Photo: Sofya Sandurskaya / Agency "Moscow"

When was the last time you celebrated on June 12 so that the soul would rejoice? The only day of Russia that I remembered was two years ago. First, I went on a march on the occasion of the case of Golunov, and then I went to the OVD-Info to help the detainees.

Surprisingly, I have more memories about the bottom of the capture of the Bastille or the Day of Independence of the United States. These are simple holidays with understandable and universal meanings. You can not invent anything, take and celebrate. Happy Russian Day is not the case. Try without Google to remember why we celebrate it on June 12.

Why is the day that should be an important holiday is indistinguishable from the jam festival? Half -workers that “state men” do not know what Russia is. The main problem is that they fill the life of the country with this vacuum.

But it may be different. And changing this situation for the better is easy. Stock all the “Commissions on the formation of national identity” and invite people to this conversation.

Having visited 40 cities of Russia, I saw that everyone had their own answer to this question. Own from the driver, who brought me from Mudyuga to Obozerskaya in the cabin of the Khodnyak. Own with an official from Ufa, with whom we held a summer school for talented teenagers. His border with Kuril, who guarded the youth forum from the bears. Her entrepreneur from Silicon Valley, who told me about the path of the startup. His activist from Makhachkala, who organized a negotiation platform for those who, in other cases, would not have sat at one table. Even in the social bubble of my Facebook, the answers vary from the “largest fragment of the USSR” to “Love” and “Paradise for crazy and adventurers”.

Some answers are unpleasant for me. And one of them would not like mine. But this is normal. If we look for an answer that does not cause a rejection of anyone, we have a splash of the child with water and get nothing that does not mean a wording like "united by a millennium history, preserving the memory of the ancestors who conveyed the ideals and faith in God."

And is it possible to find one substantial and true answer in such a large and such diverse country as Russia?

Once in a business school, I heard the phrase "We sell not answers, but questions." And it seems to me that the question is "What is Russia for you?" Much more important is the answer. Because when people are puzzled by them and conduct an open conversation on an equal footing, it becomes clear that it unites us much more than it disconnects.

I write these lines, returning from the filming of the film about the preservation of historical memory. We filmed two plots with volunteers who canned wooden churches of the 17th century. Orthodox and atheists, traditionalists and liberals, young and old, rich and poor, local and Muscovites, candidates of sciences and people without education. They argue, but do not swear, because they have a common cause (which, by the way, everyone looks in their own way) and it is more important than the difference in opinion.

So Russia, with all the variety, is truly united, and it is worth starting an open conversation-it will become clear as a day. And then it will already be impossible to scare people with tales that Russia can be ruined from the outside or hands of national traitors, fairy tales about the wild depth people or opposition in the clouds. Maybe that's why the state impedes this conversation and represses those who lead it, disperses the Zemstvo Congress and the All -Russian Forum of Municipal Deputies.

Fortunately, the state cannot yet forbid us to think about this issue and discuss it with loved ones and friends. Talk to them about what Russia is for you and how you can do it better today. Most likely, this will be the first day of Russia that you will remember in a long time.

What to talk about on Russia's Day