“Well,” the psychoterapist drawled sorely and after a short reflection he added, “You are right, the human is first of all a consumer of various goods of civilization and just a small part of the chain of their reproduction. And if there will be nothing, what will happen then? He will not be able even to build a house. Because apart from theoretical knowledge you need also a bulk of inventions of civilization such as bricks, cement, nails etc. Otherwise…” Nikolai Andreevich shrugged his shoulders.
“Otherwise only a hut or an earth-house,” Sensei joked.
“Right, it will be a cave in the best case,” Nikolai Andreevich kept up his joke. “If to analyze in details what can a modern man do if he happens to stay face to face with the nature? Nothing good, indeed.”
“That’s true… And some especially lazy individuals even have no idea about elementary things, for example, how and what can be grown,” Sensei said half in jest. “Their food ‘grows’ in shops, already nicely packed. What can be said else about it?”
Having heard it I started to ‘fit’ what was said to my person. I tried to quickly recollect the experience of my family when we lived in the country and what and how my mother grew in the garden. And in general what I know how to do in this life and what not. There were so many gaps in ‘elementary knowledge’ that I was scared. And I decided to fill all these gaps as soon as I can. I planned to ask the elder generation how they managed to survive during the war when there were severe conditions, hunger, ruins. And I aimed to take part in all possible activities in our cottage works and really to learn all those ‘elementary’ things, according to Sensei. Because one thing is when you are forced to do something and quite another when you burn with the desire to learn.
Our “sages” again laughed on their jokes and then Sensei suggested: “All right, doctor, that’s enough to talk about “sad things”, let’s go to swim.” And having looked at the location of the sun in the sky he added in philosophical manner. “While we have such an opportunity.”
3
Having swum enough, Stas and Eugene decided to make a voyage on water with their air-bag, to dive with aqualung and to fish if possible. Volodya and Victor eagerly accompanied them. Having prepared the air-bag and having loaded it with fishing-tackle, they rowed along the sea coast towards the fish-factory. The others fully saturated their desire to swim, combining long-term swimming with short rest on the hot sand. Sensei and Nikolai Andreevich mostly preferred “sun baths”, after that they swam far in the sea where our young guys didn’t dare to swim.
The rest time flew by invisibly. After one of the swims our guys blissfully stretched out on the sea coast. Having created a few small sand hills they improved their creativity and made up to form a simple sand sculpture from different parts of their bodies. Kostya, Ruslan and Slava became ‘victims’ of this grand idea, or to be more precise, their heads, arms and legs. While making a ‘sculpture’, the raising creative appetite and wild fantasy inspired them to decorate the ‘monument’ with plates, spoons and forks, clothes, as well as with the gifts of nature such as rush, seaweed, sea shells and thin local plants. As the heads of the ‘monument’ were fixed in their position during our creative activities, all the time we had to water them, to feed, to scratch their noses, cheeks, to keep off flies and other insects which used this opportunity and tried to climb them like curious tourists climb the mountain of Kilimanjaro. Finally after the painstaking work accompanied with the non-stop laughing we have got, according to Andrew, a ‘mutant of unknown origin’ instead of the planned ‘three-heads-Dragon’ from a fairy-tale. When we were giving the final touches to the decoration of our ‘beautiful creature’, one of his ‘heads’ (bearing the name of Ruslan) noticed Stas and Eugene running far alongside the sea coast.
“Oh! And where is the air-bag?” wondered the most ‘sharp-sighted head’ of the ‘three-heads-Dragon’. “What’s wrong with them?”
The “head” bearing the name of Slava extravagantly decorated with its ’hat’ lazily turned to that side, hemmed and added, “They must have forgotten something.”
And lastly the third ‘head’, the most wise one (bearing the name of Kostya), which was located between the two others and according to its status was ornamented with the super-turban made by Tatyana from a roll of toilet paper, uttered prudently, “If they had forgotten something they wouldn’t be running with such a speed.”
Indeed, judging by the hurry of the guys one couldn’t say that they were running with a slow speed. Moreover, the absense of Victor and Volodya as well as fishing-tackle obviously showed that something has happened to them. All our attention concentrated on the senior guys.
They reached our camp and started to restore their breathing after the speedy run looking with surprise at our ‘masterpiece’.
“What has happened?” the most ‘wise head’ asked puzzled.
“Well, really!” Eugene smiled on seeing the grandiose sculpture.
“Where is Sensei?” Stas questioned in reply to our question.
“He is over there,” Andrew pointed out to the sea where two heads were seen in the waves from time to time. “They swam far with Nikolai Andreevich.”
Stas and Eugene turned their heads to the sea looking far away. Without thinking twice Eugene put on his fingers to the lips and started to whistle loud towards the sea. The sound was so shrill that Andrew even shrank back from him laughing and rubbed his ears.
“You should have warned us. This is the best way to become deaf.”
“What has happened?” Yura joined our inquiries.
“Have you damaged your air-bag? Or didn’t master the current?” the ‘sharp-sighted head’ uttered with some acidity.
“We hope there were no victims,” the ‘wise head’ finished the phrase of his ‘confrere’.
“Nothing has happened,” Stas answered all the questions at once while Eugene has been artistically whistling. “The air-bag is alright. Everybody is healthy and alive, the same we wish to you…,” Stas looked with a smile at heads of the guys sticking out from the sand with their ‘scattered’ extremities. “We have just found a dolphin on the sea coast.”
“A dolphin?!” I and Tatyana exclaimed almost together.
“Yes, a small one,” the guy showed with his hands the size. “About one meter and a half.”
Our group got excited.
“Wow!”
Meanwhile Sensei and Nikolai Andreevich swimming far from us glanced back and Eugene gave them a signal by waving with his hands. The men started to swim back to the sea coast.
“Was a dolphin alive?” Andrew inquired.
After completing his duty of a ‘radio beacon’, Eugene immediately joined our conversation.
“No… a dead one, with a wound in his side. A fresh wound. It bleeds still.”
“Faugh,” Ruslan said with disgust.
“Well,” Eugene continued to spread hot news, “it’s a distressful sight.”
“Who has done it to him?” Slava asked with sympathy.
“There were some ‘nature-lovers’,” Eugene replied with black humore, “Just look around, there are so many maniacs on the sea coast. They are looking for a victim…” and he added looking at the locked position of the guy dug to the sand, “especially for a helpless one.”
“Well, well,” Kostya grinned together with us. “You will tell us stories! As they say, ‘don’t let you dupe by the professionals’.”
Eugene