17-IV-1996.
Seeing how the birch in the back still has no leaves, this was probably shot at least ten days earlier.
The legendary pic of Lena. She just loved the way her bottle and pacifier smelled, didn't really keep them around for any other reason. This is where she's enjoying it to the fullest - both sources of smell under her nose, legs on the table, shades...
The table was improvised, I just put together a few planks and connected them with a couple of thinner planks, and laid them on two pairs of siporeks blocks. The garage behind the farther birch belongs to Juliška, and the arced terrace too (whose roof will fall one day, because it stuck to the wall by mere fricion). The sheds to the left belong to that mason who had a flying pekineser dog.
Our house is, of course, unfinished, which is why the concrete mixer is always at hand. Unusable quite, though, because its engine just wouldn't run. Took it to majstor Saša, or to some other guys, who mostly did nothing, we just stopped using it. When I needed to put some concrete somewhere, as a rule it was something small, which I'd mix by hand in the wheelbarrow. A staircase down the hill from the terrace, or at the main door, or to the basement. Couldn't do more than one step a day, as each step had to lean on the previous one anyway.
The handle of the hammer on the tabletop got smudged with soot while we were messing with the heating kettle in the basement. That hammer is among the tools which we include in the „this built the house“ list.
There's another chain of events, a bit long, as it dragged over multiple days with considerable pauses, and it happened just about now, or in one of the following two years. (nope, look up 25-V-1992., and it's two stories - the one about paperwork was then in 1992 when I got that hand-written one, which was washed and shrunk probably in 1997 or 98, I visually remember the washer being in the new house, in Johan's room)
My personal card, aka ID, had expired. Not exactly expired, it shrunk. That ID I took out in, I guess 1988, and it was a special specimen. On the form with which one requests a new ID I could choose the language in which it would be (could have selected it to be in, say, romanian), and in the case of serbian, the alphabet as well. I ticked the cyrillic. Now they, by law, have to produce the ID the way I selected, but the fuckup is that nobody sane ever asked for anything but latinic. Maybe post office still had some forms printed in cyrillic, the health system too, here and there... but everybody knew they're filling it in with a typewriter, and there were no cyrillic typewriters in existence. Okay, there was one in the children's dispanzer, some pre-war Underwood; the other one in kombinat's library was long lost without a trace.
But I got what I asked for. What was preprinted, was in cyrillic. What the cops should fill in, was written by hand, in some special indelible bluegreen ink. Someone took my request seriously, just as much as I seriously held to the idea that the state should deliver what it promised, whatever I choose from its offer.
And how do I know that the ink was indelible? Well, the ID was forgotten in the pocket of my jeans, and got washed with them. The paper survived, the photograph didn't get glued to the next page, and the ink was intact. It's the cover which perished. I don't know what was it made of, it seemed like some thin pressed leather, which shrunk, after washing, to the size of an overseas postage stamp.
I could keep using it, but it wouldn't last without its cover. Too bad I didn't take a shot of it, because later even I found it unbelievable that the cops, even if it was one sole clerk in there, even if it was someone who knew me (Susjetka and Dragica come to mind), would invest so much effort to write it out so neatly. But okay, new request, new ID it is. I filled the form, went to the matricular office, got out a new birth certificate (which is, since recently, valid only six months, even though it's only a copy of the data from the book of the born, it now, a new invention, has to contain the latest data), and asked for a copy of my record in the book of citizens. The clerk says right away „you are not written into the book here“. I told her I was, „that was taken care of back in 1972“, because I clearly remember the procedure of 26-VI-1972., I ain't gone senile yet. She said „that's impossible, your year of birth was not registered here, you need to bring the certificate from the place where your father was born“. Come on, I did that already, and it was all settled back then, you have me in your computer already, just look me up, bet you anything that you'll find me on first try. Nope, she's not listening, just repeating that it's impossible, period. So I went home with unfinished business.
Called dad, told him the whole story, and he called someone in Zajač, they all there live within 200m from the local community office, so one of them went there, got me that certificate of not registered, sent it to dad. Not a week later it came, so I went, paid the citizen registration fee, order of magnitude two packs of cigarettes, took it all there and she starts entering my data and bang, there it is, can't register me because I'm already registered. Look at that. Well, what did I say...
And so I got that new ID, guess it was already my fourth. But this was not the end. During one of the coffee breaks she talked about this with Tereza, who then took a firm stance that the administration is at fault here for charging me registration without need, that should not remain so, I should ask for a refund. Ah come on, when was the state giving money back... Never mind the, she will do it herself. And she started the procedure, which eventually worked. It took a couple of months, though, and the amount was reduced by about a half pack (guess the cost of their virman), but there, I got the money back from the state..
Mentions: 26-VI-1972., 25-V-1992., june 1996., 15-VII-2024., dispanzer, Dragica, Jelena Sredljević (Lena), Juliška, kombinat, majstor, siporeks, Tereza Mazek, virman, Zajač, in serbian
5-XII-2013 - 10-III-2026