A year has passed...

The New Times continues to publish the diaries of the famous journalist Masha Slonim*, who went into exile for the second time

Suddenly, receipts began to arrive in batches for paying for everything. Not simple monthly, but fat, annual. BBC license for the right to watch TV (£145), local tax (£1800), road tax on the car (£250), annual car diagnostics (with all repairs £900), membership in AA, the Automobile Association (this they will save me on the road if the car breaks down) - £53, renewal of CASCO insurance for the car (£300) - hooray, knocked off £100 for no insurance payments! ..

Why is all this falling on me now? And then I remembered: I lived here for almost a year and paid for all this a year ago, only when I arrived, and now I’m leaving for the next circle-year.

So, summing up the year that has passed since the return.

Perhaps I’ll start with the sad ones: dogs killed four other people’s sheep - I received a warning from the police and signed a contract with the local council on acceptable behavior, gave a lot of money to dog trainers and psychologists in the hope of re-educating my uncontrollable dogs and teach them not to chase sheep, went broke on the installation a special underground invisible magical electric fence to keep the sheep safe, the dogs alive and the police and the local council happy, but I myself consider this the most successful investment; lost, buried and mourned her beloved dog Sunny, lost her own canine - gave a lot of money to a dentist and a veterinary clinic; smoked a lot of cigarettes and cigarettes; I never learned how to cook complex and delicious dishes for myself.

Good. Learned to live alone. It was easy and enjoyable. Now I know how to manage my own finances, immediately pay bills and fines. I forced myself to eat vegetables (a strict nurse in the clinic ordered me to consume five green vegetables a day, I am far from this figure). Several times I met a deer (red), a lot of pheasants (bright and stupid), badgers (crushed), I don’t even talk about rabbits, rams and cows (live) - I live in their fragrant environment. At the cost of scratched and dented fenders, my car learned to deftly back up narrow, winding paths to let oncoming traffic pass.

I can't even count how many friends have already visited me here. I was glad to everyone, treated everyone to the incredible beauty in which I live. I still can’t get used to it, every time it takes my breath away from one glance at the green hills, as if descended from the paintings of Turner and Constable, at the picturesque small villages and farms that today look like they did 300 years ago. My eye never blurred - I always feel like a tourist who has just seen this exotic. But the other day I realized that this is not only my still fresh look. Driving along one of our narrow paths, which with the onset of autumn turned from green into yellow-red-striped tunnels, I suddenly saw through the roadside fence how the midday autumn sun beautifully lit up the field with the already slightly rusted old oak and lambs grazing under it. I jumped out of the car to take this landscape with my iPhone. When I returned, they were already waiting for me - one car was standing behind mine, the other was walking towards me, but could not pass, because in some places two cars could not pass on our narrow paths. I apologized to the patient driver of the oncoming car and explained why I stopped - I couldn’t help but take pictures of this beauty! The driver and passenger nodded in understanding: “Yes, yes, we also just filmed over there, a little higher! How beautiful it is!" And they weren't tourists, they were locals. They, too, are not accustomed to the beauty in which they live.

Maybe I went to heaven prematurely?

* Continuation. Beginning - NT #40 of November 30 and #42 of December 14, 2015. No. 1, 3 , 5 , 9 , 11 , 16 , 18 , 20 , , , 22 13 28 , 30 , 32 , 34,   36 for 2016.