crazy person. But I'm just really invested in Russian gymnastics, okay!?! And Aliya is My Tsaritsa, it's my responsibility as a peasant and resident of Aliyastan to obsess over the royalty.

And maybe, just maybe my goodbyes in this post are all for nothing. Maybe she keeps going, why should a marriage end a career. Maybe she even pops out a baby, straps it onto her back, swings around the bars like nothing and wins the gold in Tokyo with her upgraded routine with a D-score of 9.0. If anybody can do it, it's Aliya.