INVISIBLE WOMAN
VISIBLE MOMENTS
One Month Later
A month ago, I became the woman in an international “Russian spy” story. What happened to her after the headlines moved on?
She built a website, continued examining the documents and finally joined Facebook.
That last development deserves a small celebration. In a recorded conversation, my former partner, a Spanish naval commander, was explicitly told that my lack of a social-media presence was a reason for suspicion.
Well, congratulations: I now have one. There are eleven social-media icons on my website. Do click to your heart’s content.
And if anyone expected the publicity to intimidate me into silence, an observation from my work in IT: this is not a bug now. It is a feature.
It has given me an opportunity to tell my own story—and make the questions behind it more visible.
This week on the blog
1. I AM BRITAIN
One month, two newspaper subscriptions and an unexpected reflection on belonging.
What happens when you become a character in the news, then start investigating the machinery behind the story? This article looks at the month after the international headlines: British humour, changing relationships, continued conversations with journalists and the discovery that public exposure can create opportunities as well as difficulties.
It also explores something more fundamental: why challenging British institutions is entirely compatible with loving Britain.
I can question the exercise of public power without surrendering my sense of belonging. Independent thinking, documentary inquiry and a willingness to examine contradictions are part of what makes Britain home.
Read the article →
2. Dear NATO, We Need to Talk. Again
In July 2025, we submitted a formal complaint about discrimination and degrading treatment within MARCOM.
Fifteen months later, on 9 October 2026, the ACO Data Protection Board reported that its fact-finding had not identified separate complaint or grievance administrative logs beyond the specified data-protection complaint and my correspondence.
That does not prove that no investigation occurred. It does raise a precise question: what happened administratively between receipt of the original complaint and the response to it?
Was it registered? Who considered it? Were allegations about conduct within MARCOM distinguished from decisions belonging to British or Spanish authorities? What process followed, and where is its record?
The article reconstructs the correspondence, explains the subsequent appeal and complaints, and distinguishes an answer to a letter from an examination of the complaint it contains.
Read the article →
3. Chapter One — A Woman Out of Place
Before the security controversy, there were two people who met on Tinder.
The opening chapter of Invisible Woman returns to the beginning: attraction, conversation, a midnight meal and the ease with which another person can seem familiar.
It also returns to my family history and the expectations I associated with an officer’s uniform: responsibility, loyalty and personal dignity.
How much do we recognise the person standing in front of us? How much do we recognise a pattern we have carried for decades?
This is the personal beginning of a story that would later acquire institutional descriptions, administrative consequences and international headlines.
Read the chapter →
4. I AM UKRAINE
An expanded republication of my earlier essay on cultural identity and the ways I think and act under pressure.
Russian space, Polish refusal and Ukrainian determination form a personal framework for understanding my response to the events around me.
These are reflections on my own cultural inheritance, rather than fixed descriptions of entire peoples. They help explain why I questioned, why I stayed and why I began creating the means to defend my position.
The revised essay adds context to the earlier piece and provides a companion to I AM BRITAIN: different cultural resources, brought together in one person’s way of thinking and acting.
Read the article →
5. The Architecture of an Invisible Woman — Sunday Thoughts
Rebuilding my website began as an exercise in organising my professional and creative work. It became a question about identity and institutional power.
In one part of the site, I describe the identities I have constructed through qualifications, work and personal choices. In another, I examine descriptions that institutions have constructed about me.
Who created those descriptions? Were they facts, allegations, inferences or opinions? Who verified them? At what point did they acquire administrative consequences?
The article examines how a person becomes an institutional category—and what it takes to participate in questioning and correcting that account.
Read the article →
Still unanswered
This week’s writing moves between personal identity and institutional records, but the questions remain connected.
Who gets to describe a person?
What evidence supports that description?
When does it become a basis for action?
And when the person challenges it, who is responsible for examining the challenge?
A description of me is not automatically evidence about me. A response to my correspondence does not, by itself, establish that its substantive questions have been resolved.
My task remains to trace those distinctions through the documents, while keeping clear what is established, what is disputed and what remains unknown.
Next week
I plan to publish the next chapter of Invisible Woman.
There are also outstanding questions and response checkpoints involving NATO, the British Ministry of Defence and Hertfordshire Constabulary. Depending on what arrives, I expect to examine the answers, the documents they disclose and the questions they leave unresolved.
An answer may move the story forward. A refusal may clarify an institution’s position. And another procedural detour may deserve a diagram.
I cannot promise a sensation next week. I can promise to read the correspondence carefully and tell you openly if anything important emerges.
Every Friday, Visible Moments brings together what emerged during the week, what I published, and what still requires an answer.
Today's song
DEUX FAÇONS D’AVOIR CHAUD
A month ago, I became the woman in an international “Russian spy” story. What happened to her after the headlines moved on?
She built a website, continued examining the documents and finally joined Facebook.
That last development deserves a small celebration. In a recorded conversation, my former partner, a Spanish naval commander, was explicitly told that my lack of a social-media presence was a reason for suspicion.
Well, congratulations: I now have one. There are eleven social-media icons on my website. Do click to your heart’s content.
And if anyone expected the publicity to intimidate me into silence, an observation from my work in IT: this is not a bug now. It is a feature.
It has given me an opportunity to tell my own story—and make the questions behind it more visible.
This week on the blog
1. I AM BRITAIN
One month, two newspaper subscriptions and an unexpected reflection on belonging.
What happens when you become a character in the news, then start investigating the machinery behind the story? This article looks at the month after the international headlines: British humour, changing relationships, continued conversations with journalists and the discovery that public exposure can create opportunities as well as difficulties.
It also explores something more fundamental: why challenging British institutions is entirely compatible with loving Britain.
I can question the exercise of public power without surrendering my sense of belonging. Independent thinking, documentary inquiry and a willingness to examine contradictions are part of what makes Britain home.
Read the article →
2. Dear NATO, We Need to Talk. Again
In July 2025, we submitted a formal complaint about discrimination and degrading treatment within MARCOM.
Fifteen months later, on 9 October 2026, the ACO Data Protection Board reported that its fact-finding had not identified separate complaint or grievance administrative logs beyond the specified data-protection complaint and my correspondence.
That does not prove that no investigation occurred. It does raise a precise question: what happened administratively between receipt of the original complaint and the response to it?
Was it registered? Who considered it? Were allegations about conduct within MARCOM distinguished from decisions belonging to British or Spanish authorities? What process followed, and where is its record?
The article reconstructs the correspondence, explains the subsequent appeal and complaints, and distinguishes an answer to a letter from an examination of the complaint it contains.
Read the article →
3. Chapter One — A Woman Out of Place
Before the security controversy, there were two people who met on Tinder.
The opening chapter of Invisible Woman returns to the beginning: attraction, conversation, a midnight meal and the ease with which another person can seem familiar.
It also returns to my family history and the expectations I associated with an officer’s uniform: responsibility, loyalty and personal dignity.
How much do we recognise the person standing in front of us? How much do we recognise a pattern we have carried for decades?
This is the personal beginning of a story that would later acquire institutional descriptions, administrative consequences and international headlines.
Read the chapter →
4. I AM UKRAINE
An expanded republication of my earlier essay on cultural identity and the ways I think and act under pressure.
Russian space, Polish refusal and Ukrainian determination form a personal framework for understanding my response to the events around me.
These are reflections on my own cultural inheritance, rather than fixed descriptions of entire peoples. They help explain why I questioned, why I stayed and why I began creating the means to defend my position.
The revised essay adds context to the earlier piece and provides a companion to I AM BRITAIN: different cultural resources, brought together in one person’s way of thinking and acting.
Read the article →
5. The Architecture of an Invisible Woman — Sunday Thoughts
Rebuilding my website began as an exercise in organising my professional and creative work. It became a question about identity and institutional power.
In one part of the site, I describe the identities I have constructed through qualifications, work and personal choices. In another, I examine descriptions that institutions have constructed about me.
Who created those descriptions? Were they facts, allegations, inferences or opinions? Who verified them? At what point did they acquire administrative consequences?
The article examines how a person becomes an institutional category—and what it takes to participate in questioning and correcting that account.
Read the article →
Still unanswered
This week’s writing moves between personal identity and institutional records, but the questions remain connected.
Who gets to describe a person?
What evidence supports that description?
When does it become a basis for action?
And when the person challenges it, who is responsible for examining the challenge?
A description of me is not automatically evidence about me. A response to my correspondence does not, by itself, establish that its substantive questions have been resolved.
My task remains to trace those distinctions through the documents, while keeping clear what is established, what is disputed and what remains unknown.
Next week
I plan to publish the next chapter of Invisible Woman.
There are also outstanding questions and response checkpoints involving NATO, the British Ministry of Defence and Hertfordshire Constabulary. Depending on what arrives, I expect to examine the answers, the documents they disclose and the questions they leave unresolved.
An answer may move the story forward. A refusal may clarify an institution’s position. And another procedural detour may deserve a diagram.
I cannot promise a sensation next week. I can promise to read the correspondence carefully and tell you openly if anything important emerges.
Every Friday, Visible Moments brings together what emerged during the week, what I published, and what still requires an answer.
Today's song
DEUX FAÇONS D’AVOIR CHAUD
DEUX FAÇONS D’AVOIR CHAUD
