A middle-aged woman, 25 years old, came in. What a piece of work. Literary crones and old men (4 photos)
The main idea of the creators of “Moscow Doesn’t Believe in Tears” was expressed by the main character of the film, Katerina. And I want to remind you of Pushkin and his “Eugene Onegin”.
And by the way: Larina is a simple, but very sweet old lady; (Chapter three, article four).
Has anyone ever wondered why Larina, although simple and sweet, is still an old lady?
But this has always confused me.
(Chapter two. general acquaintance) About the future “old lady”: ... at that time her husband was still fiancé, but out of captivity, she sighed differently.
…. (who) was an important dandy, a player and a guard sergeant.
Like him, she was always dressed in fashion and to suit:
But, without asking her advice, the girl was led to the crown.
And, in order to dispel her grief, the sensible husband soon left for his village.....
I assume that if Pushkin does not report any activities of his spouse (except for a well-fed village life) after marriage, then he already had a military rank (it takes a fairly long period of time to achieve) and therefore I conclude that he could be about forty (m .b. and more) at that time.
Humble sinner Dmitry Larin, the Lord's servant and foreman (!)... (epitaph).
Well, the wife was clearly younger and perhaps even much younger. Therefore, rather, “without asking,” the girl was led to the crown, as if she had done something out of invented love, having read novels and heard a lot of nonsense from her Moscow cousin; It’s not for nothing that the sergeant hangs around. I think that the girl was not even twenty (or perhaps even younger) years old.
Life in the provinces, especially in the countryside, erases many conventions, simplifies thinking (why put on display in clothes, manners and words, there is no one except us, everyone is our own and the same, so why stand out), all human life comes down to the optimal minimum of the most necessary (and in peace: plenty of food and sleep, there are no restrictions on where and why to rush, hurry) circle (set) of operations (everything happens today - like yesterday, and tomorrow like today; for some, closed, in its everyday life it is a circle, but this is real life). Purely from her observations, she came to the following conclusion: for a woman to age very much, so much so that those around her see her as an old woman, it is necessary that either life in general be unbearably difficult, harsh, and hopeless despair/hopelessness (hope still softens wrinkles, a quiet smile) or a momentary terrible blow to the central nervous system - somehow suddenly a severe illness or terrible news/message (awareness of the hopelessness of the situation). But Pushkin describes to us the everyday life of the Larin family, which is simply enviably prosperous.
…. and finally renewed her dressing gown and cap with cotton wool... the wife had just grown fat from a well-fed and measured village life, she exchanged her narrow corset for warm underwear, and a transparent peignoir for a cotton night robe. A normal decision, very correct for life, where one boasts of other successes, opportunities, and acquisitions. Moreover, ... her husband loved her heartily and was not included in her plans. He believed her in everything blithely, and he himself ate and drank in his dressing gown.
I don’t know where, but for some reason I know that at the time of meeting (the reader) Onegin, Tatyana was about nineteen years old, and Olga was a little over sixteen. Not complicated arithmetic calculations, even approximate ones, and it turns out that Larina (their mother, by the way, about the name: Pachett - Praskovya???) was about forty (or maybe less). Why, at the time of meeting (the reader) Onegin, does Pushkin think of her as an old woman? In the novel, he admits that he himself is about thirty (chapter six, description of the duel scenes) and does a thirty-year-old man, a lover of women, really see forty-year-old Larina as so ancient? I suppose that the factor of lack of gloss, brilliance, pride and arrogance was at work, and, naturally, the outfits of “provincial simplicity” were out of fashion and time. Perhaps its metropolitan counterpart, a sort of secular “Grandecobra”, would have made a completely different impression on the guest???
When we now use the expression “Balzac age,” we constantly forget that we are talking about a woman over thirty, and not fifty I have always understood the “Balzac age” as in Balzac.))) And the word “nymphet” is misunderstood, calling that, for example, 15-year-olds and older.
klavir The other day I specifically checked that Smerdyakov is Karamazov’s brother, not a word at the beginning of the book When did I argue with this?
But, by the way, you can guess there.))) I guessed it myself, I remember.))) "At the fence, in
nettles and burdock, our company saw Lizaveta sleeping. Having a good time
the gentlemen stopped over her with laughter and began to joke with all possible
uncensorship. It suddenly occurred to one young bark that it was completely
an eccentric question on an impossible topic: “is it possible, they say, although whoever
be that as it may, consider such a beast as a woman, at least now, etc. ". All
with proud disgust they decided that it was impossible. But in this group Fedor happened
Pavlovich, and he instantly jumped out and decided that he could be considered a woman, even
very much, and that there was even something of a special kind of piquant here, etc., etc.... still with excessive gaiety, and finally everyone went away on their own
Expensive. Subsequently, Fyodor Pavlovich swore that then he, too,
left with everyone; maybe that’s exactly what happened, no one knows for sure and
never knew, but after five or six months everyone in town was talking to
sincere and extreme indignation that Lizaveta is pregnant,
they asked and sought: whose sin, who is the offender? And then suddenly
a strange rumor spread throughout the city that the offender was this very Fedor
Pavlovich...rumor
pointed directly at Fyodor Pavlovich and continued pointing. ... They baptized and named Pavel, and by patronymic
Everyone themselves, without decree, began to call him Fedorovich. Fyodor Pavlovich
contradicted everything and even found it all funny, although he struggled
continued to renounce everything."
I’m reading Russian classics...
16-year-old Pushkin wrote: “An old man of about 30 years old entered the room.”
Tynyanov: “Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin was older than all those gathered. He was 34 years old - the age of extinction”
Marya Gavrilovna from Pushkin’s “The Snowstorm” was no longer young: “She was in her 20th year.”
“Alas, Tatyana is not a child,” the old woman said, groaning. This was said about Tatyana Larina’s 36-year-old mother
Chekhov Literature teacher: “At the wedding of her younger sister Manyusya, 18 years old, her eldest sister Varya had a hysteria. Because this eldest was already 23, and her time was running out, or maybe it had already passed...”
This list of quotes can be continued and it would be very funny if it weren’t so sad. After all, on February 9 I am 39 years old.
Probably, unlike the classics, today is the time of youth. I don't console myself, I look at life. How many people are 40 years old, unmarried and still students who have not experienced work in their profession?
There are a lot of young people in my life, but for others, this is an indicator of a lack of seriousness. But recently I watched a film about an Egyptian desert monk, the film "The Last Hermit". The monk said that a Christian's life with God and his life as a monk is the path from pride to humility, from independence to dependence and from adult to child.
The other day I talked to a 14-year-old boy and said that he was a wonderful age, and he answered me the following: " I also see that my classmates think and look older than their age, but in a bad way. Of course, I don’t care what a person thinks about, but their behavior and disrespect for others is simply darkness. And 40 years old is not old now! It's like 20 years now! You look young at your age, some people don’t look that young at 24, honestly. I liked the way you said: “It’s easy for us, because we are who we are and I have complete trust in you in everything!” Indeed, a wonderful idea, just like a quote from ancient authors! It's easy to be yourself when you don't have to hide and hide. "
But my 14-year-old namesake made me happy. For me, at the age of 14, a 30-year-old already seemed as old as a dinosaur) Now about a 70-year-old, I won’t say that he is an old person, he is just elderly. After all, if I’m 70 years old, how can I call myself young and old!)))
And yet, not a small part of life has been lived. If I lived from scratch, would I change anything or not? I probably would have lived these 39 years the same way. All my life I had to hide something from others. From the age of three, I was forbidden to talk about my gift so as not to be ridiculed, during my school years I was forbidden to hide my faith in God, when atheist wall newspapers were hanging around the school. I secretly come to the Boriso-Gleb Cathedral, and there my Latvian language teacher is hiding from me behind a column. And I’m happy, like two criminals now connected by blood)))
Man is not the master of his own destiny, only God is. I really wanted to be a doctor at the age of 16, to have a family, children, at least from the age of three I knew who I would be and how I would live. I openly told my parents and two grandmothers this before the age of 5. Perhaps children are given the ability to see their destiny and their future. I did not enter medical school, I met a monk, I became a priest at the age of 19, not without the help of that monk. And there I had to hide what I did not accept in myself by comparing the word of God and the deeds of modern holy fathers. And when the patience for silence ran out, 70-year-old people in high ranks treated me, a 21-year-old man, like a mad dog, they simply drove me out. Even the difference in age in human terms required dialogue as a father with an “unreasonable” son. But apparently those people knew that I was right and there were no good words to say to me except to expel me, call me names and threaten me. And then I realized that I was not mistaken in leaving them. I don't get along with people like that. At least today, from the height of my age, I would be wiser and would not flog a fever, but would enter into a dialogue to defend my interests. On the other hand, if the ancient persecuted Christians were diplomats, we would not have saints, there would only be Judases and Christ-sellers. I have never hidden my opinion from anyone since 1994. I am as I am, completely open in matters and judgments.
Christ, too, for the ossified Jewish righteous people was a criminal who violated the ancient law. Although he was a modern man of his society. But he was not understood. He came to save not the righteous, but sinners, and entered the houses of sinners. So what are those now boasting about who shout that they are more righteous and better than other unrighteous and unworthy Christians? Was Christ with the righteous? Is Christ with them? For 17 years I had no choice, either I should be like everyone else and blindly worship against my will those who are alien to me in terms of ideology, or the yoke of a sectarian.. But weren’t the ancient Christians sectarians in relation to Judaism? And in relation to the pagan Roman Empire of Maximian? Finally, justice triumphed and I became an “official Orthodox Christian” for my state. Well, isn’t it “Circus with horses” when in order to believe correctly and pray correctly, you need a certificate in a secular state separated from the Church from this very state that you are a true Christian, and not some kind of sectarian?
I know I'm far from ideal. There were, are and will be weaknesses, temptations and temptations of this world. I am a living person in the flesh and let him who is pure and holy throw the first stone at me. Today I realize that deep within me lies another 80% of what I could have done spiritually and what I didn’t do. our modern technologies are just a languor of the mind and a distraction from God. Probably God sees that today I am still weak to call for something where I would reveal myself more. I have not yet matured to this in this society and this country. But now the soul requires another transformation.
Once Vanga was asked: “Tell me, is your gift from God or from the devil?” She thought for a long time and said: “I don’t know. The main thing is not from whom the gift comes, but how to use it, for good or evil!” A lot of people from abroad contact me. There are things with which I can amaze people, and they also ask how you can see and know this. One guy once told me: “We now live in such a terrible time, when heaven is closed to God and all miracles are only from the devil and they are given for the sake of seducing people.” And here Vanga comes to mind. The main thing is how to use your gift. A computer is also a technology most likely not from God, but it can be used for the benefit of friendship, communication, spiritual teaching and knowledge. Through this thing I found my best friends, virtually came into contact with those shrines that I had not yet been able to come into real contact with.
39 years old. But I am only growing spiritually. When I grow up, then I will not have money, a computer, beautiful things, I will only have a big beard, a cassock and prayers in my head. This will probably be the greatest happiness that a person should strive for. After all, as one Egyptian monk said: "My strength is in my hardships!" My strength today also lies in my hardships. In deprivation of family, children, wealth... But there is still much that weighs on me. When I lose everything, even the opportunity to live in my homeland, then I will be even stronger. And if I had all the blessings of the world today, I would be a spiritually weak person.
Today the most precious words for me are not from old people, what am I... what... For these are flattery and control words, such control words as wishes for health and happiness in a New Year's card))) That's when a little hooligan boy will tell me: “Dude, even though you’re a pop, you’re cool and without showing off, not as boring as other adults!” , this will be a balm on the heart))) Because children are the future of our planet and they will rule us when we all become decrepit!
There is a biblical prayer whose words I always repeat: “I ask two things from You, do not refuse me before I die. Remove vanity and lies from me, do not give me poverty and wealth, feed me with my daily bread. So that when I am full, I do not deny You and say: “Who is the Lord?” "And so that the poor will not steal and take the name of my God in vain."
My Favorite Quote: " “Life has deceived me! I guess that living honestly here is very difficult and even impossible. In this case, it is in vain that we are presented with examples from the lives of foreign peoples. For others it is beneficial to be honest, but for us it is not. incomparably more severe and merciless than with mediocrity and seeking. With us, one can only suffer and grovel. I have lived through everything, even before I even begin to live. was not unhappy, he must not be very honest, and be amenable to everything. Because of this, I will never have my own family. It’s good to admire honest people from the outside, but it’s painful to force a loved one to endure everything in his own skin. I’m even wondering if it’s worth living myself? I don’t see the point of living in that terrible consciousness that honor and true nobility have no place in Russian life... No one can fix this, and at the same time it’s impossible to live honestly..."
Quod medicamenta non sanat - mors sana!
Lost trust in people was healed by death...
(Silver-free engineers. N.S. Leskov)
And I will end with my new verse
Again I feel sad and my heart hurts
I'm alone again in the silence of the night
That's enough, that's enough... I shout "Enough!"
Fate shattered my dreams
Childhood remains in the distant distance
And somehow my youth has already passed
Oh how it hurts, if only you knew
The soul of peace, no, did not find it.
Years pass, they fly like birds
The desert of death lies ahead
Come to the spring and drink water
Everywhere you look, there are only mirages.
And my heart beats tiredly and painfully
And the gray hair is already turning silver
And alone I breathe freely
But this will is like a prison to me.
16-year-old Pushkin wrote about Karamzin: “An old man of about 30 years old entered the room.” This could be chalked up to a youth's perception of age. My 15-year-old son told me when I was 35: “Dad, when I’m as old as you, I won’t need anything anymore either.” But here are the words of Yu. Tynyanov: “Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin was older than all those gathered. He was thirty-four years old—the age of decline.”
Today they are seriously discussing whether adolescence ends only at the age of 30. Would anyone dare say about 42-year-old Mrs. N, the president of a bank that provided a loan at a good interest rate: “Old woman”? The external and internal boundaries of old age on the map of life have changed dramatically and continue to change.
Currently, a fifth of the population of the most developed regions are people aged 60 years and older, and by 2050, according to forecasts, their share will increase to a third.”
This not only becomes an economic problem, but also seriously affects the age structure of employment, intergenerational relations, and the socio-cultural landscape. Using the potential of old age is attracting increasing attention from researchers, going far beyond just gerontology and geriatrics, as was the case until recently.
It is essentially impossible to give a single definition of old age, or to derive any general formula for it.
Chronological old age. The ancient Greeks considered the age of old age to be from 43 to 63 years, in Ancient Rome - from 60 years. According to the current criteria of the World Health Organization, this age is from 75 to 89 years. It is preceded by old age - from 60 to 74 years. This is followed by the age of longevity.
Physiological old age– “The final period of life, characterized by limitation of the body’s adaptive capabilities and morphological changes in various organs and systems.” The word “human” is not necessary in such definitions - they are equally suitable for animals. Associated with physiological aging is the idea of old age as a disease that can be prevented and treated. Old and new ideas of slowing down aging and extending life to 200–300 years go back to it.
Social old age- “the final period of human life, the conventional boundary of which with the period of maturity is associated with a person’s withdrawal from direct participation in the productive life of society.” Its age limits vary widely depending on culture, time, social structure, etc.
Psychological old age does not coincide with its other facets. “The tragedy is not that we grow old, but that we remain young,” noted Viktor Shklovsky. “It’s scary when you’re eighteen inside, when you admire beautiful music, poetry, painting, but it’s time for you, you haven’t managed to do anything, you’re just starting to live!” – Faina Ranevskaya echoes him and adds: “Old age is simply disgusting. I think it is God’s ignorance that he allows people to live to old age.” In the broad sense of the word, psychological old age is how the above-mentioned aspects manifest themselves in a person’s behavior and experiences. At least three aspects can be distinguished here.
It’s scary when you’re eighteen inside, when you admire beautiful music, poetry, painting, but it’s time for you, you haven’t managed to do anything, you’re just starting to live!
Faina Ranevskaya
First is associated with age-related changes in the psyche - from minor to pathological - and goes far beyond the scope of the topic of this essay. The only thing I would like to note is that the contribution of the individual here is much greater than that of the age group itself.
Second focuses on the psychological processing of everything that age brings with it, or, in other words, on adapting to old age and coping with it. Many authors have tried to typologize the psychology of old age. I will only mention the adaptation strategies identified by D. Bromley:
1. Constructive– the attitude towards old age is positive, it is experienced, I would say, like an Indian summer with a harvest festival. This is the strategy of a well-integrated, mature, self-reliant individual to accept age and enjoy life despite its finitude.
2. Dependent– a generally positive perception of old age, but with a tendency to expect help from others in providing life and emotional support. Optimism meets impracticality.
3. Defensive– emphasized independence, the need to be in action, the desire to work as long as possible, regrets about past youth. Those who adhere to this strategy do not like to share problems, tend to stick to habits, etc., directly and indirectly insisting that they are “okay” and cope with life on their own. This even shows up in the family.
4. Hostile– old age, retirement are not accepted, the future is colored by the fear of helplessness and death. Tension is discharged through increased activity and at the same time distrust, suspicion, aggressiveness, blaming others for their failures, hostility towards young people, anger at the whole world.
5. Self-hating– the same fear of old age, but aggression is directed at oneself. These people devalue their own supposedly wrong and poorly lived life, perceive themselves as victims of circumstances and fate, are passive, and often depressed. There is no rebellion against old age, no envy of the young, death is seen as a deliverance from suffering.
Although everyone, when becoming acquainted with these strategies, has associations with living people, these are only strategies, types of adaptation, and not types of people in whose lives different strategies can be combined and changed.
Third aspect– personal development. According to E. Erikson, in old age the conflict “integrity - hopelessness” is resolved. Its unfavorable resolution is despair because of a failed, unfulfilled life, irretrievably lost opportunities; favorable – wisdom, calm preparation for leaving (5th vs. 1st strategy according to D. Bromley).
Youth, taking into account how the resolution of earlier developmental conflicts encountered life, resolved the conflict of intimacy and loneliness: the ability to share one's life with another without the fear of losing oneself and going into loneliness, essentially the ability and inability to love.
Maturity– resolution of the conflict “productivity - stagnation”: a sense of belonging, caring for others vs. self-absorption. The resolution of conflicts in old age is seriously affected by the resolution of conflicts at previous stages of development. But she can be capable of such breakthroughs in personal development that not every youth is capable of.
Numbers are numbers, but where is the threshold, crossing which a person can tell himself that he is entering into it?
In essentia terms, where physical aging reaches a certain critical mass and is met with a critical narrowing of the field of employment and social demand. In today's Western (information technology) societies, the social threshold of old age is considered to be old-age retirement, but some people go to it at a decreed age, while others do not go at all.
In the language of existentia, old age is when a person feels old and builds his behavior and life based on this feeling. In itself, this does not determine the quality of the experience of old age: it develops in its meeting with the individual experience of life, the changing place of old age in social systems, socio- and ethnocultural portraits of old age and stereotypes of attitude towards it among a generation of children, etc. But one way or another, in old age, the basic facts of existence converge and are presented in a condensed form - “the inevitability of death of each of us and those we love; freedom to make our lives what we want; our existential loneliness and, finally, the absence of any unconditional and self-evident meaning of life” (I. Yalom).
About 10-12 years ago I had to counsel a person who came to me about a relationship with his friend: “I’m torn between the desire to help him and what – I understand! – beyond my capabilities, and with resentment.” His friend is a talented scientist from those who are respectfully called self-made-man, who paved the way in life and science with his own forehead, direct, demanding and categorical, a kind of romantic of uncompromisingness, which is by no means devoid of one-sidedness and fraught with conflicts. At first, this helps him and brings him to a fairly high service level, where his busyness increasingly comes into conflict with the flexibility in administrative and human relations required in his position, leading him to conflicts and periodic depression with a pronounced psychosomatic component. At 60, he is faced with a choice between a humiliating transfer to the leadership of one of his subordinates and retirement, he feels driven into a corner, chooses the second and plunges into depression, closing in a vicious circle with now truly medical problems.
Everything that he previously wanted to do and write, but did not have time, now that he has time for it, remains undone and unwritten. He expressed his attitude in a letter to my client, with whom he had been associated for more than forty years: “... since I have been silent, I have been offended and irritated by everyone and everything. This has become my worldview, I don’t share it with anyone, I just explode from time to time. I hate people, everyone is an enemy. In relation to you, my anger exploded, you are so subtle and humane, but...” followed by a tirade tearing apart the relationship in the spirit of M. Zoshchenko’s stories. It was clear that this was a kind of call for help, the possibility of the client’s response to which we discussed. The further fate of these people and their relationships is unknown to me, but my client’s phrase: “He is so afraid of death that he goes to the grave while he’s alive,” remains in my memory.
Mikhail Prishvin’s perception of old age is no less bright: “What happiness there is is to live to an old age and not bow, even when your back bends, to anyone, to nothing, not to deviate and to strive upward, increasing the annual circles in your wood.” And in another place: “I now rely not on the number of years, but on the quality of my days. You need to cherish every day of your life.” In his last autumn (at the age of 81), he gives a brilliant metaphor for his perception of old age: “Autumn in the village is so good because you feel how quickly and fearfully life is passing by, while you yourself are sitting somewhere on a stump, with your face turned to the dawn , and you don’t lose anything - everything stays with you.”
Since old age is already given to us, it is our freedom to suffer from it or enjoy it.
These days, elderly women over 70 are commonly referred to as grandmas, and are a less-than-respectful-sounding synonym for “old woman.” But in the old days in Rus', age criteria were somewhat different.
Girls, young women, women
In the 19th century, girls got married early, at 15-17 years old. At the age of 20, they were already considered “overage.” At 35, women already had adult children, and sometimes they became grandmothers. By the way, this is also reflected in Russian classics. For example, in Gogol we read: “An old woman of about forty opened the door for us.” Leo Tolstoy mentions in one of his works about “Princess Marivanna, an old woman of 36 years old.”
There is nothing surprising here. Life expectancy in those days was much shorter than now, and not everyone lived to be at least forty years old. By the way, according to one version, the word “forty” means “term.” Approximately this amount was initially allotted to the person. And then it depended on the state of health and various circumstances.
In Rus', a woman’s status has always been clearly linked to her age. So, young unmarried girls were called wenches or damsels. Young married women were called young women. After the birth of a child, a woman became a woman. Of course, this only applied to lower-class women, peasant women or serfs.
Origin of the word "grandmother"
The word “woman” itself has been known since pagan times. It is present in many Slavic as well as Turkic languages, and has always had many meanings. For example, pagan stone idols were called “women”.
There is a version that the term “baba” comes from Sanskrit. The syllable “ba” means “to live”, “to exist”, “to be”, “always”, “now”. From Old Church Slavonic “baba” is translated as “gate of life.”
However, according to another, much more popular hypothesis, the origin of the Russian word “baba” is the same as that of the words “mother”, “nanny”, “daddy”: small children simply tend to double syllables, and “ba” turned into “babu” "
Perhaps this is what the kids called the older women in the family, unlike their mothers. “Mom” breastfed them, but “woman” did not.
From the word “baba” the word “grandmother” was born. Krylov’s etymological dictionary says: “This common Slavic word is formed from the noun baba (meaning “mother of father or mother”) with the help of a diminutive suffix, but over time it began to be perceived as an independent word denoting kinship.” “An old woman, an old woman,” is how the author of another etymological dictionary, Shansky, interprets the meaning of the word.
Who were called “grandmothers” in Rus'?
So, initially, apparently, this was the name of the grandmothers, that is, the word denoted the degree of relationship. But later they began to call other older women this way. Moreover, it is unlikely that they began to be called grandmothers from a specific age. Rather, it was the woman’s status that mattered. Let's say, if she already had adult children, grandchildren, if her childbearing period had ended, then she had every “right” to be called “grandmother”.
There is also a theory that a wise, knowledgeable woman could be called “grandmother”. Traditionally in Rus', healers, sorcerers, and midwives were called “babas” and “grandmothers.” Some even managed to combine all these “responsibilities”.
As ethnographer Listova reports in her work “Russian rituals, customs and beliefs associated with the midwife (second half of the 19th - 20s of the 20th century)”, in accordance with traditions, the role of the midwife could only be performed by women who have given birth, but have already experienced menopause, not sexually active, preferably widowed. It was believed that in this case there would be no problems with “midwifed” children.
