has long been. At that time, the internet was not unlimited and young people loved to gather on the bench at the entrance. At the time of the neighbors, I knew everyone - our house from the former institute, and the former employees still lived in it. But there were also a couple of young families who recently moved. I did not know them. It was a time when there were no deaf iron doors, and the entrance was opened with a primitive key - a screwdriver.
A strange guy walked into our entrance. The next day at 9 p.m. he came and opened the entrance door. Twenty minutes later he came back. One day I went in for him to listen to what floor he was going up. Judging by the steps, it was the last, 5th floor. The door did not knock, the keys did not ring.
My friends and I decided one day to follow him. In order not to hear him, we even had to take off our shoes. As always at 9 p.m., the guy opens the entrance door with his key and goes through. Within a few minutes, we carefully steal after him. They climbed to the 5th floor, and he is sitting on the corks and putting his ear in the lock well and listening.
So what are you doing here? “I’ll call you,” said my friend Andrei.
The guys! Sorry, I am not a thief and not a fraudster, my wife left me with her daughter to another, they moved here... they forbid communicating with the child... and I come after work... just listen to how my daughter says... she’s just bathing her at this time... she already knows the words...
Even when I was 20 years old, my tears turned from this story.
I am actually a good driver. The honest word. And very disciplined. And the experienced - thirty years driving like no one, and Los Angeles is a huge city and difficult for the driver.
But it happens, it happens... Everything happens. It turned out. In the wrong place. The streets here are divided into “business” and “residential”. So, on “residential” you can turn, and on “business” you can’t. Although this street is relatively "business" - it is always empty. some kind of storage. And, if strictly between us, it’s not the first time I’m here. There is almost no movement here. Where did this policeman come from? He walked behind the tree with his motorcycle, no differently. Now it will begin...
Their rights? Registration of the car? The Insurance?
Here, keep it, man, I’m all right – and my rights, and my insurance. A very young cop, very struggling, the harsh official appearance leaves itself.
When was your last penalty? How much time has passed?
I am thinking. In fact, he was only one of me.
- At a thousand nine hundred... - I hardly remember, - ah, eighty-nine years.
Cop is lost for a moment and forgets how adult and serious he is:
“I wasn’t born then,” he suddenly said embarrassed.
Despite the unpleasant situation, I can hardly suppress the smile and the desire to ask, “When did you, son, be born?” Maybe somewhere in the nineties. They have grown up, too. Absolutely adult people. Even though the nineties were yesterday...
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The eighty-nine was yesterday too. The officer was also young. My fellow man. He stopped me for excess speed. I had little driving experience.
What a car! Especially for inexperienced beginners drivers such were purchased then. Old, strong, big - and beating is not unfortunate, and safer. They were robust, but the reliability of these old keys did not differ. Shortly thereafter, the front wheel fell off. While making it back, they tricked to somehow disconnect the spidometer. So, with what speed I was driving, and even from the mountain, I have no idea. Probably not very large. (Who knew her, how strong her other wheels held there?)
Also, I remember, I was delighted that this cop was not one of my students - in a densely populated Russian-speaking emigrant area, I was just at this time desperately trying to teach at least a few Russian words of police, firefighters and paramedics. All the city services were confused by this influx of Russian language, and we talked about at least short-term courses for those who had to deal with the public.
Well, real courses did not work, and some words still learned... Yes, it would be uncomfortable if a student.
Cop looked into my car, where my four-year-old daughter was sitting in a special chair in the rear seat, shaking his head - what, say, a careless mother! He gently said to the little girl:
- Baby, wait a moment, now we and Mommy will talk a little, and you will go on.
The daughter hugged a policeman's uncle, and he began to write a fine.
And so that this fine did not affect my "driving history" and insurance, it was recommended to go to a special school and sit there for eight hours. I polished a phone guide and chose one where comic actors were taught. (Life in Hollywood has its own peculiarities.) I thought, maybe it’t be so boring.
That was in vain. For eight hours, we, a group of offenders, honestly listened to how these people tried to “do ridiculously,” telling and visually depicting what could happen on the road when the driver was poorly trained, inexperienced, careless or careless. And the more they tried, the worse we became.
Per that was the point of this training. The educational moment. The impression remains simply indelible. In any case, since then, I have tried to drive very carefully and not to disturb anything if possible.
Something wrong has overcome my memories.
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“Given your perfect driving history, this time I will limit myself to a warning,” the boy in shape tells me, “and suddenly adds something very human, just don’t do it again.
I will not, I promise honestly. I really will not. If you promise something to a child, it must be fulfilled. Fuck, what kind of child? An adult man, even in execution. No matter what, the word must be kept.
Copp sits on his motorcycle and breaks so sharply that I scratch and involuntarily think that his mother is probably very worried about him. I would be worried if my son... or grandson...
I sit in the car for a moment and recover. And suddenly I realize how many people around me are very young – students, police, firefighters, paramedics, nurses and nurses in hospitals, salespeople in shops, builders... Noisy, fun, energetic, with their loud music, with their tattoos and smartphones. The world already belongs to them.
It is time for me to go home. They wait for me. Children will come to visit. Bringing a grandson.
Because I am already a grandmother.
It is just unclear when this all happened.