Every morning Sasha heard her grandmother quietly recite prayers. The words were incomprehensible, only “Amen,” and “Lord, have mercy.” The grandmother stood in front of the dark icons, time after time she was baptized and bowed, and God looked at her from above, from an old board echoed with insects.
In the morning, God was ordinary and calm, and by evening, He was changing, becoming a little scary and strict. Behind this, the largest icon, there were still small ones below. There were also granny documents and front letters of his grandfather, whom Sasha did not remember, as he was born after his death. Hiding there and formidable papers with seals, which my grandmother called incomprehensible word “taxes”.
During the day, Sasha ran up to the red corner and looked up at God. He knew whether he was angry with him or not. God was never angry and never cried, although his grandmother often told him that he was weeping over our sins. What is sin, Sasha already knew. It is a shame and I wish no one would see it. He even told his friends about the weeping God, but they convinced him that God does not watch for small sins, only for large ones, and only adults have large ones. Sasha agreed, but still sometimes ran up to the icon — checked: if God cried…
When the cherries had already ripened, and Sasha and his friends were sent to the garden every day – “chasing the spakers”, that is, making sure that the cherry birds did not peck, my grandmother said: – On Trinity, on Sunday, I will go to church. I’ll buy a new icon. Father promised to bring it. We will have a beautiful and elegant God. Sasha did not know what the Trinity was, but he wanted to see God dressed up. My grandmother left for church early in the morning, on a motor locomotive (there used to be such a draught carrying people). So that no one would scare his grandson, she sent him to spend the night with his uncle. For the night the boy went with pleasure. My uncle had a son, Sashkin’s brother, although a cousin, but he is never closer. They were born in the same month of one year.
My uncle let me sleep in the attic, in the freshly cut hay. The hay was soft, smelled of thyme and wormwood. Behind the pipe, fenced off by a grid, pigeons cooed, and in the open attic door, in time to the chirping grasshoppers, distant stars blinked. For a long time the boys whispered about a new beautiful God. And also that in the morning they will get up early and go to the duct, to the bet, to catch bumpers. In the morning, the beads calmly floated in the duct, and then hid under the snags. Fishermen overslept both the first and second roosters, and would sleep further if the pigeons did not raise a terrible noise, defending themselves from the cat that climbed to profit.
We decided to go fishing, but we had to eat something. In the kitchen, on the table, under the gauze, the children waited for a blade of milk and two slices of freshly baked bread. “The sister left,” the brother proudly said, and added in a masterly manner: “Mothers have no time.” She goes to the farm in the dark. On the way to the duct and pond (local rate), anglers looked into the garden: pick a couple more sour green apples, but find in the grandmother’s garden for a cucumber. In addition to this simple provisions, their equipment was an old tulle curtain with two sticks on the sides, proudly called “delusional”.
For an hour, the two brothers were dragging their “net” on the duct stones and the viscous silt rate, but, except for an old frog and an advanced age of cancer with one claw, they did not catch anything. When there was no strength left, and the cucumbers with apples were eaten, Sasha remembered a new icon with a beautiful God. — Run! — Sasha shouted. — Grandma’s been here a long time! Did you hear the motor locomotive knock? The boys quickly shook the remains of silt with algae out of the “ravine” and rushed to their grandmother’s hut.
My brother could not reach the goal: my mother called. She was just coming back from the farm and sending her son to the salpo for salt. In those years, mothers still listened unquestioningly, so the upset brother only waved: You, Sanya, run, and I will come later. The door to Grandma’s house was already open. — At home! — Sanya was happy. Sandals flew from the boy’s feet and he, despite looking at his feet, rushed through the corridor and upper room to the hall, where in the corner, on the table under the icons, there was already a beautiful and affectionate God. It was framed under glass. In the corners of Him glowed colorful shiny flowers growing on wonderfully wonderful branches.
Sasha froze in numbness and delight in front of the icon and only after a while he heard the lamentation of his grandmother from behind: Oh, Lord, how is that? How come you didn’t crash? Sasha looked around and… understood nothing. Where he had just run, there was a one-and-a-half-meter square hole in the open cellar. Grandma’s head looked out of it. The old woman, climbing several steps up the basement stairs, looked with horror at her grandson, who flew over her and did not crash. — Onuchek, Sanechka, how did you go through something empty? — Grandma cried. Sasha stood at a deep two-meter hole, looking into its black emptiness and only repeated: I ran to God, ran and did not fail.
Archpriest Alexander Avdyugin
The Holy Land Charitable Foundation
Soul investment!
Orthodox stories from life
