Still, why did I end up in the kitchen? Most likely because in the room the place of honour was occupied by my beloved piano — the most valuable possession of our family! I think, by the chronology of events, this was the second valuable, naturally scarce, acquisition still when we lived in the officers’ barracks. “First place” among valuable acquisitions was occupied by a carpet! Mama called it Festival, since it was bought in 1957 in Moscow after the first Moscow International Festival of Youth and Students.
In those times carpets were not laid on the floor, but hung on the walls. I remember it was bright, all-wool, and very heavy. Having moved to the khrushchoba, we laid it on the floor, and so this carpet served us “faithfully and truly” for many many Soviet and even Non-Soviet years, until I in the 2000s, because of a hard material situation, “let” into my apartment tenants with a small child, by whom it was successfully peed on to such a degree that it had to be thrown out…
Of course I tried with all my strength to resuscitate it, using all possible detergents. It did not lose its original brightness in the least, but the smell of children’s urine was “unkillable.” We had to part with the rare carpet without regret.
And now…… no! Not a coffee pause. Today is Sunday. You may wish me “happy sailing” …. in the pool.