A YEAR OF MAYS (not willie)

When I was growing up in the USSR, early May was some kind of Holy Week – every other day was a holiday:

May 1 – International Labor Day, with May 2 thrown in for hangover treatment, which most times covered May 3, too

May 5 – Printed Press Day (commemoration of the date when Pravda sold its first print ad)

May 7 – Radio Day (when Russian Engineer Popov, inspired by Marconi, built the first Russian radio).

Finally, May 9 – Victory Day (when Nazi Germany surrendered).

The red from the pages of the wall calendar diffused on other pages, turning the whole period into a nonstop celebration.

And this is how my generation perceives life in the good old U of SSR: holiday after holiday with no school or homework. Why couldn’t all life be like that?

And it could, with parades and balloons and sunshine going on nonstop. Nothing but May all year round. No, the Soviet government of my day was not perfect. They would mismanage economy and invade other countries and shut up anyone who disagreed with them – in modern parlance, they were overly macho. They just needed some sensitivity training – not the Strategic Defense Initiative. They could be reasoned with and, had it not been for Ronald Reagan, they could transform peacefully and allow Led Zeppelin and Levi Strauss to be sold openly – what’s wrong with that? But Ronald Reagan and his capitalist buddies had to come up with Star Wars and Evil Empire rhetoric, and now all we can do just sigh nostalgically at this cavalcade of May holidays.

Fortunately, American people changed their minds soon enough and elected Barack Obama, who could not be more anti-Reagan and quickly disposed of RR’s legacy. But you cannot enter the same river twice. The current Russian government is too deeply involved in Ukraine and Syria, and especially in Panama, to return the first week of May back to its full former splendor. So let us just Sign Wistfully and down a healthy shot of whatever is on sale for The Way We Were in May