Today is the last hot day of a wonderful summer that I am writing this text. Ok, maybe tomorrow will be similar. Maybe the day after tomorrow. There will be several similar ones in September. But all this is no longer exactly summer, all this is already an understanding of wilt.
As Joseph Brodsky wrote to Viktor Golyshev in 1972:
“The bird no longer flies out the window.
The girl is protecting the blouse like a monster.
Slide in a cherry pit
I don’t fall: friction force
increases with decreasing speed.
The heart is jumping like a squirrel in the bush
chop. And the throat sings about age.
It’s getting old now.”
There is sunset sadness, anxiety and even despair on these August days. Summer ends. He was good, wealthy, and relatively quiet. The nuclear bomb has not exploded yet – it’s already good. We have learned to appreciate even what seems so wild.
It’s nice in the summer because the rhythm changes in the summer. A rhythm that disturbs us from September to the end of May. This is the rhythm of the early rise – 6:30. Sometimes you can agree with the alarm clock, with the universe, with yourself at 6:45. But sooner or later someone will have to take the kids to school. Then someone from the school should greet them, feed them lunch and check on the course of the lessons. And that person is usually you. There is also a music school. There is also art. A few more chapters. There’s no need to go to the office, no matter how blasphemous it may sound, thanks to the pandemic in the past.
But let’s say I need 15-20 minutes to focus on a task. And if I’m already busy with this and someone has taken me away from it, then it will take another 15-20 minutes to refocus on that task.
And somewhere in the second half of April you start to see the light. Still dim, but the clear light of summer. A summer that will completely change the rhythm, turn everything upside down, make everything optional. At least attend the workshops in July. Please note that winter lasts for two and a half hours. In summer? Seventeen minutes. So it’s clear that nobody wants to work.
It seems that there is less to do – no children’s school, no music school, not even an art school. Looks like let’s sit down and talk. But something disagrees. I want to go to the park, to the river, to the cottage. Yes, go out the window and look at these endless green trees. Drive around Moscow at night in a taxi with open windows, meet friends, go to restaurants, what is there to hide. For some reason in winter I really don’t want to go to the restaurant. Looks like you can eat at home.
And you can’t keep yourself at home in the summer. The most important, most interesting impression seems to be missing in everything. This is of course not true. But here we are talking about sensations, not objective reality.
And so summer ends. And the rhythms were reversed. It seems that there was no need to rush anywhere in the summer, but I wanted to hurry. I wanted to run, spend time and survive as much as possible.
With the onset of autumn, you need to hurry – more work, more trouble, more than just these clothes to wear. And I don’t want to rush. I want to lie down and think. What about? Obviously, we are talking about the fact that a person is paradoxically arranged. Maybe it’s psychology, or maybe it’s psychiatry anyway.
You want something that isn’t always there, you want to run when you can sit, you want to sit while the run is in full swing.
In this sense, of course, the beginning of the year is not the 1st of January at all. The beginning of the year is autumn. Another run, another change of pace. Required, mandatory. Remember that historically the most successful civilizations were those located where the seasons changed. Summer should be different from winter. And from the fall. It is necessary to see the change of scenery, weather, scenery. It gives the person a rhythm, a certain understanding of the timeline, stimulates him to activity and encourages him to achievements and achievements.
For example, in France or Italy, the seasons are different. You can’t really confuse summer with winter. So what do we have when we look at the historical past? Great cultures, empires, civilizations. In this sense we were less fortunate; there is a change in scenery but it is painfully sharp. Now +35°C, then -50°C. But we are not coping with anything and so far not bad.
Let the rhythms change, the weather change, we say goodbye to the summer with dignity. Thank you for having you write. The main thing for us is to believe that you will become more. And not once.
The author expresses his personal opinion, which may not coincide with the editors’ position.