And now, as soon as you start talking about that ill-fated summer, the interlocutors who are “in the know” immediately come to life and readily begin sharing conspiratorial assumptions (where would we be without them) and personal memories, generously supplying them with epithets “anomalous, extreme,” even “apocalyptic.” What’s more, the ordinary interlocutors – the most respectable learned men enthusiastically broadcast from their screens (referring to mysterious “lake deposits”) that such terrible heat had not been seen in Russia for a thousand years.
“And one can even say that nothing like this has been observed here for more than 5 thousand years!” they corrected themselves somewhat incomprehensibly.
It was easy to believe them, especially if you looked at the room thermometer, where the red stripe was approaching almost the very edge, and also out the window: the city stood, completely immersed in a thick smoky haze, and despite the weather report that “the weather today is sunny,” there was no sun in the sky at all. After two months of unprecedented heat and complete lack of rain (only frequent dry thunderstorms thundered), the city found itself surrounded by raging forest fires. Smoke actively blew from the Meshchera peat bogs, and the streets quickly filled with heavy smog – it became almost impossible to breathe. Masks and oxygen cocktails disappeared from pharmacies, not to mention the necessary medications in such cases, and everyone who could, hastily left for more prosperous places.
My closest friend Olga and I, along with her mother Vera Ignatyevna, went to Arkhangelskoye to “save ourselves” – there the “wind rose” helped disperse the smog somewhat. Vera Ignatyevna sat all day on the river bank under a willow bush, and we plunged into the transparent, life-giving coolness from time to time, and all three of us, as if it were the greatest happiness, were looking forward to the trip to St. Petersburg planned in the spring.
– It should be easier there! There we can wait out this terrible anomaly, – we encouraged each other.
That day finally approached – grabbing our suitcases and throwing a bag with a fan over our backs (there was no air conditioning in the rented St. Petersburg apartment, and in general they started installing them everywhere after that summer), we went to the station to catch the night train. It was total hell on the platform: the smog made it impossible to see a thing even at arm’s length; the lanterns floated out in blurry spots one after another – and the warning horns on the tracks and the loud station announcements sounded somehow alarmingly, like a military alarm.
The St. Petersburg morning nevertheless greeted us with the familiar smell of smoke – the climate disaster had not bypassed it either. Fortunately, the local fires were not comparable to those in the Moscow region, and the sea coast played a role, which helped us to fully complete the planned pilgrimage program – to go around and bypass almost all the significant holy places, right up to the suburbs, and also to visit Kronstadt. Crossing the Gulf of Finland even looked somewhat fabulous – the road connecting the island with the mainland, and the gulf itself were practically invisible because of the smoke, and it seemed as if the bus was running right across the sky, dispersing the gray clouds before it. We returned two weeks later to the same Moscow languishing from heat and smog, and the conversations in the carriage were the same:
– Have you heard that the fire was even approaching the Sarov nuclear center? God and Saint Seraphim helped – they managed to defend the strategic facility!
– They write that the smoke from our fires has already moved towards other continents… and the smell of burning has crossed the Arctic and reached North America…
– And I’ll tell you this: a dome of motionless air heated to 40 degrees hangs over Moscow and the surrounding areas, which has never happened in our latitudes. The influx of cold and moisture from the Atlantic is somehow blocked, which causes heat unprecedented in the history of these places… You ask: is this a coincidence? No, I’ll answer – this is a man-made climate weapon, which is now acting completely purposefully! And don’t smile – I’m telling you the truth!
– Oh, come on, no one is going to dispute it – there has been talk for a long time that climate weapons exist, but we haven’t quite learned how to work with them yet… Remember Hurricane Katrina? According to some scientists, the Americans wanted to flood Cuba then, but they miscalculated a bit and flooded their own New Orleans…
Meanwhile, July was drawing to an end, the feast of the Prophet Elijah was approaching, and His Holiness blessed that on this day all Moscow churches should serve prayers for rain. August 2nd also fell on a Sunday, which meant especially crowded prayer. Vera Ignatyevna, who was a parishioner of the Church of the Deposition of the Robe in Leonovo, persuaded them to go to their service:
– The temple is in a dense park, it will be easier. And after the prayer service we will sit by the pond – at least some semblance of shade and coolness…
There really were quite a few people gathered – they stood in the courtyard, under the birches, listening to the service through wide-open windows and doors. After the liturgy, they brought out the banners and walked around the church, stopping at its four sides to read the Gospel. The priest did not spare the holy water, with inimitable zeal sprinkling his parishioners, who were immensely grateful to him for it.
– Look, look, the old lady is holding an umbrella, – two boys giggled nearby, nudging each other with their elbows and pointing with their eyes at a thin old lady in a loose light dress and an openwork blue beret. In her hand she was holding a small bag and a cane umbrella.
“Well, that’s just foolishness,” a middle-aged man said to someone solemnly, stepping on the heel of a gaping boy. And after thinking, he added:
– Saint John of Kronstadt went to such prayer services with an umbrella, but can our prayers be equal to his prayer?
The neighbor seemed to share this opinion, and they exchanged a few more words, being sure that the ancient old woman, of course, would not hear them. But she heard them and, turning around, said quite peacefully:
– As for me, why go praying for rain without taking an umbrella with me? Besides, my dress is made of thin fabric, it will get wet in no time in the rain, and I will look indecent. No, I absolutely cannot go without an umbrella!
– But it is impossible to think that God gives us His blessings because we pray to Him for them! He gives them solely by His mercy, and He knows about our needs even before we ask. So how can we expect that we have prayed, done, so to speak, the necessary work, and then immediately expect a result, a reward for our “labors”! – the man said, restraining the notes of noble indignation in his voice. – This even smacks of insolence, at best, of excessive arrogance. And we pray in order to express our love and hope to Him! And the confidence that He will give us everything we need – in due time, when it will be most useful for us. But to expect what you ask for this very minute, immediately – forgive me, I don’t know what this is!
“Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness,” the old woman answered mysteriously and disappeared into the crowd that had crowded her.
After the prayer service we went to the pond and settled down near an old spreading birch tree, spreading a light rug on the long-dried grass.
– Mom, what do you think the old lady meant when she said that Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness? What did this mean in the context of their conversation? – Olga asked, taking a thermos, plastic cups and foil-wrapped cheese sandwiches out of her backpack.
“Well, you are the one who constantly reads theological literature, so share your opinion with us,” Vera Ignatyevna answered her.
– Reading doesn’t mean understanding everything, but I can reason. Apparently, she meant that we are justified not by deeds and merits, which we really don’t have, but by faith. Faith, that is, trust in God, does not disgrace – as the apostle says. But the man was also right when he claimed that it is impossible to “demand” anything by prayer and one’s “deeds,” and that one must simply trust in His Providence. It turns out that both were right – what were they arguing about then?
– Did they argue? Maybe they didn’t argue at all, but simply tried to believe in a miracle, in God’s mercy – each in their own way.
There was a rumble overhead. It was not worth paying attention to, since everyone had long since gotten used to the deceptiveness of such thunderclaps. Sometimes lightning flashed, quite frightening, but that was all. But suddenly a large heavy drop slapped onto the foil. Everyone fell silent and looked at the spot. The second drop fell right on the top of Olga’s head, and she even touched it for emphasis. The third, fourth, fifth hit the surface of the pond, greatly decorating its stagnant, boring surface with small diverging disks. There was another rumble, this time very close, and then it rolled with multiple, receding echoes, as if a huge invisible chariot had actually sped across the sky… The drops multiplied before our eyes and accelerated their movement.
“Roll up the tablecloth – it seems we won’t be able to have any coffee here!” Vera Ignatyevna exclaimed in a trembling voice and began to put the thermos back into the backpack. Olga helped her, excitedly stuffing sandwiches and cups in there.
The thunder came even closer and more loudly, and then it cracked so loudly that the ducks, who had just been languidly playing by the shore, began to quack excitedly and quickly swim off somewhere, energetically working their paws and flapping their wings. The rain, as if freed from a long captivity, fell like an avalanche on the pond, on the park, on the golden church domes glittering in the distance.
– Let’s run to the bus stop – I don’t want our dresses to get soaked to the skin, we’ll look indecent! – Olga screamed joyfully. – And we still have to ride public transport!
They hurried to the bus stop – they hurried, in general, for the sake of decency, because grown women can’t have fun and dance in the rain, even if they had to wait for it for almost two incredibly difficult months. A large flock of happy people had already gathered under the glass dome of the bus stop; children were running around, squealing and jumping in puddles, and no one stopped them or invited them under the roof. The rain was pouring down, transparent rivers were flowing along the asphalt, women were standing with sandals in their hands. Everyone was chatting animatedly. The bus arrived – with a fogged-up windshield and open windows, from which blissful smiles shone, hands were stretched out to meet the downpour.
The sky began to noticeably clear, the sun flashed – gentle, affectionate, immensely desired. A wet smell of smoke hung in the air, as if on an extinguished fire, but it became noticeably easier to breathe, and a timid hope was born: this is a turning point. The downpour sometimes died down, then broke out again; it went on at night too. I didn’t want to sleep, I just wanted to listen to the patter of raindrops outside the window, and it was touching to tears to hear how on one of the neighboring balconies a male bass, without embarrassment, loudly and happily, said:
– Rain! Rain! Rain!!
The next two days were again muggy and dry, but on the third day it started raining again. The temperature dropped noticeably, the smoky smog gradually dissipated – the persistent battle of the capital’s “firefighters” with the Moscow region fires also bore fruit. A week later, the climate returned to normal, and the usual August weather set in.
Elena Deshko
0 комментариев