Сергей Огольцов – DIY Masterpiece (страница 2)

And at the next stage of the project's implementation, another pair comes into play: a crowbar and the hole it digs. To spite envious neighbors…

This is precisely what the world stands on, since the day of creation – all these pistils and stamens, pistons in cylinders, whatever… wherever you look, these two are locked together, as, basically, is in the action itself: here you go, bitch! here you go, bitch! NOW!… ahhh…

Dmytro Ivanovich chuckled approvingly at his unvarying favorite in the set pair of participants in the same invariable process, which would repeat itself everywhere.

It's hard to say why, but his preference as of a fan was constantly pinned on one and the same of the two. Perhaps it was some kind of solidarity or a certain interest with this particular part in any given pair of O and I.

Moreover, in reality, the action itself might well not even be in progress (yet or already), that is, not even taking place. Still, the slightest hint at it, just like that one, right now – the full of gusto bolt’s clicking into, evoked the feeling of solidarity, and comprehensive empathy.

Dmytro Ivanovich's fan sympathies never changed; they were markedly stable and steady.

There's just one reiterated action, but countless pairs of performers; you can't be pulling for each and every, even less you can root for both sides in a separate pair.

Freeing his mind from the initial motive for a grin, he slowly turned his gaze, and with it also the leisurely flow of consciousness, to the gray concrete in the flight of steps descending to the intermediate landing between the floors, from where it would be extended by the next one, equally gray yet going down in the counter direction, descending to a further depth of exactly the same amount – another measured half-floor, so that there, in turn, it would be extended by the next, about-turned too, going lower, in the same measure, to the U-turn of another to extend the arrived one and continue the circular rectangular helical rotation of the 10 flights of steps 'in the house that Jack built' – a shock worker in production, an innovator, a member of the trade union and the work collective of SID-123, who installed them here as demands the project foreseeing such, and only such, an unchangeable variability of the shuttle-like self-repeating process of ascent or descent. Up: forward-backward… down: backward-forward…

And so they flow, these flights, downward, all the way to the bottom, to the rectangular hole filled with the entrance door, there they led installed side by side, with a narrow span of about half a brick in between. As narrow as the outlook of the poor devil, the worker who installed them…

(Here Dmitro Ivanovich checked the free flow of his conscience stream taking a too cheeky turn. Because that Jack might well be a member of the party too. Dmitro Ivanovich prefers to not dwell on matters from the gray zone, neither gives out nor entertains any bold hints. Thoughtlessly irresponsible. No way, he avoids puns on 'mind narrowness' of a model member of our socialist society.

Not exactly a taboo by him, but simply a sensible restraint. We have everything needful for a happy life, so we don't need anything…

The staircase of 10 flights confined in the vertical shaft, just like any other staircase, epitomizes the crystal dream of a claustrophobe.

And we have no need for wordplay with slippery slopes. Natural selection never sleeps, loyalty to the prescribed standpoints and obligatory views is under strict control, both from without and from within.

Respect for the foundations is duly observed. We are proud of them, we are devoted to them, and we will never betray our most exemplary social way of life. Look into other nooks when hunting the dissatisfied!)

Because simplicity is the basic foundation of strength; any technological marvel ultimately breaks down into combinations of sticks and holes.

Yes, yes! From the faraway moment when a stick entered a hole made of the furry fist of our prehistoric ancestor, and only the sizes vary, but not the operating principle. And the fantasies of backward mythologies about three whales at the foundation of the universe, as well as the disputes of preposterously garbed opium dealers for the masses, about the consubstantial trinity and other such nonsense, are nothing more than the machinations of creeping schizophrenia paid by enemy intelligence services.

Oh well, who to convince here, in an empty staircase.

We even have a properly cultured cage here… well, the staircase one, I mean. It's not exactly terrific, but it certainly deserves a certificate, the Honorary Certificate in the socialist competition for the title of 'High Social Culture Entrance' among all the five entrances in this here five-story building.'

Vandals haven't been scratching their primitive arithmetic here (at any rate, not any higher than the third floor) for their announcements. Whose hole preceding '+' got cracked by whose stick coming after that same sign, and what awaits them after a couple of additional sticks: '='.

Plus the absolute absence of frescoes of a penis and balls, in the style of Picasso. Even though an abstractionist, he sympathized with the cause of peace and progressive change. He wished the socialist camp would grow and expand. And that famous Dove of Peace was his production, when asked by the Soviet Union. For free, by the way…

The whitewash, year after year, peacefully accumulates black dust above the painted, man-high panel of crusted paint coat climbing up from the steps in the flight. The paint (government-issue green, the best color scheme for anything anywhere), bears the inevitable, individual marks of everyday life.

Here, some irresponsible scoundrel, in a process of his home renovation, went down (or up?) to the in-between-the-floors landing and wiped his brush dry (yes, the color didn't quite match, but it's green, after all). Now, without buying a new one, he can start the paint job on the floor. With red, of course.

And over there the deep furrow in the panel’s plaster, the movers were working hard to fit the refrigerator into the cramped space around the turn from the narrow landing, in the process of dragging it (back-and-forward, back-and-forward, and so on) to to the said apartment’s door…

. . .

A usual—and recently too often—predicament occurred: Antonina Vasilna forgot that there was no bread at home, so she sent him to buy one.

No, let's be careful about 'sent'—Dmitro Ivanovich is not of those used for running errands. He's a Senior Lecturer in the English Department, after all. Sounds impressive, doesn't it?

Yes, the institute is provincial, nonetheless a rather prestigious one, decorated with government awards, and not just a mixed bag of nincompoops and bumpkins. Besides, he’s not a plain Senior Lecturer, like the other crickets in the cracks of their positions, but an SL notable for the personal academic baggage, a philological one…

And around here, by the way, such things still count, it’s not Central Asia for you, where khans and beys have been transformed into General Secretaries of CPSU Central Committees in their outlying provinces, by whose side diplomas, titles of laureate, scientific degrees, and so forth, have now become, albeit a special, still assortment of seasonal sales items, for intra-clan gifts…

For whom? Ha! They know best… Asia’s a separate planet on its own. That's who for.

So why, one wonders, should we be surprised by the stubborn resistance of Comrade Rashidov's country dacha—for half a day they were giving a hard time to a battalion of special forces troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs…

Chick-chick-chick-chick! My boys!..

Here’s 'fluffy little balls' for you… Hmm…

'The Party calls 'we must!'' and off they go, the trainloads of White Gold – hogwash and junk whoppers…

But what can you do if Big Bro doesn't get it in his thick head that a field can't produce three crops a year, no matter how many paper millions you spend on irrigation.

It can't: even if you plow it with modernized AKs…

Nepotism, from the Latin for 'nephew,' I think? Nothing near like it here—in the rest of Socialist Asia, on one-sixth of the planet—no, there's not even a whiff of clannishness. Heh!

Your parents-in-law, their brats, the godfather to yours, your brother’s relatives—you can't run away from your homies or shirk them, you're not some kind of ghoul, after all.

And, by the way, regarding mutual understanding, we can only envy the Jews: they'll always find a place for their own, even if he's a complete asshole, and even if they know full well he's a hopeless asshole, they won't abandon their own stranded. The family name like Zilberman or Goldstein certainly obliges you to find a place for the mudak…

And what about our Slavic assholes?

'Petro, have you done a stretch?' – 'Yep. So what?' – 'Well, I have too, but Ivan hasn't.' – 'So what? Shall we see to his paying his debt to society?' – 'Well, we need to get busy, I think…'

However, the phony diplomas and certificates are one thing, but the baggage is a completely different matter. You have to earn it with your head.