New Year has never passed with such a mysterious atmosphere as in childhood. And every new year we try to touch this childhood memory again, on our own or with the help of our little helpers;

Lying, baby, with a sled.All wrapped up.And look at the black sky with stars. Are you thinking? It’s probably New Years soon.

I asked Santa Claus for the game ‘Driving’. If he does, I won’t need anything else for the rest of my life.

I will be happy forever. There is nothing left to wish for. Well, except for the winter salad, of course, and chocolates with the Olympic bear.

And now the house is busy. parents put up a Christmas tree, mom is busy at the stove. ’Christmas tree, light up!’ I pretend not to see my dad hiding the extension cord behind his back.

Mom went on a business trip to the neighboring military town and ‘got’ mandarins there.Then I thought that ‘getting’literally means that he went up somewhere and got these tangerines from somewhere.

Suddenly my father, looking out the window, says: Come, look.’ I look through the black window, with double frames, between which salt is placed so that it does not fog up.

It is dark outside the window, but of course I can see sleighs and horses. How can you not see when daddy sees them?

We go out to the common corridor. Dad forgot to open the window for Santa. He returned to the room alone, my mother and I are waiting for him. I think.

‘It’s good that I remembered, otherwise Santa Claus would have entered the room. It’s scary to imagine.’

Opened, everything is fine. Waiting for the Wizard to arrive.After a couple of minutes, patience runs out, and I look through the keyhole.

It is strange, the light in the room was on, but now it is dark.And in this twilight I see a piece of Christmas tree with twinkling lights,

snow wrapped on branches, toys, part of the table and on the table … the corner of some big box and the inscription “For ru … ‘ on it!

The heart is about to pop out. You are shaking with fear, excitement and a feeling that can be called just ’Christmas magic’. At night, when everything is possible.

25 years have passed and I already started to ‘forget’ to close the window. And this feeling of New Year’s miracle came with me through my son.

I physically felt what he was going through, this whirlwind of childhood experiences.

Almost 50 years have passed, and now I laughingly tell my grown-up son how I opened the windows and pulled presents from the crazy balcony under the Christmas tree, forgetting about the curious cat there who welcomed the New Year in the cold.

About how he trained in one minute to assemble a railroad track around a Christmas tree, how he attached a bengal to a locomotive pipe and the plastic pipe caught fire.

An awful lot of black smoke poured out of it, smoking the entire room, along with the festive table, with the wild smell of burning plastic.

Now it will be the son’s turn to ‘forget’ to open the window. And I will stand in the back like a drug addict and wait for these sparkling waves of New Year’s miracle to come from my grandchildren.

And I can go back to my childhood.