As I already told you, my first memories
start not very early. People usually remember much more from their
childhood than I do. I do not know what's the reason for such
an amnesia, because when I was child I used to have very good
memory for nearly everything. My mother was a perfectionist and
she had very special dreams about me, her only son. Yes, I forgot
to tell you that I was the only child in the family. I might have
had brothers but they died soon after they were born, maybe they
suffered the same problem I did, but I was lucky to be born alone,
while they were twins. Anyway, I've never seen them, in my home
city, in Saratov, on the Volga river, they rest somewhere in the
graveyard. I never came to that place, I as far as I know myself
- I never would. I can't tell you why - this is something rather
irrational, some feelings deep inside my mind that make me tremble
every time I recall what I know about my brothers.
I was probably 5 when it happened, but I was 15 or 16 when I first
learned what exactly happened when I was 5. My Grandpa, Dad's
father told me that. I accepted the message very quiet. I started
suffering from this bad feelings quite late, maybe a couple of
years ago, don't know why either.
I went to school at 7, so I had three years of relative freedom
and this is the time I remember best, and for me it's like Golden
Aera, the best time of my life. My parents were busy people, they
worked all day, and I stayed with my Grandma and Grandpa (Mom's
parents), who were very kind to me and did almost anything I asked.
Dad's mother died long before I was born and my Dad's father lived
100 kilometers away from us, in Saratov itself. My family instead
moved to a small village in Saratov region so my childhood and
the biggest part of my life was spent exactly there.
I had many playmates by that time, we lived all on the same street
and often played our simple games and were the scare for most
of the windows in the area. I did not have much fear then, but
was very trustful - I believed everyone and everything. Once my
parents brought me a toy car - a very big truck, half my height.
I was amazed and took it everywhere with me. One day I was playing
on the street and some elder boy talked to me, he said he had
some bet with another guy on the other street, whose car was the
best one. He said if I could give him my car for a moment he would
win the bet and as security he left me his pocket knife - a big
treasure for me in that age. Of course he took the car and disappeared.
When I came crying to my mother she went to search for that guy,
but it was too late.
My mother was school teacher. Next day she made investigation
but it did not help much, I did not remember the boy and could
not describe him well. Then she gathered the whole school in the
corridor and I passed by each boy and looked into his eyes. By
the time it all happened it was not a big problem for me to take
part in such a procedure, but now even the fact of remembering
it is extremely painful for me. I did not recognise the guy, so
the story was over. I got my piece of punishment at home for being
so stupid and that was one of the first key lessons taught to
me by my parents.
Another lesson was much more tragic. About one year later my parents
built a child's swing in our yard. Several children came to us
to play on them. The swing was not big and only one person could
play at a time. It was all OK until once I had a very strong feeling
to swing but the toy was occupied by a girl of my age called Maria.
I asked her to let me play, she said no, I said I had preference
as the owner, she just laughed. Then I forgot myself (although
I remember very well everything I did exactly as if it happened
just yesterday), took some small metal thing from the earth and
said I would throw it at her if she wouldn't release the swing
immediately. She refused and doubted and laughed. And I actually
threw that metal thing directly into her face. It hit her in the
forehead and blood appeared. She fell down. Me and other children
who were around and watched the scene froze. Then I ran to the
backyard and hid myself in high grass. I do not know how and what
had happened during the next couple of hours as I was sitting
in the grass all that time.
My mother came to me, took me out of the grass very fiercely and
then I received the first portion of beat. Then she gave me a
chocolate bar and said I had to bring it to the hit girl (she
lived exactly across the street). I refused first but then I had
nothing else than to do it. I remember going there, knocking on
the door, coming inside, saing apologies, leaving the chocolate
and coming back home. Later in the evening I received the second
portion of good beat from my father. That metal thing was kept
in the closet for maybe 7 years or so and every time Mom cleaned
up the house she reminded me of that episode and it was the worst
experience in my childhood and adolescence. The girl got better
after a couple of days and we were playing together later, but
after one year her family moved out of the house and I do not
remember what happened to her then.
I have many other stories to tell, once I have nearly burnt our
house, only that I reacted quickly saved our asses, once I went
to visit our relatives in a remote city (my Grandma came with
me) and I made such a mess over there that most of the relatives
kept calling me a young criminal even until very recent and they
were very much surprised to learn that I was pretty much successful
in my career later on. I do not want to steal your time by telling
these stories now, as I fear to lose the general point of my own
story, but some day I will definitely make additional links on
this page and I will put all other stories on paper, whether interesting
or not.
I do not remember having many interests apart from games in that
age. I had no problems with playing roles at home, with singing
and reading verses. I started with reading in proper time and
I liked it but I had limited access to literature as parents wouldn't
allow me to read books from their home library. Instead I read
some older books I found in my Grandpa's cabinet, and since that
time I liked Jack London, I read him all and several times and
that was great. My father played chess with me and he started
teaching me English but as he was not very much ahead in this
language we had to drop it soon. One year before I went to school
my mother started preparing me to school learning - I was taught
writing and arithmetics by a school teacher so that I would have
advance in the first grades at school. This helped but at what
price. I cried, I'd been hit every day, Mom shouted at me, called
me a little bastard and many other things. I better put this as
a separate story later on.
This is also the only time in my life when I used to have a friend.
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