Dulovine

In Dulovine, Kolasin, next to the railway station, there is a house that my father built almost 40 years ago. Since my mother died in 2013, we have visited her only a few times. And a house without people collapses, like a school without students, from storms and carelessness. The fence has been torn down, bushes are breaking through the ever-widening cracks in the concrete path around the house, moss has grown everywhere, the walls were once distinctly white, but now they look haggard, like after a fire... There are cobwebs and cobwebs everywhere inside.

However, as I approached that house, my heart pounded and a lump rose in my throat. I was convinced that my mother and father would come out of the house and, like every summer, they would welcome me with open arms, smiling and a little confused by the rush of so much joy.

Only there, on that piece of forgotten land, where nothing has changed for decades, my parents are alive, more alive than anywhere else. Because the building in Popovići, rebuilt after the 1979 earthquake, has nothing to do with the one where I was brought from the Bar hospital, and the house where I spent my youth was demolished and nothing reminds me of my parents there anymore. After all, neither on Gvozden Brije, where their bones rest. Only Dulovine, only the happy days we spent there together...

* * *

From that time, I remember the morning descent from Dulovin to the city, through the forest. I inhaled strongly, as if it were not oxygen but the nectar of life. The sun's rays broke through the branches, mourning the dew and cheering the grasshoppers, who were preparing to start their summer dance in the nearby, freshly mowed meadows. The strawberries, for who knows what reason, were waiting for me. Somewhere in the distance, roosters and some not-so-musical birds were crowing. Kolašin was lazily preparing for the new day downstairs... And just when I thought "maybe this is paradise", the leaves would suddenly move, first quietly, then more and more intensely. It seemed out of pure peace, like Edgar Allan Poe. I was getting more and more uncomfortable. But, the unpleasant feeling would numb the moment I felt the cause of this slightly eerie rustling of leaves on my skin. It was the wind rolling slowly towards the bottom of the forest. I don't know if the rustling of leaves reminded me of the barking of dogs that heralds bad weather, only the anxiety would last until the first houses.

* * *

We got together after two years, longing for each other. We slipped out of the Bar, agreed to avoid social networks and to "scout" current events in Montenegro. And that I, for a certain time, at least while we are all together, give up blogs. But that's easier said than done...

The whole of Montenegro was on its toes on the occasion of the enthronement of Metropolitan Joaniki.

Sometimes I have something like sympathy for that dislocated view of the people of Cetinje on themselves and the world around them, the "valley of the gods" and similar metaphors. At one point, I thought that the enthronement could perhaps take place in the Church of the Resurrection of Christ or in the Ostrog Monastery, so that those protesting calmly and with their hearts do not get teargassed or swallowed, but when I saw those obscure figures from the former government hanging around after Cetinje, and there is no one from Cetinje to see them home, then it was clear that there is no other place for the enthronement of bishop Joanikija than the Cetinje monastery, nor can there be.

* * *

I have the impression that in the synchronized action of destabilizing the country, those who suddenly thought of challenging the image and work of the water polo legend, the late Zoran Gopčević, participated. Anyone who knew, probably, the best Montenegrin water polo player of all time, had only one word - human.

He responded to the call of his homeland (such as it is) to mobilize. Among the loudmouths who at that time wholeheartedly assured us that something terrible was coming from our vampiric neighbors was the current president of Montenegro.

Therefore, Zoran did not fold his tail like many who are now moralizing, and then they hid in mouse holes, not because of the subsequent wisdom of going to an unjust war, but out of sheer fear.

He did not choose Morinj, he was sent there as an ordinary reservist. One of the elders was uncomfortable with the well-known athlete standing guard non-stop, so he attached a "bump" to him and promoted him to a guard distributor. Zoran, they say, was militarily responsible here, as everywhere else.

Has even a single prisoner in Morinje, which Montenegro, in any case, has no reason to be proud of, ever in these 30 years stated that Zoran Gopčević mistreated or hit him? As far as I know - it is not. After all, Croatian teams also played at the Zoran Gopčević Memorial. But now was the right time to attack the Montenegrin sports legend, who was not "our" but "theirs" and most importantly, he cannot answer.

I did not know Zoran Gopčević. This was told to me by a man who was with him all the time in Morinje, someone I have no reason not to believe.

* * *

Everything passes. Beautiful unfortunately, ugly fortunately.

We started and ended this summer in Podbišće, in "Eco village Ćorić". We can't wait for spring to be again in that meadow from which the stars are so close and to again feel the power of kindness and the healing power of a smile, almost forgotten in communication between people.