My first doček, at the apartment of Zvojko on ruža. His parents went to doček with mine, into the Dom Armije (army home, previously known as officers' home). They left us with a cousin, age 18 or so.
Mostly folks from our VIII2 (well then only seventh grade)... Rencika, Dragana, plus a number of guys, whose names don't connect to any faces for at least half of them. I remember dancing with Miljka, plus Oli Boj whom I kind of knew from the school. They put her up for school shows (29-nov for the Republic day, and sometime in mid april for school's day) because she was good looking and had a voice which would carry. She'd do her imitation of Nela Eržišnik, which is now looking ridiculous, if one counts all the national and regional animosities. But then it was taken in good faith and she was a big success, which is how I noticed her. And I was there for practically each of these shows, in the accordion orchestra (of between six and ten players).
The usual setup, which I already saw on various birthdays - the main light would be turned off and a bedside lamp would be on the floor, somewhere close to the record player. We'd gather what singles we had. There was nobody in charge as a DJ, it would usually be the guy who brought most singles, but then there were breaks when the song would run out and nobody was nearby to play the next one, or someone would insist on playing the same one again. Or someone who didn't much care would just pick up one from the pile and it would be one we had ten minutes ago.
The hit of the night was "Mony, Mony", which we sort of sang while we went to visit other places... We didn't drink anything stronger than lemonade.
Around 21:30 Dragana got in some kind of a row with someone, Gradivoj perhaps (or were they an item at the time or was that later, who can remember), so she was in a sad mood for a while. Then we had some bad luck, a fuse blew - but it affected only some lights, not the music, so the party went on. An hour later some of the girls were sleepy, so I sat with Oli Boj and she leaned on my shoulder to take a nap, but some of the guys from my class were making catcalls to that, so she moved to the other end of the couch, angry. 23:55 Dragana has a nosebleed. We take her to the kitchen, cold towel to the neck, we all know the drill. A drop of blood falls on her dress, Oli Boj tries to clean it up and raises the hem, and it's already short... so they tell me to turn around. A couple of times I asked her to dance, but each time it was the same game, she tells me to dance with Đica first, which never happened. For a while I thought they were cousins.
At midnight, the all around kissing and best wishes take at least twenty minutes. Around 1:00 we realize the other gang isn't coming, so we go visit them. From the description in the diary I now have no clue where it was, just that it was an ordinary village house, and that we tipped the coathanger. Didn't stay long, perhaps half an hour. Probably somewhere between ruža and Lesnina, because after that we visit Ivka, who was then a tenant with Tejka. The weather was dry but there was refrozen sludge on the pavement, so I slipped at the entrance and by the time we were up (luckily, first floor, though above a store, so technically second) I was still gasping, as I've hit my rib cage and had to force myself to breathe. We meet and kiss Tejka and Duca (who was living on third floor, same entrance).
By the time we got back to Zvojko's place, I was still gasping so I came up later, tired, and had to lie on the bell to get some rest, as they closed the door before I got up.