Substitute for happiness

With the arrival of calendar spring in Russia, the signs of economic and political spring are becoming clearer. Officials and experts vying with each other to report on the slowing down of the crisis and the still timid but sure signs of economic recovery. Oil prices and the ruble exchange rate have stabilized, the economy has become accustomed to sanctions, and now experts are predicting slow and uncertain, but still growth and reduction in inflation. Rosstat noticed an increase in household incomes and a recovery in consumer demand. And now Russians are again going on vacation to Turkey and Egypt, and even tickets for flights to Europe are being sold out almost as vigorously as before the crisis began.

And just as the economy, for lack of anything better, learns to exist in unfavorable conditions, which, as it was said, will last “indefinitely,” so the country and society are slowly learning to enjoy life “against the backdrop of Crimea.” The feeling that “everything is not so bad” is strengthened by the latest thaw. Fortunately, at such a turn of the nuts, very insignificant signs are enough to hint at it: it is significant to release one or two of the many unjustly convicted, to repeal some particularly absurd law - these signs are picked up by the public with nervous rapture. Nervous, because everyone understands: a thaw does not mean the arrival of spring, just as defrosting a refrigerator does not mean that it will now start working as a heater; both are preventative measures designed to help the system freeze more efficiently. The anticipation of elections invigorates and feeds stubborn hopes, like the greenery that sprouts on a compost heap every spring. And when the ruler is elected for a new term, this term again - for the umpteenth time! - will be different from the previous one. This time there will be economic reforms, soft preparations for controlled liberalization and the transfer of power to the next generation, and new spasms of the power mechanism, physiologically incapable of voluntarily retreating from conquered positions.

It is human nature to expect the best, and spring is a time when everything around seems to support you in these expectations. True, several thousand new graves have appeared in cemeteries throughout Russia, and the relatives of these guys are silent about where and how they died. There are even more such graves in one neighboring country, and no one there is silent about whose hands they died. In the courtyards of our houses, cars appear with coats of arms and flags that are not in any heraldic registers; on the street, no, no, and you will meet people in khaki with strange stripes. A security guard at a nearby supermarket rushed to Novorossiya for several months and now, after drinking, he talks about how he “soaked the dill.” Perhaps he’s making it up (he’s a great guy, he gives children candy and adds money to old ladies when they don’t have enough to pay at the checkout), although, honestly, who knows. Two years ago he disappeared, and when he reappeared, he bragged about expensive phones for a while, but quickly let it all go and now he only chats sometimes when he drinks heavily. If you turn on the TV, it is easy to see the journalists who, just recently, in front of everyone, turned the majority of viewers' ironic sense of superiority towards the inhabitants of the country next door into bloodthirsty hatred. They continue to do their work, receiving salaries and bonuses for it. In the busy life of Moscow, at a children’s choir concert, you can stumble upon an Orthodox businessman who gave money to incite war in that very country, at the presentation of a fashion publication in a bookstore - a former writer who called for going there to fight, in a fashionable cafe - a former “prime minister” minister” of one of the “governments” operating on the big roads there.

If you look closely and think about it, you realize how many fruits of this war there are around. Not somewhere far away, under nameless crosses in the Pskov region, but nearby, in the everyday flow of life. Phones, cars, houses bought with money earned in the neighboring country, careers made during this war are present here, next to us, moving in our common circulatory system. The first time you realize this, you are shaking. But you won’t live in such a state; passes with time. We are all adults, life goes on, and in it, whether we like it or not, we have to come into contact with not only pleasant things.

Could the change from military escalation to lazy and tired skirmishes be similar to the change of seasons, which run their course, stringing together like annual rings on a tree, surprising or shocking no one? Is it possible to simply move on after Donetsk, Ilovaisk, Debaltsev, after the Malaysian Boeing and the murder of Nemtsov?

Why not? Reasoning that unredeemed blood somehow complicates life and poisons the body is naivety, abstraction and childish maximalism. There is plenty of experience. We have to move forward somehow. It always worked, but can’t it work now?

Yes, the consequences of some actions will remain and cannot be undone. Sanctions will remain, to which not only the economy, but also public consciousness will adapt. Living “in the consciousness of war” is constantly difficult and psychologically tiring for both its instigators and those who fight against it. Especially when around you is a prosperous and prettier Moscow, warmed by the very spring sun, with its cozy kitchens and cafes, fascinating exhibitions and concerts, where it is so good to forget about troubles. In its supermarkets you come across security guards who fought, on state channels there are people whose conscience is calls for murder, and in its offices, down to the most important things, sit the bosses who gave the orders that turned into this war - but in Russia, life has always been tightly intertwined with death, and everyday life was based on something that was better not to think about, not for the first time, not to get used to.

The economic recovery and political thaw are, of course, temporary. Getting used to sanctions and restrictions, like getting used to pain, allows you to live an almost normal life, but does not allow you to move forward. A new change in the oil market (it seems that prices have already gone down again), new conditions on the market, a slightly stronger than usual seasonal fluctuation in consumer demand will easily nullify all the growth that has been so difficult to achieve. But temporaryness and inconclusiveness are the most familiar regime for both the authorities and citizens. This is how it happened historically. For serious changes, a radical revision of the foundations on which the current political and economic structures are based is required, and, of course, there is nowhere to come from. But no one expects reliable changes. The habit of somehow coping with difficulties and living on for today, without seriously hoping for anything in the future - what is beautifully called a “narrow planning horizon” - is in fact the result not of the current crisis, but of much more fundamental things.

This device is based on the unspoken knowledge that any crimes and any victims will go unpunished and any untruth will get away with it. There are no moral and legal (because the rule of law is the result of the consent of citizens to recognize it) checks either in power or in bosses at various levels - from family tyrants to the occupants of the most important offices. Spring is spring, but when the authorities once again feel that their problems can be solved by another crime, they, of course, will do it, simply because it is easiest. After all, there is no responsibility, and the consciousness of continuity in relation to criminals and the crimes they committed, by and large, is stronger than any other.

Why not? It is forbidden? Who said it's impossible?