Family album

At some point in my life, I had to make a fundamental decision. I stopped going to visit and began to meet with my friends and even with relatives exclusively in a cafe. I lied to everyone shamelessly, lied that it hit. He said that I have an allergy to pets, to children, old people, carpets, fish food - on anything, depending on the characteristics of the inviter's home. He said that for a long time I adheres to the aura of personal space or that I have torn socks - depending on the characteristics of the brain of the inviting. He said that there is a certain certainty and task at home, and some joyful adventure can always happen in a cafe. And so on, so on, so on.

I made a decision, and since then I have been happy. Because he stopped watching all these numerous amateur photographs, which certainly fell into the hands of everyone who came.

"Family Album" - how comfortable and cute it sounds. And what kind of muck is in reality. Each Moscow family had a stack of family albums. Long-standing-pot-bellied, cardboard, with glued black and white pictures. Reception to pioneers, the last call, gaiters at the station against the background of the train, excursionists against the backdrop of the Volgograd Mamaev Kurgan. Moscow realities-Krasnaya Square, VDNH (today's VVC), Novodevichy Museum-monastery, Museum-Estate "Ostankino". Numerous feasts - Olivier salad, vinaigrette, men drink "white", women - red. The background is a wall, a chair-bed, a TV on thin legs. On the wall there is a carpet, on the carpet - amateur inlay, as meaningless as all these photos.

A compulsory program - a person on board the ship, smokes, looking thoughtfully at the water. There were lovers of taking pictures of the funeral. However, this is more from the field of psychiatry.

Then the next round of progress, and all the same moved to the screen. Slides, slides, numerous stacks of slides in gray plastic frames, whether they are wrong. Slides are cooler, because they are colored, projected onto a special screen on a thin leg. The screen and leg were bought in the same photo stores as the slides themselves - on Kalininsky Prospekt (today - the new Arbat), on Sokol, in Stoleshnikov.

There is no screen - the case is fixed. The sheet was spaced on the already mentioned carpet (amateur inlay, of course, was removed, but at the end of the viewing, unfortunately, it was posted again).

Slides are much more evil than an ordinary album. The album, as a rule, was holding the guest himself in his hands, he could at least turn over all this faster. Slids were led by the owner, his comments were extended, the ceremony was tightened on the watch. The worst thing, if the owner was simple, about the screen did not bother at all, but projected his art to the ceiling. The guests sat with their heads, as if in a planetarium. The neck flooded, the backs ached, the air stolen-the windows were closed and launched, the slides looked in absolute darkness.

Then the albums again prevailed, only others - neat, plastic, with stupid rose on the cover. The subject changed, but not much. The place of Mamaev Kurgan was taken by Karlov’s bridge, and just. But the main problem remained: the guest wanted to quickly eat and drink, but instead they showed him how completely alien men and women have a bite in the pictures.

And then the Internet and digital cameras appeared. As well as new nasty words - “photo”, “photo”. Everyone is “taking pictures”, which means that this is no longer a subject for pride. For some reason, they like to “take pictures” of cats and sunsets most of all (for such uncomplicated “photos” even the term appeared-“koschozakata”). Children, flowers on the graves of parents - where without them. The numerous foreign country is the same composition, "I am and the monument." But the jester would with them.

The main thing is now all this on the Internet. If you want - look, but you want - no.

Now I would go to visit someone. Yes, only no one invites. [A.M.]

Alexey Mitrofanov is a writer, a researcher of Moscow life. The author of books about the streets of the capital and cities of Russia.

The author’s opinion may not coincide with the position of the editors.