The one who cares...

Well, here I am 30. Now I’m one of those “who cares about...”.

Now the time has come to savor the phrase “where are my 16 years” and dreamily look at the ceiling. But it seems that I would hardly want to return to my 16, 19 or even my recent 25. I feel good at 30. Each period of life has its own meaning and is remembered in its own way.

They say that your reckless youth ended yesterday, and now you need to become more respectable. They also say that the period from 30 to 40 years is the most critical. On the contrary, it seems to me that I could not and will never do more than I could do in this decade. This is exactly the age when you already know a lot, and you can still do a lot.

I've always wondered who came up with age stereotypes? When we are 19, we are afraid of twenty, because in this ten, according to generally accepted rules, we must begin to want to get married, and it is very difficult to force ourselves to want to. At 29 we are afraid of thirty, because at 30 we already have to be a respectable woman, but we still want to wear baseball caps and breeches. But what's the point? And where is such a law, after all?

As one Parisian woman admitted to me, in Europe you can get married and go to discos until you are 80 years old. Also, at any age, you can radically change your profession, radically transform your appearance and permanently ignore your neighbor’s opinion. And it’s true, there would be much more harmony in the world if people entered university not strictly after graduating from high school, but when they were really ripe for study. We got married not because our relatives insisted, but because we met a person without whom we couldn’t live a day. They had children when their parental instincts awakened. They did not work in a prestigious organization, but where they could be useful, or at least where they received maximum satisfaction.

Let's live and enjoy today and now, make plans based on our desires, listen to ourselves more often, and not to what others say. After all, looking back, we remember not public opinion, not milestones of world history, but personal feelings and experiences about this or that occasion and event. And humanity has not yet invented anything more important than them.

Yesterday, feeling like an adult lady and mentally turning over some bright pages of childhood, I realized that it didn’t matter to me at all who was the president of the country at that time and what factions the parliament consisted of. This is, of course, global, but small on the scale of the history of one’s own life.

I suggest you remember a few pictures from your childhood that will be the first to come to mind. I think this is a 100% positive motivator. Even if not all remembered events turn out to be happy.

I remember some fragments from early childhood that, according to logic and common sense, are impossible to remember. For example, the situation in the ward of the intensive care unit, which she entered at the age of 1.4 years.

I also remember trips from Vladikavkaz to Nalchik and delicious kebabs in a roadside cafe that my dad loved. He claims that now even in expensive restaurants they don’t know how to fry meat so deliciously.

I remember friendly neighbors in Vladikavkaz. Having moved to Nalchik, it took us a long time to get used to the fact that we didn’t have to communicate, not invite people to holidays, and not go to condolences with residents from another building. Since then and to this day, Vladikavkaz evokes in me a thrill of memories and a riot of warm feelings.

My grandmother lived in Nalchik. I remember her image, her tenderness and, it seems, even her smell. The night when she passed away was etched into my memory like a sharp needle. I was 6 years old. We rushed from Vladikavkaz. It was the first time I saw so many people crying. And her without a smile. I remember that moment in detail. The feelings were, of course, not adult ones. After all, the child’s brain is protected from shocks by some kind of shell. It didn't hurt me. It's just not clear. Perhaps, from that moment in December 1988, my, albeit childish, but already conscious life began. Since then, a chronology has appeared in my memory.

Next was a move to Nalchik. The first dog that my brother and I, having persuaded our dad, brought in his car from Digora and settled in the courtyard of our nine-story building. I remember how I prepared breakfasts, lunches and hearty dinners for him, adding eggshells to them (my brother said that they help the dog develop “standing” ears). Besides Barsik, there were about 10 other dogs of different sizes, colors and genders in the yard. They also fed at our expense and lived in the dwellings we built. And when they had offspring, I turned into some kind of dog babysitter, spending most of the daylight hours taking care of the puppies, running in the mornings for fresh milk to a store two blocks from the house and feeding them first with a pipette, and then - real pacifier.

A significant part of my childhood memories are associated with animals. I spent my entire childhood dreaming about having a pet. I was allowed to put animals in the apartment only twice. The first time it was two hamsters, which later had to be repaired to get rid of the smell. The second time was a chicken given to me by my relatives in Digora. It was a real pet, running around the apartment with the air of an owner, responding to its name and being the first to greet guests in the hallway. I even managed to take him for walks in the yard. While he was nibbling the grass, I ran around, chasing away the cats that were hunting him.

I remember when I was in first grade I walked alone to school for the first time. It was alarming, but respectable and proud.

My nephews, who today, at one and a half and three years old, can skillfully handle my iPhone and know that a cartoon can be downloaded from the Internet, will have completely different memories of childhood. And they will probably think that our childhood was difficult - without gadgets and early development schools. But for some reason I am convinced that childhood is never difficult.

PS Returning to the conversation about my adult life, I want to introduce you to its new attribute - a blog on the “15th region” . I hope you will love him as much as I do - at first sight and word.