book (1)

Instead of an epilogue

Tatiana

Once again, I became convinced that history is a spiral, including the story of my life. In the early '90s the country (USSR) began to collapse. After a period of personal well-being (I was a young Associate Dean, with a good salary, I allowed myself to go abroad, even on youth permits), I found myself at the bottom. Dad was in the hospital, my mother was a recumbent (developed serious problems with legs), I had no money and I was always hungry. I started to sell things to the pawnshop, I moonlighted where I could. It seems to be, I coped with it. I went to another university, I got stronger financially. Again I began to allow myself to go abroad (already further away in Turkey and Greece), to pamper myself with different delicacies, to go to an expensive salon for a haircut, massage, to drink Italian and Spanish wines. And here again, history repeats itself. Once again the country is falling apart, again recumbent mother (this time completely motionless), again there is no money. Just new factors added both advantages and disadvantages. Disadvantages: no work; very uncertain political perspective (up to the resumption of the civil war); + twenty years of age; there are no old friends who could help around me. But there are advantages: I already have the experience of survival in a similar situation, so I've done the grocery stores; I have enough clothes and shoes for several years forward; I basically have a pension that may be paid; I have a grown niece and new friends. But the main thing, I have the belief

that the situation will normalize! I have some irrational feeling that everything will calm down. Of course, I do not hope for French wines and a trip to Spain, but I believe that I will work and will have a normal life. It is only necessary to believe, and all this will happen!!!

In May, before the war, I had time to visit Cyprus. During one of the trips we went on the Turkish part of the island. We were shown the city of Famagusta. Before the occupation, it was the famous resort. After the north of the island was captured by Turks, the Greeks left the city. No one lives there, houses stand with broken windows, broken here and there. Famagusta became a dead city ... In August, during a particularly heavy shelling of Luhansk when I went out to walk the dog Jem I was walking down completely deserted Sovietskaya and Oboronnaya streets, which are the main streets in Lugansk. I remembered the expression - "dead city." I was scared that Lugansk can turn into Ukrainian Famagusta...

I stop writing these notes. A lot of new worries have appeared, although some old have disappeared. But free time is even less. And a feeling has appeared that there is nothing fundamentally new to those who will read these lines, I will not say. The main thing is that I see that Lugansk alive! Wounded, tortured, it would not become Famagusta. And let the other to say that it will not be reborn, that there is nothing to do and you need to leave. I determined for myself: this is my city!

I stop writing these notes. They were about the war, the

war is over, and I hope that forever...