I was a 3 year old when we moved for the first time... and that was the last time…until I reached nineteen and I moved out from my parents’ place, to start my adult life…which was probably too early…probably too seriously… but never mind…I don’t want to talk about all of this now… I would like to talk about that day, when I was three years old, when we moved.
I hardly remember our first flat. It wasn’t even a one bedroom flat. It was a studio with a small kitchen annex and a bathroom the size of a wardrobe. My parents’ bed was next to the window, with a view of a busy street in the city centre. My crib was on the opposite side, in a quite dark but calm and cosy corner. I do not remember this, I know it from pictures… But I recollect without any problems the corridors in our building, wide, even spacious, with shiny floors and massive windows. It was a fifteen -floor block of apartments. Most of the flats were tiny so we lived almost like a commune, surrounded by our neighbours’ voices, their lives. We were a commune – quite appropriate for the time of communism… but never mind…I don’t want to talk about all of this now… I would like to talk about that day, when I was three years old, when we moved.
We moved to a one bedroom flat, with a kitchen big enough for a table and three stools. My parents slept on a sofa bed in the living room. I had my own room, which was at the same time my bedroom, my study and the room where I practised the piano. For a while the piano lid was my desk as well. I also used to climb on the piano and play with my doll. I fell off once, on to the radiator and I cut my head open and I bled badly… but never mind…
So… I was three years old, when we moved. My parents must have asked someone to look after me, but I still remember carrying a couple of light things, like a lampshade and my huge elephant-mascot which my god-father had given me. But I don’t remember any truck or any problems with the furniture which must have been too big to fit into the old, creaking lift. Or maybe the lift was too small for the furniture… but never mind…
I would like to talk about that day, when I was three and we moved. I was kneeling in the middle of a freshly painted room, purely white, with a lot of boxes and bags around me. My parents had organised our removal well so all our belongings had been put in the right rooms, but obviously higgledy-piggledy… so I knelt in the middle of my new room and looked at my toys through their plastic bags. One wasn’t inside a bag. It was my tired rocking-horse, nick-named The Horse, covered in worn and faded fabric. He was too big to fit into a bag. Or the bag was too small for The Horse. I was cuddling him as he had lost his long, black tail that day, and so I was trying to cheer him up…that’s all.
