It always happens that we remember our childhood years better than what happened to us only two or three years ago. And so I very well remember my street, where I was born in 1954, and my playmates, although I "just saw" all this then. The understanding of what exactly I saw came, of course, much later. For example, I saw how and who lives on this street from my comrades of children's games. On the section of Proletarskaya Street next to my house there were 10 more houses, although there were much more households in them. For example, in my house, besides my grandfather, grandmother, mother and me, my grandfather's brother and sister lived behind the wall. We had two rooms and our grandfather, the former head of the city department during the Second World War, awarded the Orders of Lenin and the Badge of Honor, slept in the hallway by the door leading to the entrance, and grandmother was on the couch in the hall. Mom and I were accommodated in a small room, where there was still her desk and wardrobe.
My house, view from the street. So he was until 1974. (I promised one of our regulars an article with my drawings and now - I found it. As a child I drew well, but little survived, unfortunately)
And here is the hall. To the left is the door to a small room. Where you look from, the entire space is occupied by a Russian stove. There are four more chairs not painted at the table. There is no kerosene lamp in the middle of the table, and piles of newspapers and magazines. In the portraits above the chest of drawers on the left in the center, the grandfather, on the sides of his sons who died in the war. Downstairs on the dresser is a very expensive Moser watch. In the sideboard on the right, there was always KBVK cognac and a decanter with vodka infused with lemon peels. But my grandfather used it very rarely. The mirror has survived without a table and now hangs in my hallway. Huge palms in tubs - date and fan at that time were very fashionable houseplants, along with ficuses.
So the house was very crowded and I did not like to stay there. There was simply nowhere to play especially. For example, spreading the clockwork subway on a table meant taking everything away from it, including the huge 1886 Matodor kerosene lamp in the style of Bernard Palissy. Although you could sit with your feet on the couch and so listen to very interesting radio programs: "In the land of literary heroes", "The Club of Famous Captains", "Postal Stagecoach", KOAPP … There was also a large entrance in the house, a closet with cans and pans with candied jam, three sheds (one with rabbits) and just a huge garden, which my wife still regrets, because it would be better for us now than any summer cottage.
One of the few surviving photographs "from childhood". Then we, the boys from Proletarskaya Street, looked like this in the school camp. The author is on the far left. He loved to play chess then.
These 10 houses accounted for 17 households, that is, some houses resembled real burrows. But children (boys) of my age, plus or minus two or three years for these households, there were only six and four more from Mirskaya Street and the end of Proletarskaya. I don't know how many guys were on the opposite side. We "did not get along" with them. But about the same. Only one family of the Mulins had two children. There were only two girls for this whole boyish crowd, and it is clear that we were not interested in them. Now let's think about it. The street was for working families. The parents of my comrades worked at the nearby plant. Frunze. And what a shortage of "personnel"!
This is the most extreme house on Proletarskaya Street, where I once lived, because there was a clearing further on, although the street itself did not end here. One of my friends boys lived in it "Sanka-snotty", who had such a nickname for the green snot constantly flowing from his nose. He was an outcast and therefore had a harmful character. I don't know where he got to, but his mother still lives in this house. He was a “rabbit-breeder”, a rabbit-breeder, as you can see, and remained, but … modern materials gave him … a modern look!
That's when the crisis began with the population of our country, and not at all in 1991! In theory, in all complete families, except mine, there should have been at least two children, and all had one. That is, let's say, Proletarskaya Street (this part of it) did not ensure the self-reproduction of its population. Now only one house has survived from my childhood on it! On the site of my house there is a building materials store, the neighboring house has been rebuilt, and two cottages have been built at the end of the street. The street itself is overgrown with grass. Workers have not been going to the plant for a long time, but it used to be a continuous stream, so I woke up from the continuous stomp of their shoes - top-to-top.
This house appeared already in the late 90s …
I went to the houses of my comrades. But it was difficult for them to come to me. Painfully, our house was clean! There are carpets on the floor, a velvet tablecloth, a carpet on the sofa and on the back of the sofa, a carpet on my wall by the bed, at my mother's … There was nothing like this in their families. I was especially amazed in what conditions my comrades Mulins live. Their house had four apartments with five windows facing the street. That is, these were dwellings of the "carriage layout". So they had a porch, a cold entrance, where in the summer they cooked food on a kerosene stove, and one long room, divided by a stove into two parts. In the first one with two windows to the street there was a parents' one-and-a-half bed (and how could they fit on it, since neither their mother nor their father differed in fragility!), Between the windows a chest of drawers, a wardrobe against the wall, a shelf with a dozen books, table and … everything. Behind the stove were the beds of my comrades Sashka and Zhenya with patchwork blankets and a chest on which their grandmother slept. There were red bugs under the wallpaper. Bedbugs! And I did not know what it was and told at home. After that, they stopped letting me in at all.
Moreover, I saw all this in 1964, when I was already in the second grade. By the way, the first refrigerator and the first TV on our street appeared again in my house, just in 1959, when TV broadcasting began in Penza.
And this one following him, too … But they have no children!
Which of the guys on our street lived at about the same level of material wealth? There was another boy - Victor, the son of a pilot at the Penza airport. A complete family, all parents worked, and in the house they also had carpets, rugs, and he had cardboard games and Meccano constructors.
Of course, everyone had amenities in the yard. But of a different "type". We have a spacious lavatory, with wallpaper, a chimney, and completely odorless. The grandmother there regularly washed the floor and it was even pleasant to be there, looking out into the garden through the open door.
But this is already nostalgia … The house where my physical education teacher "San Sanych" lived. Nowadays, his heirs have bricked it up and made gas heating.
Here is a close-up of this house.
It was not so with the neighbors, including in the outhouse with my comrades. There, the "grace of the womb" splashed almost at the very opening and there was a terrible stench. But the worst of all was the toilet of one of the village women who lived in the same house in one of the "carriage apartments". Disgusting there was simply indescribable. However, no one paid attention to this. And then one day, playing in my garden, I saw how one of these women, standing in the beds, did not even sit down, but lifted her hem and … large … fell from her to the ground like peas, as if from a horse … And then she lowered the hem, jerked with the fifth point and … went to weed the beds further. To say that it was a revelation for me is to say nothing. It was just a shock! As I remember myself, I was taught the skills of personal hygiene and cleanliness, after each meal I had to brush my teeth at the washstand, regularly change my linen. And here … I didn’t notice this woman’s underwear at all, and I don’t need to mention everything else. In general, I felt the very real hatred for her, which people probably feel for a snake or a toad. Her mere existence next to me struck me as offensive and unacceptable. And … he immediately decided to take revenge on her. Just for being that way!
We walk on the remnants of the Soviet Proletarskaya street and see a house with a collapsed roof (let's call it "Victor's house", but not the pilot's son, that house was demolished!), Which has not changed since 1967, when I was in it for the last time. And since then it has not been repaired even once! True, a brick extension with a heating system was attached to it.
Pocket money, since I was already in school, was given to me. So I went to the store, bought two packs of yeast - at school we did some experiment … and mixed with sugar, set it to ferment. And then at night he crept into her yard and poured it all into the hole.
In the morning, forgetting about everything I had done the day before, I go out onto the porch and … smell … and also hear screams from neighbors in the yard and see … the rickety roof of her toilet! I ran there, and there - a real eruption of Vesuvius. The men arrived at the "shit-cleaning", but refused to clean, they said that they would rip the car apart if they did it. We must wait for the "completion of the process" - then. It is interesting that all the neighboring boys did not like this woman, and from behind the fence, so as not to see anyone and complain to their parents, they teased her like this: “Oh, you old hag, the cat gave birth to you, put you on the bed, began to kiss on your cheeks!"
Here is a close-up of this house. I always walk past him … "shivering", as if I had arrived in the past in a "time machine".
What I liked with the Mulins was the smell of fried potatoes in the evenings. When my father and mother came home from work, the grandmother fed them such potatoes. They also invited me, and our … "social differences" were immediately revealed. It turned out that it was customary for them to fry potatoes in butter, and half a pack fell into the pan at once. They noticed my amazement and asked: isn't it so with you? And I said that our potatoes are cut into cubes and grandmother fries them in vegetable oil, which makes them all fried and crispy. "And you have it kind of soft, everything stuck to the bottom … and with a bow!" It is clear that they did not invite me to the table anymore. And they explained to me at home that you can't fry potatoes in butter, because it burns. Whereas the vegetable can withstand a higher temperature, and the potatoes will brown properly.
On the site of this house there was a “house of thieves”. With the "front porch" All the men were thieves and periodically "sat" … The house is completely rebuilt, as you can see.
I must say that even then I felt that I knew more than my peers, I could do more, but I was very shy about my upbringing. I remember how relatives came to visit us: my mother's cousin with her son Boris. My mother was already working at the institute, first as a head of the cabinet, and then as an assistant at the department of the history of the CPSU. Well, her sister taught at a music school, and this Boris came to us in short pants and with a bow on his shirt. We sat down to dinner and they called me, right from the street, with dirty hands, in satin trousers and a T-shirt. I somehow washed my hands, sat down at the table, and then she asked my brother: "Borya, do you want to pee?" And he told her: "No, mom!" I remember that I barely waited until the end of dinner, ran out to my street boys and said: “Shy, right now a brother in girl's panties came to me with a bow. His mother is right at the table - you want a pic …, but he tells her - no mom! When he comes out into the street, we will beat him! " Fortunately, he didn’t go out into the street, and I just don’t know how we would beat him up for this dissimilarity!
On the site of my house there is now this store and the cargo yard on the right. There were six windows on the street!
I went to school not simple, but in a special one, with English from the second grade. But not by special selection, and not by a call "from above", as it happens with us now, but simply because it was a school in our district. Nobody in our district at that time understood the benefits of such a special school, and all the guys in it were “local”. Not like now. Now it is a gymnasium, where children are taken from all over the city in Volvo and Mersach, and there are already as many as five languages to choose from. My daughter also studied there, when, however, things had not yet come to such "delights", but her elitism was already felt in everything. But the granddaughter goes to a regular school. I don't want to deprive her of her childhood and drag her into the race for survival from a young age. And now who graduated from what school does not play a special role. Plays the role of who prepared your child for the exam. And he can study in a small school in the village of Malye Dunduki. So here the social lift worked, one might say, by accident. By the way, from among my schoolmates from the parallel class, he has already gone upstairs … Oleg Salyukov, well, the one who became a general and together with Shoigu now takes parades on Red Square, well, another boy who became the most famous in the 90s … a counterfeiter in Russia. I am proud to know both! By the way, the latter's son became a candidate of sciences (like my daughter!) And teaches today at the university. Another boy became a famous local bandit (!). But he was already dead.
On the site of this building there were three households at once: the Mulins' house, the "doctor's house" (three windows) and the "Victor-2 house" (the pilot's son).
Studying at this school was … interesting, although studying, due to poor performance in mathematics, gave me a lot of trouble. From history I did not know how to get fours, but from algebra with geometry and three I was incredibly happy. But with English (since I simply did not understand its special benefits at that time!) I started having problems from the 5th grade. And in general, problems with studies after the 5th grade, it was such an age "trend". Today he has moved to higher grades. And then my mother told me that “you must correspond to the level at which your family is in society and that if you continue to study like this, you will slide down and go to the plant. And there is the first payday, "washing", you will come home all dirty and oiled and I … will tear you away from your heart and … you will go wherever your eyes are! " The threat seemed serious to me, but already at school I picked up some propaganda and replied that we are all equal! And then she gave me Orwellian (although Orwell herself, of course, did not read and could not read, but apparently she thought of it herself!): "Yes, they are equal, but some are more equal than others!" And here I could not find what to answer. But I remembered the patchwork quilts of my comrades down the street, and the "red bugs" under their wallpaper, and potatoes in butter, green snot from the nose of "Sanya the Snotty", their drunken fathers every Saturday, realized that she was right, and decided that I will never be like them. Lodged to study and straightened out everything except mathematics, but it was not required at the history department at that time. But when I came to take the English exam at the Pedagogical Institute, and sat down to answer the table, I heard in response: “What school did you graduate from? Sixth! So why are you fooling us here! With this, and it was necessary to start! Five - go! " This was my entrance exam, and only then at the institute, up to the fourth year, I rode on the baggage of the knowledge acquired at school. It was convenient, to be sure.
The house opposite mine in Proletarsky passage. Once it seemed to be the tallest among the one-story five-walled. Now it is not visible behind 5-9-storey buildings. Moreover, it has grown by a meter into the ground, or rather, the level of the surrounding land has risen by a meter. I used to go up the hill to him, but now I have to go down the stairs. This is how the relief has changed over the past half century.
And this is my least favorite house on the neighboring Dzerzhinskaya street, it turned out to be right in front of my current home. Then there was a "fire" in it (now it is empty, people are less burning!) And the only telephone in the whole district, where I was sent to call an ambulance for my grandfather and grandmother. In any weather, one had to go, get into the eyes, explain what and how, then meet the doctors at the gate and escort them through the dark courtyard past the watchdog into the house. Oh, how I didn't like it, but what was there to do - debt is debt.
Such preferences were given then by training in a Soviet special school, even if in the most ordinary provincial town. In addition to "just language", they taught us geography in English, English literature, American literature, technical translation and military translation, and even taught us to disassemble an AK assault rifle and a Bran machine gun … in English, that is, we had to know in their English version and be able to describe their actions; taught to interrogate prisoners of war and read a map with English inscriptions.
And here is a store opposite the previous house. In 1974, it was a one-storey, typically Soviet architecture, "shop-aquarium" - "Cooperator", where my wife and I went to buy food. The store is still here. But … how was it built and how was it finished ?!
By the way, my street friends did not get into this school, although they could. "Well, who needs this English ?!" - said their parents, sent them to a regular school next door, and our paths parted after that forever.
And here time seemed to have stopped for the second time. Nothing in this house has changed in 50 years, except that the roofs above the entrance doors on the pillars were added. That is, there seems to be a lot of changes, yes, but even the old wooden wreckage ("Victor's house") on Proletarskaya Street still stands … It's time to open a museum here: "a typical house of the family of a Soviet worker who worked in the 60s of the last century at the plant named after … Frunze ".
